On VOD: WHO TOOK JOHNNY?

Coming to VOD tomorrow, Tuesday, April 5: WHO TOOK JOHNNY?

David Beilinson, Suki Hawley, and Michael Galinsky’s investigation of a mother’s decades-long search for her missing son debuted at Slamdance in 2014. The doc also screened at Big Sky, Brooklyn, Maryland, Chicago Underground, and Newport Beach, among other events. FilmBuff now releases the film on VOD platforms.

Noreen Gosch has been searching for her son Johnny since the then twelve-year-old vanished from his Des Moines neighborhood during his paper route in 1982. Despite being the first missing child whose photo was featured on the side of a milk carton, Johnny was never found. Hampered by regulations that necessitated a 72-hour wait period, authorities turned up no clues and instead suspected he ran away, angering Noreen and setting her on a life-long quest to discover what happened. While sensitively exploring the toll of her mission on the still-grieving mother, the filmmakers also carefully detail the prevailing theory on Johnny’s fate – a disturbing conspiracy that suggests he, and other missing children, were the victims of a human trafficking ring catering to well-connected pedophiles. At the same time, a late revelation from Noreen introduces an intriguing ambiguity that colors the entire film, calling to mind other 1980s-era scares around child abduction and abuse – day-care hysteria, Satanic ritual panic – that have nevertheless left a lasting impact on parents of irrational fear and distrust.