No Limit: A Search for the American Dream on the Poker Tournament Trail

The intimate and revealing documentary No Limit: A Search for the American Dream on the Poker Tournament Trail commences with two filmmakers – the husband and wife team of director Tim Rhys and producer Susan Genard of Camden Pictures – and their joint decision to embark on a subject-by-subject, 8-month documentary portrait of the “stars” of international poker. Rhys and Genard thus trek off, cameras and four-year-old son in tow, with the casual intention of not only profiling these individual subjects, but playing in the World Series of Poker and winning a little bit of money themselves. The portraits indeed emerge, by turns eccentric, humorous and heartbreaking – each subject with his or her own individualistic rules of play. Yet as Susan and Tim involve themselves in the game, the activity begins to take an on-camera toll on their relationships with their son and each other. Meanwhile, central, haunting questions surface and linger about the enduring ties between professional poker and the quintessential “American dream.”