Google Earth is great. I often use it to find that one restaurant I went to on that one street, or for dumb reasons like trying to see if those satellites ever caught me walking outside my apartment. (We’ve all tried it, right?) But Google Earth can also do some actually important things, like help you find your long-lost family.

In Garth Davis’ Lion, Dev Patel‘s adopted Saroo Khan uses the virtual mapping technology to find the mother and brother he lost in a train station in India as a young boy. The film is based on the real-life story of Saroo Brierley, who spent years looking at satellite images on Google Earth to the railway station he remembered from his childhood. After 25 years, Briarley finally found and reunited with his birth mother, brother and sister, all thanks to Google Earth and Facebook. Insane!

In the first trailer for The Weinstein Company’s Lion, debuted by USA Today, Patel’s grown Saroo begins to search for his family while remembering the day he lost them as a five-year-old. The film jumps between his present search with the help of a new friend (Rooney Mara) and the young Saroo’s journey through India until getting adopted by an Australian couple (Nicole Kidman and David Wenham).

Lion has been touted as an Oscar contender for a while now, at least if you take Harvey Weinstein’s word for it. The producer told The Hollywood Reporter last month, “Lion could get nominated for eight or nine Academy Awards.” As a dramatic retelling of a pretty unbelievable real-life story, Lion does look like a solid awards season contender. The film premieres at the Toronto Film Festival next month and hits theaters on November 25.

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