Review of American: The Bill Hicks Story (2010) by Ally C — 15 Apr 2011

A posthumous apology to Bill Hicks from me. Bill, I was wrong. The problem with Hicks (I thought) was that he was too cynical, didn't care about life and flaunted drink and drugs to his audience too much.

This was only a small part to his character and if American The Bill Hicks story is to be believed (and with as many of his friends and family taking part, it would be churlish to believe otherwise) he was a humanist with alot of love in his heart for humankind and with a strong philosophy on how life should be lived.

He was a polemicist advocating peace instead of war and he would often take the government to task turning his 'comedy' routine into passionate diatribes for the just cause of peace and government lies.

The documentary comes down firmly on Hicks' side but this is fair enough given his early death at the hand of pancreatic cancer and the overcoming of his personal demons that allowed him his gift of introspection culminating in self-expression of the most eloquent sort.

A riveting film, but maybe most people knew the true Bill anyway?