‘Searching’ review — A thriller for the digital age

John Cho shines in Searching, an engaging and suspenseful thriller that takes place completely on a computer screen

Searching begins with a very familiar landscape with rolling hills, a blue sky speckled with clouds, and mountains in the distance. This vista is the desktop of a computer. That’s where the entire running time of Searching, like the film Unfriended before it, takes place.

For the most part, it takes place on the computer screen of widower David Kim (John Cho), a father who frantically searches for his daughter by piecing together her real-world life by learning about her digital life. While the way the movie is presented might feel like a gimmick—and the tactic has been used as a gimmick in the past—Searching quickly undoes any skepticism you’d have by using it in increasingly innovative ways.

However, the plot isn’t something we haven’t seen before. Through a breezy montage at the beginning of the film that brilliantly walks us through Margot’s (Michelle La), David’s daughter, childhood from kindergarten to high school. Along the way, through home videos uploaded onto YouTube, calendar events, and emails we learn the story of how Margot’s mother Pam (Sarah Sohn) succumbs to cancer. So much of our lives are spent online. It seems like a fitting way to throw us into the narrative.

We skip forward some years since Pam has passed, something that still weighs heavily on David and Margot. Much of the film is told through texts and FaceTime calls between characters, which is how the center of the plot gets moving. We see the familiar multi-colored tentacles of a Mac screensaver fill the screen. Soon, a call from Margot pops up. Then another. Then a FaceTime call that activates the camera and shows David fast asleep.

The next day, he’s oblivious to his daughter’s disappearance. However, like any parent that hasn’t had contact with their child for a few hours—he sends her countless texts, the familiar “hello” and “are you alright?” that we always get from our parents even as adults—he begins to worry.

From there, he goes on a digital journey from Facebook to YouCast to Venmo to try and find his daughter and piece together her mysterious life. Along the way, Detective Rosemary Vick (Debra Messing) becomes attached to the case and works with David to unravel the mystery.

At one point, David goes onto Margot’s Facebook—he recovers her password by hacking his way onto her email in a way that I’m sure almost all of us have experienced—and makes his way through her friends list calling and texting every person to figure out where she’s been and what she’s doing. All of David’s actions on his computer screen are things that we’re all familiar with. It’s one of the main reasons that the movie feels so realistic, at least at the beginning.

Searching is beautifully stitched together Nick Johnson and Will Merrick who balance the narrative with subtle hints to the horror that the internet can bring. Specifically, we journey through YouTube comments and Reddit threads as the public catches on to the case.

At one point, a girl that admits to David that she wasn’t friends with Margot posts a tearful video mourning the loss of her “best friend.” The film dissects society’s response to a crisis, both good and bad. It feels all too real.

The movie’s greatest asset is how grounded it feels. During the first half of the film, it truly feels like we’re intruding on character’s lives. However, unlike Unfriended, the format can’t sustain the narrative the movie is trying to tell.

Workarounds for the limitations of the format like surveillance cameras and live streams feel bulky in the otherwise lean plot. Even more, the film’s finale, while pleasing to some, knocks some of the air out of the film. However, Searching feels like another step further in capturing the digital age. And John Cho—always a steady hand in Star Trek and off a career-high performance in Columbus—shines as an equally hopeful and hopeless Daniel.

Searching is available to buy or rent on Amazon!