David Rysdahl Archives

Review: ‘The Luckiest Man in America,’ starring Paul Walter Hauser, Walton Goggins, Shamier Anderson, Brian Geraghty, Patti Harrison, David Strathairn, Johnny Knoxville and Maisie Williams

May 8, 2025

by Carla Hay

Brian Geraghty, Paul Walter Hauser and Patti Harrison in “The Luckiest Man in America” (Photo courtesy of IFC Films)

Directed by Samir Oliveros

Culture Representation: Taking place in Los Angeles, in 1984, the dramatic film “The Luckiest Man in America” (based on true events) features a predominantly white group of people (with a few African Americans) representing the working-class, middle-class and wealthy.

Culture Clash: A man has a record-breaking winning streak on the game show “Press Your Luck,” and the show’s employees frantically try to find out behind the scenes if he is cheating.

Culture Audience: “The Luckiest Man in America” will appeal primarily to people who are fans of the movie’s headliners and movies about TV scandals or con artists.

Walton Goggins in “The Luckiest Man in America” (Photo courtesy of IFC Films)

“The Luckiest Man in America” is a well-acted character study that’s fascinating but incomplete. This drama omits many interesting details of the real-life story of Michael Larson, who won a record-breaking 1984 jackpot on the game show “Press Your Luck.” Larson’s long history as a con artist before and after this jackpot is hinted at but never fully explored in this mixed bag of a movie, which has an underwhelming ending.

Directed by Samir Oliveros, “The Luckiest Man in America” was co-written by Oliveros and Briggs. The movie had its world premiere at the 2024 Toronto International Film Festival. In May 1984, Larson (who died in 1999, at the age of 49) won $110,237 on “Press Your Luck.” At the time, it was the largest jackpot in U.S. game show history. For the purposes of this review, the real Larson will be referred to by his last name, while the characters in the movie are referred to by their first names.

“Press Your Luck” (created by Bill Carruthers and Jan McCormack) originally aired on CBS from 1983 to 1986. “Press Your Luck” was revived in 2019 on ABC. In each “Press Your Lock” game episode, three contestants answer trivia questions. The contestant who is the first to anwer a trivia question correctly earns a “spin” on a crossword puzzle-styled game board displayed on a large video screen. In each square shown on the board is either a prize (usually cash) or a goblin-like cartoon figure called a Whammy. For each “spin,” the contestant presses a button that creates movement across the board. The contestant can control when to start and stop each spin.

When the spin movement stops, whatever is shown in the square that’s highlighted at the end of that stop is what the contestant will get. If the highlighted square is a prize, the contestant will get the prize. If the prize is something such as a trip, the cash value of that prize is counted for the contestant’s total. If the highlighted square at the end of a spin stop is a Whammy, then the contestant loses everything that was accumulated in the game and has to start over until the game time ends. The contestant with the highest cash total at the end of the game is declared the winner.

The “press your luck” aspect of the game has two meanings: Contestants have to press the button to stop and start on what they hope will be a square with a prize. But the “press your luck” aspect also has to do with contestants with the spin control of the board having to decide if they should keep going with the button pushing or if they should stop, so as not to risk getting a Whammy. If a contestant chooses to stop, the trivia round part of the game opens up again so all three contestants get a chance to get control of the board.

In real life, Larson had a “too good to be true” winning streak where he kept winning prize after prize and avoided the Whammy. Did he cheat or did he find a flaw in the system that allowed him to legally win these prizes? This review won’t answer that question because many people watching the movie won’t know until the movie reveals the answer about halfway through the story. Viewers who already know what happened in real life will probably more bored with this movie than viewers who don’t know what happened before seeing this film,.

“The Luckiest Man in America” (which takes place over a few days in May 1984) begins by showing 35-year-old Michael Larson (played by Paul Walter Hauser) doing an audition interview at a “Press Your Luck” production office at CBS’s Television City studio complex in Los Angeles. Some of the movie’s production design and cinematography makes it look like it’s set in 1970s, not the 1980s. The main clues that the movie takes place in the 1980s are scenes that show 1980s-styled cars, computers and VCRs.

