Utilizing a
cut - and - paste animation style with a photographic edge to recreate
scenes from Hicks's life, usually to cheeky
effect, American turns some 90 minutes of interview footage into a smooth, illustrated, altogether agreeable narrative that is chock - full of anecdotes and achieves a genuine intimacy without resorting to hero - worship (only the occasionally lame visual, such as the whitewashed depictions of tripping
during Bill's mushroom blowouts at Kevin Booth's ranch, weaken the device).