Amy Winehouse: The Final Goodbye (FULL MOVIE)

please recall by the London Ambulance Service to house in Camden Square Northwest one shortly before 1605 hours today one reports of a woman found deceased on arrival officers found the body of a 27 year old female who's pronounced dead at the scene next of kin have been informed and I can confirm that the deceased is Amy Winehouse [Music] [Music] Amy Winehouse is one of the greatest singer songwriters of her generation she actually changed the music industry and that's what music icons do there was only one Amy Winehouse there was only one girl with the Daft here and that she had her Luke she had her sound and she was loved in her early days on the music scene amy was high octane and infectious I'm not going thank you and her trailblazing talents meant she was destined to be famous America loved her Amy Winehouse didn't break the UK she broke the world she had the potential to be the Edith Piaf of her generation there was nothing mediocre about her and she had [ __ ] roses [Music] but amy was headstrong and reckless and her fame and fortune was gained at a terrible cost the Amy Winehouse's addiction would have start from a position of pain infamous pictures tell their own story the star-crossed lovers relationship with Blake fielder-civil the addiction the self harming the distraught parents I think the damage that had been done earlier on 2005-2006 that kind of time when she got into classier drugs I think it's beginning to manifest itself and as her addiction took a grip it seemed her life was going in only one direction [Music] on Saturday July 23rd 2011 amy was found dead at her home in her beloved Camden Town London amy was chronic as an addict and and and everybody was really was waiting for the headline Amy Winehouse is dead I mean everybody knew it was coming everybody knew that's how it would end because no one could find a way of stopping her yeah I'm cold don't worry about me [Music] I first met him in 2003 at the BRIT Awards it was the year before Frank was released to be honest nobody really knew who she was I was wearing a dress with lots of tassels on she came running up to me is it made me love the dress love the dress I looked at her and I kinda recognized her she was this chubby faced young energetic full of life having so much fun you could see that she was visibly thinking I'm at the prince this is amazing amy was hilarious that's the first thing she loved making jokes she loved taking the mickey out of people and she found her jokes hilarious that zel think she found herself funny but yes at the same time she could be quite belligerent - she could be quite rude she didn't want to do something she'd say it I mean I think the fact o matter is when you had that under the influence of alcohol or drugs whatever it happens to be you lose your defences they they come down so she didn't have that natural thing where she was polite to anyone she just said what she thought all the time I do that now you know I'm never gonna change I will be I will be rude to you now if you were to me but that will never change I think she definitely had a big force behind her suit so when she was in a room or backstage everyone wanted to be around her but at the same time there was an element of morbid fascination I guess about just looking at how low at times she had come although her management tried to control Amy it just didn't work and towards the end of her life if she was out and about spotted journalist she liked she go over to them and hug them Amy was all about the love and that's what her dad Mitch said she was all about loving she loved too much and she couldn't help herself and at time she was very honest - about how much she drank about blotting out the pain and a really candid girl that was almost lost in this world where everybody wanted a slice offer people never used to come up to me in the street and say oh my god Jeremy Winehouse people never used to say that and they do no but I won't say that's a change I mean that's an obvious change but I'm not changing I'm not going yes it is me yes it is Amy Winehouse I'm going no you don't that's really nice go and buy one for your mom as well thank you bye a doctor is alleged to have seen Amy 24 hours before her death she was getting weekly visits and reported always well he's not saying she's cured he's not saying she's not an addict he's not saying she's she's a paragon of Health the point is a bad addiction is one day somebody can be look as if they're okay in a next minutes I mean tips and over their edge and like Amy Winehouse they can die and and we don't know what killed her yet but whatever it was it was off you see link to the addiction she said to her spent the night before her death in camden town drinking with friends anyone who went out with Amy had never seen anyone drink so much vodka so fast her friend said that she could drink vodka all day that combined with medication or drugs and it could just have been a lethal cocktail for a 27 year old girl she looks great when she was able to doll herself up put on the makeup but you could tell sometimes she was very thin I think the real tragedy is that there were glimmers of hope that sometimes she did Luke okay she was trying to write songs she was able to perform now and then and that's the real tragedy that that we thought she might just get there much of Amy's addiction was blamed on her relationship with her ex-husband Blake fielder-civil a notorious substance abuser their romance was tempestuous and volatile they couldn't live with each other and they couldn't live without each other Blake's mother georgette described them as soulmates Amy's father Mitch did everything in his power to tear the couple apart at certain points in time during him his life it'd be fair to say that mitch actually hated Blake fielder-civil when I talked to him he was so angry the girl that he knew and loved had changed so dramatically she was always a bit of a terror certainly huge personality perhaps she had an addictive personality all along but she went from a girl who actually was very anti-drugs even cannabis when she was a teen - meeting Blake and becoming a fully fledged addict amy's album Back to Black was inspired by