When a single father to a teenage daughter learns that he has a fatal brain tumor, he takes her on a road trip to find the mother who abandoned her years before and to try to teach her everything she might need over the rest of her life.
I would watch pretty much anything with John Cho in it, and this movie solidified that for me. The combination of teen tragedy and classic road trip film line up in Amazon’s latest acquisition to grab you by the heart and shake you aggressively until you’re left crying over an ending you sort of already predicted. It’s not about the outcome; it’s about the adventure.
Mia Isaac plays Wally Park, your average suburban teenager. She’s trying to figure out her relationship status with a boy and mostly survive her deeply embarrassing single father. When her dad, Max (John Cho), forces her to go on a cross-country road trip, she rails against her angry father, not knowing he has a terminal bone cancer diagnosis. The operation has a twenty percent chance of survival, or Max could live for a year. Max takes the year (and the road trip) as one last chance to prepare his daughter for life without him. This means tracking Wally’s mother at their old high school reunion to set his affairs straight.
This movie is a two-hander between newcomer Mia Isaac and unsung hero John Cho. Together the two carry the film to great heights. Cho’s expressiveness wavers between cheesy dad to desperate man and often in the same period. Isaac’s teenager-trying-to-be-taken-seriously plays so well. For the first time around, Mia Isaac absolutely nails the angsty, angry teenager. These two stick so many beats and make so many moments work with finesse so pure it often feels like they ARE father and daughter.
It’s not all sorrow and tragedy. The middle part of the movie (the road trip) offers some light hijinks. As they gamble in Vegas or drive through the flat plains of Texas, we see the two as not just angry Daughter-versus-Goofy-Father but as two humans trying to reconnect. Incredibly, so much of the scenery in this road trip was faked in New Zealand (the director’s home country.) Texas certainly never looked more attractive.
The movie succeeds in offering saccharine, sentimental moments, and some may accuse it of being overly sweet, but you don’t start a film about a teenage road trip meets cancer story and think it’ll be “First Reformed.” The script, especially, feels particularly natural. This script sets everything up perfectly, even for a road trip film where hijinks seem arbitrary. There’s a natural cohesion to everything up until the very end.
Obviously, we can’t live in the beautiful road trip world forever. We have to return to Earth, so Max can tell Wally the truth and allow her to meet her mom. So much of the finale feels tragic because of the fun middle. So when the film derails its intended ending (set up by Wally’s narration, “You’re not going to like how this movie ends”), it feels so thorough a rug pull that the last twenty-minute gloss over brand new emotions.
The movie’s finale comes out of nowhere and creates an ending people won’t like. It’s tragic, make no mistake, but not in a sense that the script is built towards. The film’s last fifteen minutes are narrated wrap-ups for all our dangling threads. It’s done with so little subtlety it feels like a wholly reshot ending. Almost as if they were scared to go with the conclusion that feels right. It’s an ending that looks good on paper but doesn’t translate well on screen, given the balance of each character’s literal screentime.
I would still heartily recommend this movie to anyone (especially teenage girls – weird, I know.) It’s got a solid beating heart built on the natural dynamics between a newcomer and a veteran. Its script feels dynamic up until a last-minute game changer. It may dissatisfy you, but if you remember the middle section fondly, the rest can feel like a distant dream. If you’re streaming something this weekend, check this movie out. It’s leagues above plenty of other teen content other streamers offer.
Streaming exclusively on Amazon Prime Friday, July 15th
