By Dennis Hartley

(Originally posted on Digby’s Hullabaloo on April 10, 2021)

The problems of the rich and famous…we should all be so lucky? 8½ meets Green Acres in this portrait of an aging British game show host (James Faulkner) who descends into an existential malaise after hearing of the death of a longtime friend.

Moping through his fan mail, he reads a touching letter that inspires him to travel to America to pay his admirer a surprise visit (and of course, to give himself some time to mull over a life tragically misspent). He ends up in a one-horse burg in Eastern Washington…where unexpected bonds are forged, and Life Lessons are Learned.

Despite teetering on maudlin at times and containing more false endings than The Return of the King, writer-director Andrew Hyatt’s dramedy made me laugh and made me cry.