André Is an Idiot
Tony Benna’s unusual film is everything you thought a documentary about dying of cancer could not be.
Image courtesy of Dogwoof Releasing.
by MANSEL STIMPSON
We have here something quite out of the ordinary: an award-winning film which was created with the specific purpose of encouraging people to check for signs of cancer by arranging to take a colonoscopy. That purpose may be one that would lead you to suppose that André Is an Idiot must be a work of very specialised appeal if indeed "appeal" is the right word at all. Consequently, it is all the more important to stress that of the four awards already granted to it two were audience awards. This provides strong evidence that Tony Benna’s film reaches out to viewers very effectively aided by the popular tone favoured both by the filmmaker and by the man who is the movie’s central figure, André Ricciardi.
Ricciardi, who was born in 1968, was somebody with an irreverent attitude to life, one that encouraged him to embrace his own eccentricities despite the fact that he took on a conventional career working in advertising. What had been out of the ordinary was his decision in 1995 to help out a Canadian, Janice, who was working as a bartender in San Francisco and was in need of a green card. Purely with this in mind he married her and only subsequently found that he was attracted to her in a way that led to them staying together and raising two daughters. André's older brother, Nick, who also appears in the film recalls his brother confiding in him about how things had changed. The way he put it when admitting his feelings to Nick was to say "I fucked my wife". That is just one of many moments in this film which are engagingly comic and illustrate the extent to which André relished humour and often delighted in making people laugh.
André Ricciardi was in his early fifties when he was diagnosed with stage 4 colon cancer and realised how foolish he had been on an earlier occasion when he had turned down the suggestion of his best friend, Lee Einhorn, that they should go together and have a colonoscopy. Had he done that it might well have given him a possible chance of surviving the cancer but, despite hoping against hope, it was now apparent that he had almost certainly left it too late. However, the bad news resulted in André determining to make the best of things and to spend what time remained to him doing something of value. A friend of his was Tony Benna who had worked as a film editor and André decided that to have what was happening to him filmed would not only give him a purpose in life but would encourage others not to delay as he had done over having a colonoscopy. Benna would not only be involved in the editing of what was filmed but would now take on the role of director too.
Taking the view that he was discovering that dying is surprisingly boring, André was determined to be as spirited as possible and to show his defiance in his own way (he would, for example, put on a T-shirt that proclaimed "The End Is Near"). His humour was so much a part of him that Benna rightly decided that this film should build on that. It is not clear if the title was actually chosen by André but one is certain that he would have approved of it. In ensuring that the movie would be on the wavelength of today's viewers (and especially those who are young men) the film begins with a scene in which André addresses the camera direct. He tells us an anecdote about himself which takes one by surprise and which is just outrageous enough to win over the audience immediately.
Given the decision to adopt a popular tone and to take a comic line whenever that is not unfitting, Benna’s film incorporates elements of animation from time to time and there are song snatches heard too including one on the subject of cancer. Early footage about André and Janice coming together includes their comments on their shared appearance on a TV show entitled The Newlywed Game and they confess regarding the tactics they adopted in order to win a prize. But, if making André Is an Idiot as entertaining as possible is a key part of the film’s approach, so too is being honest about the pressure André’s diagnosis imposed on the family (not least on Janice whose contributions to the film are heartfelt) and on the difficult decisions that had to be taken. The parents don't want the situation to be burdensome on their daughters but have to balance that against their wish to be honest with them as to what is happening. Furthermore, they want to remain hopeful but have to ask themselves when that turns into being in denial. For a long while André would be as jokey as possible and would refuse to talk about pain and fear yet ultimately he would have to acknowledge the presence of both. He talks to a therapist, Peter Carnochan, about his situation and rather oddly also has a discussion with a father figure (his actual father being very private by nature did not want to take part in the film and the comedian Tommy Chong, himself a cancer survivor, in effect stands in for him).
André would live for just over three years following the diagnosis (he eventually died in 2023) and as the film goes on the deterioration of his body is sad to see. However, Janice was able to be grateful to find that in the later stages of his illness André became willingly vulnerable. Indeed, part of the film’s message is that to be vulnerable is to be real and in a scene involving looking at photographs it is indeed suggested that honest portraits of people as they really are count for far more than posed shots created simply to give an impression. An episode featuring a company representative who can be hired to advise on suitable last words for a death yell finds the film at its most outlandish, but it also includes sage comments by the therapist when André expresses his concern over letting his state upset his family. Here Peter advises André that he should be generous and let them be true to their feelings by being openly sad. For all its consciously popular appeal, André Is an Idiot never betrays the underlying tragedy and allows that to emerge naturally while at the same time very effectively promoting the importance of having a colonoscopy. That he should now be remembered in this context is exactly the contribution that André Ricciardi wanted to make.
Featuring André Ricciardi, Janice Ricciardi, Tallula Ricciardi, Delilah Ricciardi, Nick Ricciardi, Lee Einhorn, Peter Carnochan, Tommy Chong, Tommy Means, Jason Harris.
Dir Tony Benna, Pro André Ricciardi, Tory Tunnell, Joshua Altman, Stelio Kitrilakis and Ben Cotner, Ph Ethan Indorf, Ed Parker Laramie and Tony Benna, Music Dan Deacon, Animation Flesh and Bones, Inc.
A24/Sandbox Films/Safehouse Pictures-Dogwoof Releasing.
88 mins. USA. 2025. UK and US Rel: 6 February 2026. Cert. 15.
