Back to trending
Lost in America

Lost in America

Comedy · 1985

David and Linda Howard are successful yuppies from LA. When he gets a job disappointment, David convinces Linda that they should quit their jobs, liquidate their assets, and emulate the movie Easy Rider, spending the rest of their lives traveling around America...in a Winnebago.

Movie details

Lost in America

1985 Comedy 1h 31m

Critical arithmetic

The consensus, allegedly.

IMDb

7.0 / 10

10.6K votes

Rotten Tomatoes

95 %

Tomatometer

Metacritic

78 / 100

Metascore

TMDB

6.9 / 10

Community rating

External scores via OMDb · CC BY-NC 4.0. Values normalized for display; availability varies by title.

David and Linda Howard are successful yuppies from LA. When he gets a job disappointment, David convinces Linda that they should quit their jobs, liquidate their assets, and emulate the movie Easy Rider, spending the rest of their lives traveling around America...in a Winnebago.

CriticWise case file

What this film says about your taste.

Not a recommendation score. A measure of how closely the film’s taste signals resemble yours.

The archetype split

Who fights over Lost in America?

The split comes from the same five-axis model used by the test, not audience ratings or review sentiment.

Taste neighbourhood

Nearby on the taste map.

TMDB supplies the candidates. CriticWise reorders them by craft, strangeness, prestige, emotion, and pace.

Problemista

Problemista

Comedy · 2024

Alejandro is an aspiring toy designer from El Salvador, struggling to bring his unusual ideas to life in New York City. As time on his work visa runs out, a job assisting an erratic art-world outcast becomes his only hope to stay in the country and realize his dream.

Tommy Boy

Tommy Boy

Comedy · 1995

To save the family business, two ne’er-do-well traveling salesmen hit the road with disastrously funny consequences.

Beavis and Butt-Head Do America

Beavis and Butt-Head Do America

Animation · 1996

Slacker duo Beavis and Butt-Head wake to discover their TV has been stolen. Their search for a new one takes them on a clueless adventure across America, during which they manage to accidentally become America's most wanted.

The Secret of My Success

The Secret of My Success

Comedy · 1987

Brantley Foster, a well-educated kid from Kansas, has always dreamed of making it big in New York City, but once there, he learns that jobs - and girls - are hard to get. When he visits his uncle, Howard Prescott, who runs a multi-million-dollar company, he is given a job in the mail room.

Back to the Future Part III

Back to the Future Part III

Adventure · 1990

The final installment finds Marty digging the trusty DeLorean out of a mineshaft and looking for Doc in the Wild West of 1885. But when their time machine breaks down, the travelers are stranded in a land of spurs. More problems arise when Doc falls for pretty schoolteacher Clara Clayton, and Marty tangles with Buford Tannen.

The Mouse That Roared

The Mouse That Roared

Comedy · 1959

The Duchy of Grand Fenwick decides that the only way to get out of their economic woes is to declare war on the United States, lose and accept foreign aid. They send an invasion force (in chain mail, armed with bows and arrows) to New York and they arrive during a nuclear drill that has cleared the streets.

Crocodile Dundee

Crocodile Dundee

Adventure · 1986

When a New York reporter plucks crocodile hunter Mick Dundee from the Australian Outback for a visit to the Big Apple, it's a clash of cultures and a recipe for good-natured comedy as naïve Dundee negotiates the concrete jungle. He proves that his instincts are quite useful in the city and adeptly handles everything from wily muggers to high-society snoots without breaking a sweat.

Last Vegas

Last Vegas

Comedy · 2013

Aging pals Billy, Paddy, Archie, and Sam have been best friends since childhood. When Billy finally proposes to his much-younger girlfriend, all four friends go to Las Vegas to celebrate the end of Billy's longtime bachelorhood and relive their glory days. However, the four quickly realize that the intervening decades have changed Sin City and tested their friendship in ways they had not imagined.

Rat Race

Rat Race

Adventure · 2001

In an ensemble film about easy money, greed, manipulation and bad driving, a Las Vegas casino tycoon entertains his wealthiest high rollers -- a group that will bet on anything -- by pitting six ordinary people against each other in a wild dash for $2 million jammed into a locker hundreds of miles away. The tycoon and his wealthy friends monitor each racer's every move to keep track of their favorites. The only rule in this race is that there are no rules.

Taking Care of Business

Taking Care of Business

Comedy · 1990

An uptight advertising exec has his entire life in a filofax organizer which mistakenly ends up in the hands of a friendly convict who poses as him.

Where it lives

Watch in your region.

Cinema release signals and current streaming, rental, and purchase options for your region.

Streaming availability data supplied by JustWatch.

Names above the title

The people responsible.

Directed by

Albert Brooks

Written by

Monica Johnson · Albert Brooks

Albert Brooks

Albert Brooks

David Howard

Julie Hagerty

Julie Hagerty

Linda Howard

Michael Greene

Michael Greene

Paul Dunn

Garry Marshall

Garry Marshall

Casino Manager

Maggie Roswell

Maggie Roswell

Patty

Tom Tarpey

Tom Tarpey

Brad Tooley

E

Ernie Brown

Pharmacist

Court is in session

Put Lost in America on trial.

Two incompatible taste archetypes. One film. Read the arguments, then issue a completely binding cultural ruling.

The defence The Sentimental Softie

“Sincerity is not manipulation.”

The film risks embarrassment to make emotion communal, and that openness is harder than fashionable detachment.

The prosecution The Cool Ironist

“The strings are showing.”

Every cue tells you exactly what to feel and when, leaving sentiment to do the work character should have done.