From the outset, director Hannah Marks’ latest work, Don’t Make Me Go promises to be a wild road trip movie. Starting with images of a nudist beach area where everyone is naked as nature intended and Wally’s screams, “You took me to a nude beach?!” as Max her father frantically and humorously tries to shield her eyes only for Wally’s scary whisper to follow in the background “You’re not gonna like the way this story ends:” . Don’t make me go tells us straightaway that it is what all road trips aim at being: unforgettable (unforgettable), memorable (memorable) and transformative. In general, the movie keeps its word on this count.
Don’t Make Me Go premiered last month at Tribeca Festival by Vera Herbert who has had Emmy and WGA Award nominations for This is Us. It follows the life of one Max Park, a terminally ill single father who decides otherwise about telling his daughter Wally Park about his death sentence. Instead he proposes — well actually bribes her with driving lessons — that she accompany him on a road trip from California to New Orleans all through an idea of going on his college reunion. There he plans without Walli knowing so as to meet up Nicole,his ex-wife in order for them to live together after max dies in future. However, being a road film nothing goes quite according to plan. As such tensions increases threatening their relationship nearly falling apart.
One thing is certain about Cho’s best movies; they constantly reveal him as an actor who can play any role and is always emotionally available when one thinks of how Hollywood should have made him become a leading man by now but has chosen not allow it yet. Without doubt, Cho shines brilliantly in Don’t Make Me Go when he takes up this character which however does not seem very new considering that he continued with music career previously.
To Wally Max seems strict; no parties, no boys, and even preparing for college while Wally still has half of high school to go. Of course it seems unfair but through his secret relationship with Annie (played with a cool vulnerability by Kaya Scodelario), Max’s motives are genuine. He walked out on Nicole when Wally was an infant so his need for order and security is reasonable.
While her debut film, Don’t Make Me Go, sees Isaac play as Wally, it is quite remarkable how she brings pain and love yet does not caricaturize an American teenager. Cho’s onscreen presence from the very beginning shows that they have a good rapport with Isaac. In fact, Cho told The Hollywood Reporter in an interview that it was the credit for bringing this relationship into being went to Isaac who “brought in that relationship. She presented it to me in the audition…[.] They had both gone through the same trauma, and that had brought them closer. That was a relationship that she presented to me, and I really picked up on it and responded to it, and we just built on that.”
This is Marks’ best directorial attempt because she presents us with a rough-edged father-daughter connection which is pure (though having its own flaws) as well as warm even if there may be lack of understanding between them. It’s almost like Park household is waiting for us to step inside as they linger over every moment with Max and Isaac making us experience their unnerving lives. The issue of love and family engages viewers throughout Don’t Make Me Go. When talking to Game Rant about this film, Marks said: “I was really excited about the father-daughter story…There’s a ton out there, especially about single fathers. I thought it was an opportunity to tell something unique, that is also universal. Everyone can relate to a parental relationship.”
In conclusion of Don’t Make Me Go movie where characters grow extensively, the ending is somehow unsatisfactory considering all these developments has been made by two main characters along the road trip journeying across several states each other side by side became much stronger eventually though they worked out their differences but still more remains unresolved between them which means they are not exactly close friends much unlike at home; Wally finally picking herself over her unattentive and insensitive crush (played by Otis Dhanji) and Max started to enjoy his life and have fun with daughter (it all climaxed in one of the best karaoke scenes in recent years), hence positioning the entire film as a coming-of-age story for both father and daughter. This is something more natural for Wally, an angst-ridden teenager than it is for Max, a middle-aged man, so Mark’s touching narrative remains effective even until its last act. In fact, it seems like one can still find out who they are – or who they used to be as it goes about Max. It’s Not Cool When Don’t Make Me Go Makes a Sharp Turn into Cheap Drama.
Don’t Make Me Go (2017) is a road movie that generally represents the course life takes – if you let it. Finally, the film’s ability to conclude successfully depends on whether people can accept that in real life events end, people pass away and sometimes there is no opportunity to turn back. It is therefore a big demand and also where Marks’ movie calls home to a very delicate situation: typically, people visit cineplexes in order to run away from their daily lives rather than reckon with or remember it may come to an end one day.
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