Sick: The Life & Death of Bob Flanagan, Supermasochist
Haut et Court | Release Date: November 7, 1997 CRITIC SCORE DISTRIBUTION
82
METASCORE
Universal acclaim based on 15 Critic Reviews
Positive:
15
Mixed:
0
Negative:
0
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Critic Reviews

Critic scorePublicationBy date
100
Entertainment WeeklyOwen Gleiberman
If you see only one movie this year about a twisted, cuddly, courageous, fatally diseased, self-mutilating love slave, make sure that movie is Sick: The Life and Death of Bob Flanagan, Supermasochist. Read full review
91
The A.V. ClubScott Tobias
The film's greatest achievement is transforming his supposed acts of deviancy into disease-of-the-week uplift, not to mention a moving love story, an irreverent black comedy, and an intellectually compelling study of an artist at work. Read full review
90
VarietyEmanuel Levy
Undoubtedly the most wildly original and audacious documentary in this year's Sundance Film Festival, Kirby Dick's Sick: The Life and Death of Bob Flanagan, Supermasochist is an uncompromising chronicle of the flamboyant poet and performance artist who died in 1996. Read full review
89
Austin ChronicleRussell Smith
The driving forces behind Dick's courageous, defiantly candid film are curiosity about all things human and a desire to explain the seemingly inexplicable. Read full review
88
Chicago Sun-TimesRoger Ebert
What makes Sick bearable is the saving grace of humor. Apart from the pain he was born with and the pain he heaped on top of it, Bob Flanagan was a wry, witty, funny man who saw the irony of his own situation. Read full review
80
Film ThreatStaff (Not Credited)
An enlightening experience that explains what cystic fibrosis as well as why someone wracked with pain from it might want to hurt themselves. Read full review
80
EmpireWilliam Thomas
Whatever you want to call Sick, it's anything but a piece of exploitative voyeurism, by turns sombre, hilarious, wince-inducing and inspiring. Read full review
80
The New York TimesStephen Holden
The most powerful and disturbing personal documentary since Crumb, Sick examines the life of the performance artist Bob Flanagan, who died of cystic fibrosis. [14 Nov 1997, p.E24]
75
San Francisco ChronicleEdward Guthmann
Sick does a remarkable thing in presenting extreme, sometimes revolting material and simultaneously making us like and admire Flanagan. Read full review
75
Slant MagazineEric Henderson
The title alone of Kirby Dick’s alleged documentary Sick: The Life and Death of Bob Flanagan, Supermasochist practically screams: This is not your standard biopic! Read full review
75
TV Guide MagazineMaitland McDonagh
Funny, eye-opening and ultimately very moving portrait by director Kirby Dick. Read full review
75
Boston GlobeJay Carr
Those who can endure it will find Kirby Dick's film provocative and surprisingly touching. [14 Nov 1997, p.D11]
75
Chicago TribuneMark Caro
Sick provides no easy answers but stands as a strangely powerful testament of a man who laughed in the face of terminal illness and fought for his life using the tools of self-destruction, including the occasional hammer and nail. Read full review
75
The Globe and Mail (Toronto)Liam Lacey
Two parts pain, one part pleasure, a masochist's life with cystic fibrosis results in a weirdly tender documentary. [14 Nov 1997, p.D4]
70
Time OutStaff (Not Credited)
This documentary, shocking and enlightening, succeeds in contextualising, and thus humanising, misunderstood sexual deviancy. Read full review
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