Amy is a stunning, heartbreaking, and necessary reevaluation of how the public views one of the most revolutionary singers in decades. With her smooth jazz accompaniment and some scatting here-and-there, Winehouse captures your attention in mere seconds and every song thereafter has you feeling a vast range of emotions. She truly has a song for every mood, seeing as she’s experienced more of the best and worst of what life has to offer us. Her spiraling descent into drugs and “public indecencies” is clearly driven by the media to alter our perception of someone who wanted to live a simple life. She had an extraordinary gift which we’re lucky to have, but she passed at 27 (as did other musical greats including: Jimi Hendrix, Kurt Cobain, Janis Joplin, & Jim Morrison) and was taken from us too soon.
This film doesn’t feature any live interviews, which is something I thought might not work all that well doing into it. Afterwards, I feel like it actually paid off more because of the recordings and prior interviews that we’re listening to. Many of Amy’s songs lead us through her journey, as the lyrics find themselves written out on-screen, alluding to deeper meanings within her words. We watch some archival footage of a younger, healthier, and more at peace Winehouse. We see her grow from a teenager to an adult and how the media and her boyfriend lead her to turn to harder drugs, effectively leading to the end of her life. Over some of the archival footage is audio interviews with Amy’s closest friends, family, and people whom she worked with, telling us more about the woman we’re seeing in front of us. Her actions make more sense when we hear the full story and the wealth of knowledge this film presents is astounding, as the film never feels like it’s dragging. One the one hand, this film is an education on Winehouse and how celebrity/media can affect many others. On the other hand, this film opens so many people up to a specific type of music and artist that has been sorely missing from the airwaves.
When discussing the film with the representative after it had ended, we were both concerned with how much her death felt like Princess Diana’s in a way. Unlike some celebrities, Winehouse lived in a modest-sized flat in England, making her more vulnerable to paparazzi. Rather than respecting her privacy, they lay out all day in front of her door, hoping to catch her slipping up and attempting to elicit a negative reaction from her. It’s disgusting to watch grown men and women harass her for a little publicity and it just never stopped. Everywhere she went, Winehouse was being pursued by the paparazzi and mocked by the world. Her and everyone else’s drug addiction is not a laughing matter and so many people turned her into the butt of a joke, when everyone should have lending her a helping hand. At one point, even her own father begins exploiting her talent and presence when he makes his own documentary about Amy’s inside life. He speaks to his daughter as if he owns her, telling her what, how, and when to do things.
Striking me most about Amy, was how she presented herself to the world and the way in which she handled early celebrity life. In one scene, she and Tony Bennett are recording a song together and she can barely hold herself together because she’s getting to sing with one of her idols. She’s critiquing herself so harshly because she wants to impress a man who is absolutely floored by her vocals and what she’s able to do with her voice. Around her close friends and loved ones she makes along the way, she’s a complete goofball and is even weirder than you could imagine. She’s not putting on a facade and that’s something which truly makes her so revered, in my opinion. She didn’t act like anyone other than herself and we see that beautiful person, no matter the circumstances. We also see and hear about many intimate moments in her life and learn about the effect that some of her boyfriends had on her. She was addicted to love and would do anything for her lover, something she often wrote about and eventually acted out. When crack cocaine becomes a larger habit of her fiance, she follows him down the rabbit hole because she couldn’t imagine her life without him. In every aspect of her life, she was gracious, caring, and devoted to the people who cared for her and that unfortunately got the better of her later on.
It’s not a surprise to me that I’m listening to her music as I write this and have been for weeks following the screening. When Amy was struggling as I was growing into a teenager, I’m sure I made jokes about how drugs had affected her. I knew she had a song about rehab and felt like it was ironic, given her current state. When she died, I remember people mourning her death but I didn’t have an intimate connection to her yet. As my taste in music got better over time, I listened to more jazz and found myself enchanted by her poetic perfection and sultry voice, causing me to consider myself a fool when I was younger. Now, things have come full circle, as this film has truly enlightened me on just who this woman really was. You’re watching a vulnerable, emotional, and uncertain human being who is just like the rest of us, only her life is on display for the whole world to see. Sure, she makes some mistakes like everyone else, but because she’s held in a higher regard it becomes a story that she gets drunk someplace, as if no one has ever gotten drunk before. Forget what you know and walk into the theater with open ears, an open mind and an open heart. In a short couple hours you’ll find yourself closer to a woman who brought something special into the world and your only regret will be that you can’t express to her just how incredible she truly is. Amy is an absolute must-see which will no-doubt find itself touching the hearts of people worldwide.
