Meewella | Critic

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Tag: Nicholas D. Johnson

QuickView: Missing (2023)

Missing poster

“Mom, where are you guys?”

June

Directed by the co-editors of 2018’s wonderfully unique Searching, Missing tells a similar story and deploys the same storytelling conceit, unfolding through applications on a screen, but it suffers for the comparison. Inverting its predecessor’s story, June is an 18-year-old searching for her missing mother who disappears while on holiday — June is well equipped to investigate as a tech-savvy youth and, naturally, a true crime afficionado. Missing is less faithful to its screenlife gimmick than Searching, and the issue with this half-measure is that the whole exercise becomes a clunky method of storytelling without the same consistent voyeurism. It does deliver a more involved story with a well-executed midpoint twist, though its later revelations become distractingly convoluted. Storm Reid is believable as June, but a frequently sullen and detached teenager is a far less engaging protagonist in a medium that already distances the audience through layers of interface, clouding any emotional investment. There is enough that works to make Missing worthwhile but the inescapable déjà vu serves as a constant reminder that Searching delivered something all to similar in a more effective package.

6/10

QuickView: Searching (2018)

“I didn’t know her. I didn’t know my daughter.”

David Kim

Rarely is a filmmaking gimmick stretched across an entire film as effective as Searching’s construction solely from items on a computer screen — from FaceTime and instant messaging to web searches and streaming video — in this thriller for the social media age. Opening with the nostalgia of the instantly recognisable Windows XP desktop, we are introduced to the Kim family through a 5-minute montage that unfolds like a heartbreaking version of Google’s advertisements. This settles us into the slick editing techniques that Nicholas Johnson and Will Merrick employ throughout, creating motion in static screens through slow zooms and pans. The real benefit of Searching’s conceit is the voyeuristic sense of discovery as we learn about the missing Margot through her private accounts (an approach I have seen in videogames rather than cinema), though this exploration comes at the cost of the other characters who are sketched in only the depth required by the plot. John Cho has the most screen time but, although his strong performance elicits emotional investment, it is difficult to connect with an individual through only their screen-based interactions. Rarely can the camera sit with a character and their thoughts. The writing is as taut as any recent thriller, with frequent twists in the investigation and a satisfying, if somewhat abrupt, denouement. Searching is ideal for those who desire the voyeurism of true crime without the exploitation of a real tragedy.

8/10

"A film is a petrified fountain of thought."

(CC) BY-NC 2003-2023 Priyan Meewella

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