Michael (who has grayish white hair and looks about 20 years older than his real age) is unkempt and schlubby, with a bushy beard and and uncombed hair. Michael is visibly nervous and gives a tacky-looking plate with a hand-drawn Whammy on it as a gift to the two interviewers: “Press Your Luck” creator/director Bill Carruthers (played by David Strathairn) and a “Press Your Luck” executive producer named Chuck (played by Shamier Anderson), who is looking for authentic contestants.

Michael is not an authentic contestant. It turns out he snuck into the audition by using the name of another person named Travis Dunne, who was selected for this audition. (Travis Dunne is never seen in the movie.) The only truthful things that Michael said in the interview is that Michael is from Lebanon, Ohio, and he works as an air conditioning repairman. During the summer, he also operates an ice cream truck.

When Michael’s impersonation ruse is discovered, he admits his real name is Michael Larson. He says that he only impersonated someone else out of despertation because he applied to be on “Press Your Luck” several times but never got a response. Michael’s excuse is not accepted, so he is told to leave immediately.

But something about Michael intrigues Bill, who wants to give Michael another chance. Bill immediately finds Michael in his ice cream truck in the studio parking lot. Bill tells Michael that he can be a contestant on the show if Michael cleans up his physical appearance (by dressing better and having tidier hair) and coming back to the studio promptly the next morning. Michael eagerly agrees to this deal.

Michael’s ice cream truck (which has the company name The Magic Garvey) parked in the studio lot is a contrivance for this movie because of certain things that happen later, when his truck becomes the center of an investigation. In real life, Larson did not drive his truck from Ohio to California. He took the trip by airplane.

Michael and other “Press Your Luck” contestants are given a short tour of Television City by a production assistant named Sylvia (played by Maisie Williams), a stressed-out Brit who becomes even more stressed-out when Michael begins acting erratically and occasionally disappears from the studio set during breaks after the game begins. The other two contestants in this game are an amiable Baptist minister named Ed Long (played by Brian Geraghty) and a smirky dental assistant named Janie Litras (played by Patti Harrison), with Michael seated in between Ed and Janie.

The host of “Press Your Luck” is Peter Tomarken (played by Walton Goggins), a toothy emcee who seems like he’s a game show host because he couldn’t be a successful stand-up comedian. Peter tells lukewarm and corny jokes that would probably get him heckled at a stand-up comedy club but get laughter and applause in this TV studio because staffers are holding up cue cards telling the studio audience how to react. When Michael goes on a winning streak, Peter reacts as if he doesn’t know if he’s witnessing a train wreck or a happy miracle.

Backstage, things aren’t quite as dubious about how certain people on the staff feel about Michael’s winning streak. At first, Bill thinks is amused by Michael because Bill thinks Michael is an eccentric underdog who makes for good television. When a control-room assistant director named Todd (played by David Rysdahl) asks Bill, “Where do you get these people?” Bill smugly answers, “What can I say? The crazies come to me.” Bill’s attitude then begins to change when he and Chuck begin to suspect that Michael is cheating, but they haven’t figured out how.

During breaks, Michael nervously makes phone calls in a hallway because he says he’s trying to reach his daughter Susie (played by Carlota Castro) to wish her a happy birthday, who’s about 7 or 8 years old. He really isn’t supposed to be making these phone calls, because it’s against the contestant rules to make or receive calls while they’re playing the game, but Sylvia let Michael use the phone because she fell for his sob story about Michael wanting to talk to Susie on her birthday.

During the contestant introductions part of the show, Michael mentions Susie and his wife Patricia. He gives the impression that he’s a happily married family man. The truth is much different: He’s been separated from Patricia (played by Haley Bennett), who has another man in her household: Lyle Roberts (played by Stefano Meier), whose relationship to Patricia and Michael is eventually revealed in the movie.

Michael acts suspiciously from the beginning, like he’s on the verge of a sweaty meltdown, but a lot of it looks fabricated for the movie. During one of his breaks backstage, he takes a detour into a studio where a talk show is being recorded, and he starts talking to host Leon Hart (played by Johnny Knoxville), as if Michael is in a therapy session. It’s a surreal part of the movie that is meant to show that Michael is starting to lose touch with reality.

Hauser gives a compelling performance as fidgety Michael, whose methods and motives become clearer as time goes on. The other cast members do well-enough in ther roles, althoug many of the supporting characters seem underdeveloped. Where the movie falls short is not showing or not telling who Michael was before he was on this game show and how the prize money (and the high-profile scandal) affected his life. Despite an ending that falls a little flat, “The Luckiest Man in America” can be passably entertaining to watch, but it’s not the type of movie that will become a beloved classic.

