Searching
2018
***
Director: Aneesh Chaganty
Cast: John Cho, Debra Messing, Michelle La, Sara Sohn, Joseph Lee, Alex Jayne Go, Megan Liu, Ric Sarabia, Sean O'Bryan, Colin Woodell
When 16-year-old Margot goes missing, her recently widowed, overprotective father David delves into her digital life in an effort to assist the police to track her down. Aneesh Chaganty's gimmicky screenlife thriller tells a conventional story entirely through computer screens, smartphones, CCTV footage, news broadcast, and other digital media. It's an initially refreshing approach, but it eventually and somewhat inevitably becomes monotonous and implausible.
