Searching is, without a doubt, different!

I was originally planning to see the new Predator movie and expecting it to be average. But my subconscious told me ‘Hey Dumbie, you liked the trailer for that FaceTime Mystery Thriller. So stop watching all these terrible Cashin horror flicks and go watch some real art.’ Yeah, so don’t expect me to review The Predator, I’ve only seen the 80’s Predator and that was enough for me.

Searching is about a happy normal family until someone in the happy normal family dies. A few years later Daddio tries to bond with his kid but the kid mysteriously disappears and it’s up to Daddio to find the kid on his own while proving how far he would he go to save his child. Well, not as far as the dad from Heavy Rain, but they’re both terrible fathers. While on the subject, the plot of this movie reminded me of that game. Except this movie is actually way better than that game tries to be.

So the main character, played by John Cho, gets extremely worried about his daughter so he decides he has to delve into her unknown life and he learns that he truly knows nothing at all about his daughter. So if you’re familiar with shows like Murdoch Mysteries or Castle then you’ll probably love this movie. But the gimmick of this movie is all the shots and camerawork takes place on a computer. So mostly the only time you’ll see the characters is when they’re on FaceTime or whenever they leave their webcams on. This movie actually shows sites like Instagram, Facebook, Tumblr and a lot of Google Searches. It’s not like Insatiable where they just have to make-up a cheap knockoff because they’ve a 2 cent budget.

So for most of the movie you’ll be viewing it as if you were watching it on your laptop. I feel a bit mixed on this as I like the idea of watching a whole movie on someone’s computer screen but there is little room for change. So the only way to visually see characters interact with each other is by webcam or watching a video on YouTube. Then every other time you’re just watching someone scroll through the Internet or doing other computer duties. I’ll come back to other nitpicks later because this is actually a really good movie.

Besides being just another mystery thriller, it also felt like a bit of a character study on the dad who was getting into his daughter’s secret life, to the point of him becoming a bit unstable. I also loved the opening showing how happy these people were back in the Windows XP era and it also reminded me of the opening montage from Up. It made me feel an emotion that I thought had been ripped out of me after watching Slender Man. It’s a thriller too so prepare to have your heart pumping because there are some tense moments in the movie and I do love me some good thrillers. When done right, thrillers can get me sucked into a story and along with the music building up to making your heart want to explode.

Besides the mystery being a little bit unoriginal the movie did a good job getting me invested in this mystery as John Cho goes onto his daughter’s Mac and investigates all the social media sites she uses, contacting all her Facebook friends and making up a Excel spreadsheet documenting everything they did on the night of her disappearance. I loved the journey to solving the mystery but my other complaint is there are a few parts in the movie where they set up a particular character to be a part of the disappearance only to find out that it’s all a misunderstanding. This movie also has a Scooby-Doo twist villain but I’m not sure what to think of that and may require a re-watch. My last complaint is more of a nitpick and it’s when John Cho finds a clue the camera needs to zoom in just in case the people searching up the ending missed out on the important bit of information being shown on screen.

Besides the plot being really basic and my little nitpicks it’s actually a really good movie which shocked me at little.  It was only as I was leaving the cinema that I realised I loved this movie. If I wasn’t planning on seeing some other movies this weekend I would happily watch it again and I would give it a solid 9. Man, it’s been a long while since I’ve seen a movie I’ve actually enjoyed and if you haven’t seen it I would highly recommend it over whatever score I would have given Predator.

There you go!  A short one for all of those who think my reviews are too long! (But don’t expect this to be a recurring theme.) Hoped you all enjoyed this week’s addition of The Blog Complainer and I’ll be back next week doing the same thing I do every week – TRYING TO TAKE OVER WORDPRESS, THEN EVENTUALLY SOCIAL MEDIA AND FINALLY, THE WORLD!!!!  But that’s only if I get around to it.

Until Next Time, I’m The Blog Complainer, Signing Out.