IFC Films (now known as Independent Film Company) released “The Luckiest Man in America” in select U.S. cinemas on April 4, 2025. The movie was released on digital and VOD on May 6, 2025.

Review: ‘No Exit,’ starring Havana Rose Liu, Dennis Haysbert, Dale Dickey, Danny Ramirez, David Rysdahl and Mila Harris

February 25, 2022

by Carla Hay

Havana Rose Liu in “No Exit” (Photo by Kirsty Griffin/20th Century Studios/Hulu)

“No Exit” (2022)

Directed by Damien Power

Culture Representation: Taking place in California, the dramatic film “No Exit” features a racially diverse group of characters (white, Asian, African American and Latino) representing the working-class and middle-class.

Culture Clash: During a blizzard that has caused road blockages and closures, a young woman finds herself trapped in a visitor center shelter with four strangers, when she finds out that a van owned by one of the strangers has a kidnapped girl inside.

Culture Audience: “No Exit” will appeal mainly to people who like any suspense thriller, no matter how idiotic the plot gets.

“No Exit” is an apt description for how this mystery thriller gets trapped in its own stupidity. It starts off suspenseful and then it takes a steep nosedive into illogical nonsense. There’s a long stretch of the film, which takes place during a snow blizzard, where the criminal element in the movie frantically struggles to get access to a car to make an escape. Meanwhile, the filmmakers are expecting viewers to forget that the entire point of the movie is that all the movie’s characters who are trapped in the blizzard know that the blizzard has caused the roads to blocked, with police guarding the roadblocks, and an escape isn’t really possible.

It’s not spoiler information to reveal that “No Exit” is about a serious crime that’s been committed, and whoever has committed this crime is in a small group of people at a visitor center shelter during this blizzard. The movie’s protagonist decides she’s going to be a one-woman police force to solve the mystery and get justice for this crime. Directed by Damien Power, “No Exit” was written by Andrew Barrer and Gabriel Ferrari. The movie’s screenplay is based on Taylor Adams’ 2017 novel of the same name. Even though some of the cast members give good performances, the entire movie has a flawed premise that’s poorly executed in the last half of the film.

“No Exit” begins with protagonist Darby (played by Havana Rose Liu) looking bored and emotionally disconnected in a drug rehab center somewhere in California. (“No Exit” was actually filmed in New Zealand.) Darby is in her early 20s, and she’s in court-ordered rehab for a crime that is not mentioned in the movie. Through conversations in the movie, it’s revealed that Darby has been in rehab or tried to get clean and sober seven times already in her life.

During a rehab group meeting, Darby is told that she has an emergency phone call. When she takes the call, she finds out from her uncle Joe (voiced by David Chen) that her widowed mother has had a brain aneurysm and is in a hospital in Utah. Darby’s mother is scheduled to get a brain operation, but it’s a risky procedure. The medical diagnosis is that Darby’s mother might not have much longer to live.

Darby is estranged from the two family members who know her the best: her mother and Darby’s older sister Devon. And despite Darby’s pleas to make a phone call for this emergency, she’s denied this request by her rehab group leader Dr. Bill Fletcher (played by James Gaylyn) because it’s the rehab center’s rule that patients can’t make outgoing phone calls. Any incoming phone call for a patient has to be an emergency, and the call is monitored by the rehab center staff.

But this obstacle isn’t enough to stop Darby. She borrows a cell phone that was snuck in by another rehab patient, whose name is Jade (played by Nomi Cohen). Jade and Darby don’t like each other, but Jade reluctantly agrees to let Darby use her phone because Darby threatens to tell the rehab officials that Jade broke the rules by sneaking in a cell phone.

Darby uses the phone to call Devon (played by Lisa Zhang), who tells Darby in no uncertain terms that she’s doesn’t want Darby to contact her or visit their mother. Darby says she’s going to find a way to visit. Devon abruptly and angrily tells Darby, “I don’t have time for your bullshit. Don’t call me back!”

