Synopsis & Review of Missing (2023) by director Aneesh Chaganty in collaboration with Screen Gems production house, technology -based search mission!
In 2018 yesterday, there was a film titled Searching which is the work of director Aneesh Chaganty in collaboration with the production house of Screen Gems, Stag 6 Films and Bazelevs Company. It turns out that the film now has a sequel that just aired early the third week of February 2023.
Titled Missing directed by Nicholas D. Johnson and Will Merrick collaborate with similar production houses. Tells the experience of a girl who was searching for where her mother was after never returning from a vacation with her new lover who would be a prospective father continued the girl.
Synopsis
The film begins with a screening screen on a computer. The cursor moves back and forth and chooses a film containing a photo of a man and a girl together, followed by a video of a small family that is on vacation together. Shortly after that, the photo was stored in an archive.
The plot finally advanced until the present, the child in the photo and video was already a teenager. The girl named June (Storm Reid) or often dubbed as Junebug by her mother, Grace (Nia Long). June has a history of unfavorable relationships with his mother, June doesn’t like him when his mother is overprotective with him.
One time, Grace was about to travel far with her new lover named Kevin (Ken Leung) for a vacation to Colombia. June’s stupid times with that, he chose to stay at home and hold a party with his best friend, Veena (Megan Suri) and his other friends.
When Grace said goodbye, June was absorbed in chatting with Veena about the party at iMessage, and sent money through Venmo to buy alcohol drinks through the emergency fund given by his mother while he left. As soon as Uber Kevin and Grace arrived, June only saw from the window. A message appeared, ‘I love you’, from Grace.
Kevin and Grace left. June immediately asked Veena and his other friends to come to his house after qualifying for his mother’s close friend, Heather (Amy Landecker), a lawyer who was asked to watch June during Grace. But a week passed, Grace and Kevin did not return.
June tried to keep on calling and gave a message to his mother who never returned. The next day June felt nothing was wrong. June immediately reported to Heather and the authorities until the FBI also intervened. But June feels the FBI performance is too slow.
Especially after he learned that CCTV in the hotel where Mother and Kevin stay will be rewrite after 24 hours so he only has 6 hours to get the recording. June also investigated all alone by relying on several applications and intelligence.
Starting from using the Google application, Google Maps, Order on Facebook, browser history and others. He also employs a delivery service provider in Colombia named Javier (Joaquim de Almeida) to help him. The search results showed June that Kevin was not a good person.
He managed to hack Kevin’s Gmail account and found that Kevin had a criminal record and had a alias. Kevin is also suspected as a con artist of a number of women to squeeze them. This made June sure, Kevin kidnapped his mother for money. June also worked with Javier to find the last location of Grace.
Their search is nil and produces gray instructions. June tracking against Kevin also leads to a rehabilitation center which is a church. June even managed to contact one of the priests named Jimmy who became the mentor of Kevin’s rehab. Not satisfied, June finally tried to open his mother’s dating profile.
He opened it by relying on luck considering Grace’s passcode he knew. In the history of the conversation, June learned that his mother already knew that Kevin had a criminal record and it turned out by telephone, his mother also told a secret of the past to Kevin.
June thinks hard about what his mother told Kevin about his past’s secret? All of these findings were given to the FBI agent, Elijah Park (Daniel Henney) who helped search Grace. News about the abduction and profile of Grace finally smelled the media and viral, everyone now knew that Ms. June was a victim of kidnapping.
Shortly after the report was given June, Elijah received a video recording that showed that Kevin and Grace were kidnapped while walking in Colombia. June shock was not playing after knowing that, but he was aware of something that all the photos sent by Kevin were rather strange, his mother seemed unclear to show his face.
June then remembers that the woman who with Kevin is similar to one of the women who Kevin contacted through his e -mail. The woman named Rachel Page (Lauren B. Mosley). Once arrested, Rachel was confused, because according to him he was invited by Kevin to Colombia only as an actress and asked to play someone.
Being more tangled, the police apparently found evidence that Grace was not his real name. This makes people think that Grace runs away over his own will. Believe his mother innocent, the search for June became deeper even to be able to hack the path of encrypted communication between Heather and Kevin!
Unlucky when asked to information by June, he found heather was killed and the state of all files on the computer that had been deleted. As soon as the police handled the case and June returned home, he began to despair, but he managed to open his mother’s e -mail account so that he returned to find a clue, an e -mail threat.
The e -mail led him to the next instructions, namely the purchase of CCTV cameras that Kevin bought and installed in an empty house which turned out to be a family vacation house in Nevada. When it was engrossed in tracking, Rev. Jimmy came to Juune’s residence, as soon as he opened the door; June was shocked because Jiimmy was his own father, James (Griffin Team).
James then kidnapped June, investigating, James took acts of domestic violence and drug dealers so that Grace reported it and registered for witness protection so that the name was changed from Sarah to Grace. That made James want revenge by working with Kevin, his cell friend.
June was taken to his family vacation house and met his mother again. He tried to escape & managed to paralyze James. Then through a CCTV camera, he called the police through the Siri application on his cellphone that was left in front of his home computer. Grace and June survived and their stories were adapted by the TV series titled Unfiction.
Good sequel?
Comparing with the previous film, this sequel film seems better both in terms of the story and execution of the search. When in the previous film, all the instructions come from (mostly) from Facebook and Tumblr applications, then in the Missing film this time the application becomes more diverse and makes it more exciting.
For acting, the character June, played by Storm Reid, is quite good. Rarely there are stories where children are looking for their parents, most plots in this type of film must be parents who save children like in the film searching. Not to mention there is a plot twist that makes us enough to say WTF many times.
Intelligent
Getting B grades from Cinemascore and positive responses from many viewers made the script writer namely Sev Ohanian and Anesh Chaganty (the same script writer who wrote the film script searching) received praise. They both succeeded in entering Techno-Thriller in the film well.
The audience was successfully focused with the story that did not give a break for those who watch. Juune’s exciting search action is quite attention. Especially when he managed to find instructions after successfully breaking into Kevin’s e -mail account. Not to the point, we will also be made wondering what the secret of Grace is.
Next Story?
Repeating the success of the two films, most likely the second sequel will be made again; And hopefully filled with more exciting plots like this missing film. Besides being exciting, this film also provides a lot of education if we want to find someone in an emergency, supported by strong memories and good luck.
Not only that, the issue of black victims was raised; with the perpetrators is a person of white race. As we all know that black and white race has an uncomfortable ‘story’. Everything was put neatly by the director.
