Not an easy watch.

guyshankland

score 7/10

'Amy' (the film) highlights the obvious perils of pop music fame, sex, drugs, alcohol and every rock n roll cliché, with one main underlying current. No matter how great the person, how strong the voice, how catchy the songs, if the people closest to you aren't playing with a straight bat, you're in trouble. Alcohol and drugs played a massive part in Amy's demise, the film will also let you draw your own conclusions on who else was responsible and why she was allowed to get to such levels of addiction and despair before any real help was forthcoming. Watching 'Amy' is a macabre experience as you allow yourself to smile during her pre-headline innocent years. I find myself waiting for the dark days, not wanting to get attached to the upbeat teenage jazz singer smiling at me from the HD cinema screen. Early live footage reveals just what a talent in waiting AW was, young, confident, funny and a voice that could floor an elephant. But behind the scenes we learn of her bulimia, father Mitchell's infidelity, her mothers lack of control and how the pair's lack of any parental discipline molded her own life. Enter Blake Fielder-Civil, the love of her life, her dark inspiration. The relationship with Blake is laid out in all it's distressing glory. Blake confesses to introducing Amy to Crack, Coke and Heroin, a regular user himself before they paired up. Then he left her for his previous girlfriend, leaving Amy an emotional and physical wreck. Friends and managers begged her to go to Rehab, she left the final decision to her father, who said she didn't need it. A hit song was born and her life as we see, is ended. The missed window of opportunity of getting Amy into rehab early in her addictions proved a massive turning point in her life, personally and professionally. Chart success on both sides of the pond, reconciliation and marriage to Blake, Grammy's, artistic recognition and a house in Camden, for a time she thought she had everything she had ever wanted. Then the footage becomes harder to watch as Amy deteriorates. She becomes a Red top superstar, each disaster spread out for the nations titillation. If handled correctly Blake going to jail could have been the saving of her, for a time she was clean then plummeted. Footage of a one off concert in Serbia, (possibly the most ill advised trip since Hitler's winter invasion of Russia). Amy makes it on stage but refuses to sing, a drunk, stumbling, shambolic mess, it's not easy to watch. In fact it's utterly depressing. The films final shots of a body bag leaving her Camden home put a rotten cherry on this whiskey and coke soaked cake. Ultimately 'Amy' is a painfully insightful film, Blake and Mitchell may want to avoid it, they are (rightly or wrongly) cast as the villains, a pair of emotional and financial vampires. Their misplaced arrogance in interviews does nothing to help their cause. Amy Winehouse was one of the most original female artists this country has ever produced, period. She deserved, in life and love, better.

Guy Shankland 16/07/15

guyshankland 16 July 2015

Reprint: https://www.imdb.com/review/rw3277945/