This rejection still doesn’t stop Darby. In broad daylight, she sneaks out of the rehab center to steal the car of an orderly named Mike (played by Nick Davies), nicknamed Mikey, who seemed to take pleasure in denying Darby any phone privileges. Darby has also stolen Jade’s phone. Darby’s plan is to take the stolen car and drive to Utah to see her mother. But this trip comes at a very bad time because she isn’t on the road for long when a blizzard hits while she’s in California’s Sierra Nevada Mountains.

One of the first things that Darby found in Mike’s car was a small packet of cocaine hidden in the driver’s window shade. The movie plays guessing games with viewers over whether or not Darby will relapse by using this cocaine. Darby describes her drug addiction as being willing to do any drug that comes her way.

During this blizzard, Darby gets text messages from Devon that say, “Mom doesn’t want you here.” “You’ll only make it worse.” “Don’t come.” Darby is still undeterred. She pulls over on a road to get some sleep, and she has a nightmare that people outside the car are trying to get her. She wakes up to a state trooper named Ron Hill (played by Benedict Wall), who finds out why she’s traveling during a blizzard.

He tells Darby that the only road leading to Utah is closed, and she has one of two choices: She can either reverse and go back to where she came from, or she can stay at a visitor’s center a few hundred yards away. The center is being used as a temporary shelter during the storm. The trooper also mentions that some other travelers are already at the shelter.

Darby decides to go to the shelter. Inside, there are four other strangers. Ed (played by Dennis Haysbert) is a former U.S. Marine who served in Operation Desert Storm. Ed’s wife is Sandi (played by Dale Dickey), a former nurse who met Ed when she was working at a Veterans Administration hospital. This middle-aged couple is traveling to Reno, Nevada, to do some gambling. Rose and Ed are immediately friendly and welcoming to Darby.

The other two people in the shelter are men in their 20s: Lars (played by David Rysdahl) is introverted and eccentric. He’s the type of person who talks to himself out loud when other people are around. Ash (played by Danny Ramirez) is talkative and a little flirtatious with Darby. He can also be crude and insensitive. Darby and the other four people in the shelter make small talk as they get to know each other.

No one in the shelter can get any cell phone service or WiFi service because of the blizzard and because of where they are in this remote mountain area. Still, Darby occasionally goes outside the shelter near the parking lot to see if her phone can pick up a signal. It’s during one of her trips outdoors when Darby is alarmed to see a hand and noises coming from a van parked outside.

She goes inside the van and finds a kidnapped girl, who’s about 9 or 10 years old. The girl is bound and gagged and desperate to escape. However, Darby knows that she can’t use her phone to get help, so she tells the girl that she will help her, but she has to be patient. Darby later finds out that the girl’s name is Jay (played by Mila Harris), as well as more things about who Jay is and why she was kidnapped.

Feeling trapped and helpless, Darby goes back into the shelter and acts like nothing is wrong, in order to figure out who’s the driver of the van. Before she went back into the shelter, Darby noticed that the van has Nevada license plates. The rest of the movie is a ridiculous cat-and-mouse game where Darby tries to solve the mystery and get help for the kidnapped girl without getting caught by whoever is responsible for the abduction. It’s this second half of the movie that unveils some twists and turns, with each becoming more ludicrous as times goes on.

“No Exit” has so many bad decisions, not just with the characters, but also with how the filmmakers staged everything to look so phony in the latter half of the movie. As the flawed hero Darby, Liu does her best to try to make everything in this moronic film believable, but the movie completely buries any credibility with some of the stupid plot twists, just like the blizzard in this movie buries things in the snow. The rest of the cast members are fairly solid in their roles, except for Ramirez, whose performance becomes campier as the story devolves into an irredeemable mess. You know a movie is bad when it’s called “No Exit,” but everything that happens in the last half of the movie is as if the reason for this movie’s title doesn’t exist.

Hulu premiered “No Exit” on February 25, 2022.

Review: ‘Nine Days,’ starring Winston Duke, Zazie Beetz, Benedict Wong, Tony Hale and Bill Skarsgård

September 5, 2021

by Carla Hay

“Nine Days”

Directed by Edson Oda

Culture Representation: Taking place in an otherworldly dimension, the dramatic film “Nine Days” features a racially diverse cast of characters (white, black, Asian and Latino) representing souls who can observe humans on Earth.

Culture Clash: A “soul gatekeeper” must decide which one among five soul candidates will get to be reborn as a human on Earth.

