Amy Winehouse She wanted to be remembered as a singer who made people have a good time, or at least that’s what she wanted at the age of thirteen, according to the letter in her own handwriting that the protagonist reads. Marisa Abelain the singer’s unmistakable tone of voice, during the family party overflowing with wine in her father’s house with which it begins Back to Black.
That teen Amy and daddy Mitch soon sing together Fly Me to the Moon and the director Sam Taylor-Johnson (Fifty Shades of Grey y Nowhere Boya biographical film about a teenager John Lennon) makes it clear from the outset that his view of the controversial Mr. Winehouse has nothing to do with the stark portrait that Asif Kapadia made in his documentary Amy.
The filmmaker prefers to avoid problems with the heirs by telling the life of Amy Winehouse almost literally from the confessional tone that she gave to her songs, with the focus on the successful second album that gives its name to the film, which Amy wrote after a breakup from which he never seemed to recover.
Back to Black It has the structure of a musical, with songs that crown each sequence and they put into words and music what was just seen on screen, but that literality flattens Amy’s search for inspiration and on top of that the constant repetition of each event, unfolded into action and performance, slows down the narrative.
Back to Black resorts to the traditional rise and fall format and Taylor-Johnson uses it in duplicate by recounting Winehouse’s relationship with fame on the one hand and her turbulent love story with Blake Fielder-Civil on the other.
Amy declares herself in the film as an anachronism, referring to her retro style during that first decade of the millennium, and also prefers to ignore feminism with a joke, but it is still striking that her portrait here seems so conditioned by the presence of her father and his partner.
Blake’s singer even gets the best musical moment of the film, when he shows Amy the band that would define her sound, with an exquisite choreography in a bar to the rhythm of Leader of the Packfrom Shangri-La’s.
A scene from “Back to Black”, the biographical film about Amy Winehouse.
The trigger for his death
The film dares to insinuate without pruritus or subtlety that Blake’s decision to completely rebuild her life was the only trigger for the alcohol poisoning that caused Winehouse’s death.although Taylor-Johnson is closer to justifying the leading man here than to holding him responsible.
The only villains in Back to Black are the paparazzi and Amy, already in flash mode, does not even express disdain for the most overwhelming situations she suffers.
The film takes a position by moving away from sensationalism and portraying Winehouse’s disorders and addictions with some subtlety, despite using a canary that she carries around as a metaphor for the singer’s fragility.
The filmmaker’s visual talent is unquestionable, beyond the aforementioned rhythmic problem. T
aylor-Johnson also stands out in the shot-by-shot reconstruction of some iconic moments in the singer’s career, such as the performance of Rehab during the Grammys that marked her worldwide consecration when she was fresh out of her rehabilitation.
The real Amy Winehouse, singing at the Glastonbury Festival, in 2007. She died at age 27. Photo: AFP/Carl de Souza
Marisa Abela completely disguises herself as Amy, even singing Winehouse’s repertoire herself, and her interpretation of the iconic image of the scrawny, toothless singer full of tattoos with a beehive hairstyle and absolutely busted is more accomplished than the adolescent innocence of that unlikely beginning centered on the dreams of a thirteen-year-old girl.
Back to Black proposes a neatening of the controversial figure of an artist who, even in the film itself, declares herself against image washes and prefabricated stars.
Token
Biography. Great Britain, 2024, 122′. SAM16. Address: Sam Taylor-Johnson Con: Marisa Abela, Jack O’Connell, Eddie Marsan, Lesley Manville, Juliet Cowan y Sam Buchanan Salas: Hoyts Abasto, Cinépolis Recoleta, Multiplex Belgrano, Cinema Devoto
