Luckiest Man in America

 

TIFF! Another TIFF film I got the opportunity to go see was The Luckiest Man in America. I was really excited about this movie because I am familiar with the case of Michael Larson and The Press Your Luck Scandal. For those who don't know, The Luckiest Man in America follows an ice cream truck driver from Ohio, Michael Larson who cracked the code of the game show Press your Luck from watching at home. He made his way onto the game show and won triple the amount that any contestant had ever won before.



I wish I went into the film knowing nothing about what happened in real life because I genuinely think it took away from the film. The film takes too many creative liberties away from the real story. So the whole time I’m like “that didn’t happen!”. At the same time, the stakes didn’t feel high enough. I feel like they could have made the situation more dramatic. Instead it feels like the story just comes and goes.



I loved the actors. I think Paul Walter Hauser is the perfect fit for Michael Larson. He looks and acts so much like him. Walton Goggins is great as the host of Press your Luck he has the same feel as the original host. The characters that stood out to me the most were Chuck (played by Shamier Anderson) and Slyvia (Maisie Williams) who are kind of the underdogs in the story, doing the most behind the scenes of the game show.



It feels like half a film. The movie just ended. It is missing what happened to him, what happened to CBS? Who got fired after this scandal? In the real world Michael Larson blew his money and kept trying to find his next get rich quick scheme. Then he ends up getting chased down by the FBI and later dies of throat cancer. So as tragic as it is, I think that this makes a lot more sense then ending it where they did with his wife watching from home. The reality of that too is that she says she never watched the episode. The ending just leaves more questions than answers.



The film was very pretty to watch, the cinematography was gorgeous. It really looked like it was shot in the 80s. I also liked the colouring, where the game show is shown in warm tones, and then the control room was shown with cooler tones.



Maybe I would have liked the movie more if I didn’t already know the story. Knowing what happened, I spent the whole time comparing it to the real world. I loved the experience of seeing this film. Any movie at TIFF is a good time.