Amy Winehouse: Fallen Star (2012) User Reviews

Could have been something special.....

[msnwinfree · 1/10 · 30 June 2012]

A few months back I read an article on the development of an Amy Winehouse movie. I personally find her story quite interesting and I thought it would be an amazing film. According to the article Amy's story was gonna be brought to life by her boyfriend and film producer Regg Travis with Lady Gaga set to star.

Mitch Winehouse, Amy's father, upon hearing the news of this lashed out against the film stating that they were cashing in on his daughters death and that he would never release the rights to the music to be used in such a film.

Unbeknownst to any of the mentioned above a group of 'Filmmakers' were already working on a adaption of the legendary singers life. And this is the outcome.

Upon receiving my copy of this film on DVD I read the back and to my horror noticed that they had got the dates wrong for her Grammy wins. And that really sets the tone for the movie itself. As the filmmakers stated in the opening credits: they had to use fiction to spice up the drama in the film. I looked on for the next 50 minutes (not 70 as the case says) in pure unbelievability. It turns out this film is pure mockumentary style filmmaking that shows more dishonor to Amy than honor.

As I had stated earlier Mitch never gave over the rights to her music so that leaves this film lifeless of Amy's magical songs. Such a poor attempt at something that could have been amazing.

Amy who I personally look at as one of my favorite singers who was only here for a short period of time, but accomplished so much. The story of her life would be an amazing thing to see told in a film. But only if the right people do it. They could present a story of love, addiction, music... The story of a LEGEND.

Gutted

[jazz_ozz_layla · 1/10 · 29 June 2015]

I have been waiting for so long for this to be released in the UK. Although i am not what you'd call a huge fan i did find her a very interesting lady with a sad story that poured out in her music.

Believing this was going to be a following of Amy's life into music using real interviews and her music yet it couldn't be far from it. If it had been it would of been such a fantastic biography of her life that wouldn't need any fiction added to spice it up.

If the people behind this as well AND her father had spent their time trolling through all the interviews, news stories, rumours and so on instead of fighting over "rights" (although the true is more likely to be money!) they could of made this Fallen star shine once more.

It is full of lies, terrible acting and to be honest an insult to Amy's memory and to think her father would sooner have this as a memory of his daughter because of a few quid, Shameful

Spinal Tap with all the funny parts removed

[rooprect · 22 June 2019]

If you want to save the eye strain of reading this review, just hop over to YouTube and watch the first minute of this movie where the interviewer asks, "So tell me, Amy, what do you really want to get out of life?"

What follows is a pointless, meandering ramble of Nigel Tufnellian proportions, where she asserts that she just wants to sing, then apparently confusing herself she says that she just wants to live her life, then asserts that she just wants to be Amy Winehouse, ultimately punctuating her monologue with "you know, I just want to be loved and love unconditionally."

All that was missing was "and these go to eleven."

I'm being completely serious, I was so intrigued by that atrocious, unflattering opening that I actually bought the DVD (on ebay for a buck forty nine) and couldn't wait to watch what promised to be, at best, a disrespectful but funny mockumentary, or at worst, one of those movies that's "so bad it's good."

What followed was the worst of all possibilities. Although the Tap-ish "mockumentary" style continued, adding scores of interviews with random people who are never identified, occasionally spicing things up with cutaways to dramatic recreations of events (dear lord I feel sorry for the poor young actress who played teenage Amy and spent half her screen time with her head in a toilet), ultimately there were no joke payoffs, and the production wasn't quite horrendous enough to tip the needle from "bad" to "so bad it's good".

I ended up getting bored and skipping ahead to the death scene. And, omg, words cannot describe my reaction. Let's just say, imagine if someone made a film about the Hindenburg disaster, and in the climactic scene they just showed everyone laying down and going to sleep.

Pros: The actress playing Amy was actually quite good. I don't know how authentic her portrayal was, but she was fun to watch. I'm being completely serious: if someone were to hand her a comedy script along the lines of Spinal Tap, I would go see it in a heartbeat. Unfortunately, "Amy Winehouse: Fallen Star" never quite made it to eleven. A bit like an 18 inch replica of Stonehenge, it didn't quite measure up.

PS I imagine someone could make a fun drinking game of this movie where every time someone says "Oimy!" everyone has to take a slug.