Amy

The title of this documentary is perfect. It’s a portrait of a person and not the superstar creation of Amy Winehouse that the press made her image into.

This is the first documentary I’ve seen that completely uses archival footage without the use of talking heads and instead uses voice over. This technique gives the film another layer because the voices become cries of what could have been done while the whole time we watch Amy’s face become more desperate for help as her years pass. To be honest I didn’t know much about Amy Winehouse, nor did I know much of her music, and like most people I was led to believe she was in lack of a better word “trash”. She was bulimic, she was a drug abuser and she was an alcoholic. What we get from this documentary is that she began to spiral because of heartbreak and fall again and again with the growing pressures of fame her music was creating for her. There is no exact way to pinpoint what it was that led to her death, be it relationships, fame or drugs, then again that’s not what this documentary is about. We do see that she was already gone in the days, weeks and maybe even years up to the day of her death, but you can be the judge of that.

Amy is more than just a frightening look into the life of Amy Winehouse, but a fantastic documentary that has you feeling more and more respondent the further it goes and the closer you know you are getting to her end.

Check out Amy and see her charismatic and shy beginnings to tragedy in this haunting documentary.

4/5 – Stars for Amy

Robert Ring