Amy Winehouse Documentary Premiere Illuminates the Life of a Brilliant but Troubled Talent
When introducing his Amy Winehouse documentary at its U.S. premiere to a star-studded Hollywood audience on Thursday night, director Asif Kapadia said the songstress’s friends and family had repeatedly asked him whether he was going to tell the story of the “real Amy.” He earnestly told the crowd that he hoped his film, AMY, had done just that.
The full-length feature about the otherworldly talented and tragically troubled singer-songwriter illuminated several aspects of her life, from her teen years – when an astonishingly rich and powerful voice effortlessly emanated from her petite body – to her heartbreaking death of alcohol poisoning at the age of 27.
Several audience members at the screening had close connections to Winehouse, such as Universal Music Group CEO Lucian Grainge, who headed the label when she was signed to it and supported her through rehab. “She was one of the greatest artists of all time,” he told the audience. “I, for one, think about Amy a lot and miss her very much.“
Ozzy and Sharon Osbourne, whose daughter, Kelly, was a close friend of Winehouse’s, also attended the screening, as well as famed music producers Rick Rubin and Don Was, and rising singers The Weeknd and Mayer Hawthorne.
In Kapadia’s attempt to show the “real Amy,” he amassed an incredible amount of intimate video footage, from blurry home movies of the pre-beehived singer shot by her friends and family in London long before she became famous, to candid interviews in which she admitted, “I don’t think I’m going to be at all famous. I don’t think I could handle it. I would probably go mad.”
Looking back now, these words penetrate deeply, as it’s easy to see that Winehouse wasn’t exaggerating, and that fame played a large part in her ultimate demise.
To the film’s credit, it handles Winehouse’s story with care, and frequently illustrates the beautiful and complicated contradictions that made the singer who she was. Shy yet unafraid of the spotlight, sweet but at times bitingly acerbic, Winehouse couldn’t be pigeonholed, and AMY goes a long way to show viewers different sides of the eyeliner-loving singer they likely haven’t seen before.
It also features several tracks that Winehouse never released as well as her early demos, with the songs’ lyrics written across the screen as she sings, reminding us that she was not only an incredible vocalist, but also a gifted songwriter.
The film gives us an inside glimpse into her tumultuous relationship with her on-again, off-again boyfriend (and eventually husband) Blake Fielder-Civil, whose bad influence helped fuel her spiral into drug addiction. Winehouse’s love for him is clearly written all over her face in footage throughout the film, but it’s hard to fathom her affection given that he appeared to have nothing but his own interests at heart and conveniently resurfaced in her life when her star was rising so he could hitch a ride on her gravy train.
Some controversy is swirling around the film’s portrayal of her father, Mitch Winehouse. If what we see is to be believed, he left Winehouse and her family at a crucial time in the young singer’s life, fueling her lifelong troubled and co-dependant relationships with men. Even more disturbing is the fact that he reappeared when she became successful, telling her friends that she didn’t have a drug problem when she clearly did, and steering her away from rehab at a crucial juncture (hence her famous lyric, “My daddy thinks I’m fine,” in her mega-hit, “Rehab.”) He repeatedly and inexplicably appeared to put his daughter’s career before her health.
Not surprisingly, Mitch Winehouse distanced himself from the film, declaring it “horrible” and telling The Guardian, “They are trying to portray me in the worst possible light.”
We’re also shown brief glimpses of Winehouse writing and recording with producer Mark Ronson on what would later become her multi-Grammy Award-winning second and final album, Back to Black. It’s striking to witness how easily her brilliance flowed when she was in the zone and had her wits about her.
Toward the end of the film, Winehouse’s enthusiastic reaction to her sweep of the 2008 Grammy Awards – when she unexpectedly won five honors including the coveted Record of the Year Award for “Rehab” – is moving and encouraging. That is until narration by Juliette Ashby, one of Winehouse’s closest childhood friends, heartbreakingly reveals that she was still pining for a fix. “This is so boring without drugs,” she reportedly said at the time.
Any way you slice it, the neglect of those closest to Winehouse played a huge part in her tragic story. With the exception of a few close friends and perhaps one of her bodyguards, it seems as though nearly everyone in her life ignored the warning signs in favor of a paycheck, gave up hope or were in denial.
AMY also goes a long way to show how terribly she was treated by sensationalist media and aggressive paparazzi, who couldn’t get enough footage of her descent into drug addiction and her now-legendary on-stage meltdowns.
At the end of the film, Winehouse is quoted as saying she’d give up all her talent and fame just to be able to walk down the street without being bothered. Ironically, as the celebrity-filled audience exited the movie theatre, paparazzi bulbs flashed incessantly.