Culture Audience: “Nine Days” will appeal primarily to people who are interested in watching thoughtful dramas about what spiritual life could look like before being born.

Zazie Beetz in “Nine Days” (Photo by Michael Coles/Sony Picture Classics)

What if you were given the responsibility of deciding which souls could be born into humans? And what if you were one of those souls who had to be evaluated as “worthy enough” to be chosen? Those are the questions facing the main characters of writer/director Edson Oda’s feature-film directorial debut “Nine Days,” a somber-yet-hopeful meditative film about the existence of spirits in a dimension where they are chosen to either continue their lives in a human being or disappear entirely.

It’s a heavy burden for anyone to bear, so it’s no wonder that “soul gatekeeper” Will (played by Winston Duke) takes it so seriously, he almost never cracks a smile during the entire story. Will exists in an unnamed dimension that looks like an outpost house in a remote area, where he spends a lot of his time looking at several stacked-up TV monitors at once. (“Nine Days” was actually filmed in Utah.) Each TV monitor shows Will what’s going on at that moment in the lives of various people on Earth. The monitored people’s entire lives are recorded from birth to death on VHS tapes (yes, you read that right), so Will has a massive archive of people’s histories.

There’s one monitored person in particular who has a profound effect on Will. She is a 28-year-old successful violinist named Amanda Grazzini (played by Lisa Starrett), who was a child prodigy and is described as “emotionally strong.” That’s why it’s a shock to Will when Amanda commits suicide by driving her car into a wall. This tragic death happens early on in the movie and is the catalyst for what happens in the rest of the story, so it’s not really spoiler information.

Amanda’s suicide sends the usually unflappable Will into an emotional tailspin. With her soul having left Earth, Will now has to decide which soul will be born on Earth, to replace Amanda’s life that was taken away. Five soul candidates arrive at the house and are interviewed separately by Will.

Each candidate is evaluated for nine days. All of the candidates are told that after this nine-day evaluation process, anyone who isn’t chosen will then cease to exist. Each rejected candidate gets to decide on a personal ultimate fantasy that will get fulfilled as a sendoff.

The five candidates are:

Mike (played by David Rysdahl), a serious soul who is prone to worry a lot.
Maria (played by Arianna Ortiz), a shy soul who’s somewhat afraid of trying new things.
Kane (played by Bill Skarsgård), an arrogant soul who thinks he’s smarter than everyone else.
Alexander (played by Tony Hale), a wisecracking soul who can be neurotic and insecure.
Emma (played by Zazie Beetz), a “free spirit” soul who is naturally inquisitive.

Will has a friendly co-worker named Kyo (played by Benedict Wong), who is not as uptight as Will. Kyo’s job is to give his opinion to Will on whether or not Will has chosen well. Even though Will has a monumental task of deciding which souls will live and which will cease to exist, “Nine Days” makes it clear that Will is not God or some other supreme being. In fact, at one point in the story, Will describes himself as “a cog in the wheel.”

The candidates are told they must answer certain questions about what they would do when faced with certain ethical dilemmas. Will assures them that there are no right or wrong answers, but they must answer truthfully. All of the candidates except for Emma answer the questions.

Emma tells Will that she can’t answer the questions because she doesn’t know how what her answer would be in these ethical dilemmas. Emma also replies to Will’s questions with more questions. This back-and-forth conflict irritates Will, but it also intrigues him.

During this evaluation process, the candidates are encouraged to look at the TV screens to watch the lives of three people on Earth: Rick Virgil (played by Sterlin English), a 14-year-old who is being bullied; Luiza Coolin (played by Erika Vásquez), a newlywed; and Fernando Pereira (played by Álvaro Cortez), a police officer.

“Nine Days” is a richly layered film that might be too much to wade through for people who prefer more straightforward stories about life in other dimensions. The acting is solid all around, but the heart of the movie is in how Will and Emma get to know each other better. Will has a dark secret that is hinted at and eventually revealed. It explains a lot of his angst. If viewers are willing to tolerate the slow pacing of “Nine Days” and immerse themselves in this fascinating story, then they will be rewarded with seeing a movie that will inspire existential thoughts that go beyond the movie’s 124 minutes.

Sony Pictures Classics released “Nine Days” in New York City and Los Angeles on July 30, 2021. The movie’s theatrical release expanded to more U.S. cities on August 6, 2021.