While the success stories of 2018 genre films such as A Quiet Place and The Nun have been the subject of headlines all across the net, there’s one smaller film that hasn’t been mentioned a whole lot by horror websites these past few weeks. This site included, we admit.
We’re talking about Aneesh Chaganty’s Searching, the latest thriller that plays out across computer screens. Starring John Cho as a father investigating the mysterious disappearance of his young daughter, the thriller began its limited theatrical release on August 24, before being expanded a bit wider on August 31. To date, the film is only playing in 2,000 theaters in its third week of release (for the sake of comparison, The Nun arrived in just under 4,000 theaters this past weekend), but the worldwide box office total is as impressive as the critical acclaim.
The budget for Searching is unknown at this time, but as of today, the Sony/Screen Gems movie has amassed $32,011,130 worldwide, as it heads into its third weekend on screens across the world. $14,311,130 of that has been made domestically, with $17,700,000 made overseas. That includes South Korea, where Searching topped the box office this past weekend.
Searching keeps expanding, quite simply, because it’s doing so damn well.
Critically, Searching is Certified Fresh on Rotten Tomatoes, with an incredible 92% rating from the collected reviews of 157 critics. The audience score on Rotten Tomatoes is also incredibly high, currently at 92%. Many have been raving that it’s one of this year’s best and certainly one of the top “internet horror films,” with Edgar Wright (Shaun of the Dead, Baby Driver) even tweeting his praise last week. “I loved Searching. Fans of mysteries & thrillers should check it out. An ingenious use of the net, video, facetimes & texts combine to hypnotic effect on the big screen. And John Cho is brilliant in the lead,” Wright tweeted.
Coming off an incredible 2017, horror has been having another kickass year here in 2018, and we couldn’t be more thrilled about it. Searching is another in a long line of recent hits, with its quiet dominance building week-by-week. It’s another reminder that horror is hotter than ever right now, both critically and financially, which bodes well for the genre’s future.
If you haven’t yet experienced Searching, you might want to get on that ASAP.