Blake and she had his name tattooed over her heart weeks before she died she had told a friend he is the only one who can save me and they lead up to her death of course she was at home in Camden where she had the sort of magnetic pull I would say to that suburb in London recently Amy hadn't been particularly well you know she'd I think in the newspaper we've reported in the last two or three weeks that she'd collapsed three times because she drunk herself interstate where she she was no longer conscious plans for a summer comeback had been written off after a shambolic drunken concert in Belgrade where she was booed off stage this show was a complete and utter shambles it was the worst yet and believe me there'd been some pretty bad Amy Winehouse performances over the last few years however she was booed off stage she threw the microphone into the crowd she didn't remember her words and of course in this modern day of YouTube it all ended up on the Internet within a few hours and at that point there was huge pressure on her management because so many questions have been asked why was she on to it in the first place so as a result of that criticism they actually cancelled the rest of her European tour and she came home and they said they were going to focus on her health when you've been put up there when you've had five Grammys in one year and a Brit Award for Best Female and then you go from that to being booed to being panned how would you take that and somebody like Amy wasn't strong enough to take it after the travesty of the Belgrade concerts Amy retreated back to Camden to lick her wounds she became secretly engaged to film director reg Travis but Blake was still very much on her mind there was speculation actually that in the final days Amy had been having these conversations with Blake fielder-civil her ex-husband who was in prison and that perhaps read Travis who had been her on-off boyfriend for some time but had been very close to Amy had actually overheard some of those conversations and had ended up calling things off with Amy now that would have led to a very volatile situation if it is the case could that and her tour cancellation have driven Amy over the edge she was spending a lot of time in Camden drinking a lot of course and on quite a few benders that appears before that terrible day security checked and Amy in the morning on Saturday at 10 o'clock and she was still breathing fast asleep and they checked again in the afternoon and she wasn't breathing so it was about six hours between her last being checked and the time she died at the shocking news of her untimely death Amy instantly became immortalized joining the notorious 27 Club and look at the names Jimi Hendrix Janis Joplin Jim Morrison Kurt Cobain these are all people Brian Jones of the stones these are all people who died at 27 and sometimes people get on a certain trajectory and come hell or high water you can't stop them if people aren't careful this will continue almost in the same way as it did with Marilyn Monroe because of course Amy Winehouse like Marilyn died at home by herself some people suggest that it may have been to do with a drug overdose other people suggest it could have even been suicide now I never believed that amy was suicidal however she had by all accounts just had a quite a nasty temporary Blake breakup with her boyfriend of the time rich Travis and was back in contact with the love of her life her ex-husband Blake fielder-civil who was behind bars you can imagine the effect that that must have had on her psychologically there's an awful lot of speculation around Amy's death and that's quite telling in itself because if you look back a few years you wouldn't have been surprised if she had overdosed however friends talked to her a couple of days before she died said she was fine she was on stage actually with Dionne Bromfield who she really supports and she seemed the reclaimers of hope that she was getting there and that's why there is so much speculation it's not a clear-cut case that she overdosed it may be that her body gave out she's been through so much and put her body through so much and had so many health warnings it may just be that her body gave out in the end but how did it all begin for Amy Winehouse and how did her wild child behavior and destructive personality bring about her tragic but inevitable death Amy grew up in a Jewish household in North London her dad Mitch and mom Janice were both influential in her love of music you know it was wonderful I mean I can remember houses within my own house my Grandpere - lots of grandparents are full of music and laughter and that's the way it was in my house - so that's what Amy that's what I'm what Amy got from anything my dad sings and I sang as a child obviously and I just assumed growing up - everyone sings you know I that was really it even as a little girl her taste in music was wildly eclectic definitely people like Thelonious Monk Hendrix and Sarah Vaughan and Louie Jordan and salt and pepper and Beastie Boys there's just so many Beastie Boys and TLC when I was a little kid and Carole King Emer was brought up in a very loving Jewish family and met her dad and Janice remember together you just have to look at the picture as a family as a kids to see the cheekiness written all over her face she was she was a wee terror and she was into everything as she grew up she'd sing with her dad Frank Sinatra songs really ordinary upbringing to her mum works for a pharmacy her dad was a double glazing salesman and then went on to become a black cab driver and I think it's fair to say that it was a very secure upbringing and then Mitch started seeing other women eventually married her of course this would have been traumatic for Amy when you when you're happy or sad you know I'm saying Amy when she got to early teens rumor has it and it will be legend has it very soon that she arranged her own addition at the Sylvia Young Theatre in art school and she wowed them of course she got in but she played up like a secondhand lawnmower as she was always yelling and talking in class and not really fulfilling her talent they knew she was talented but what he would do this girl she's disrupting all the other ballet dancers so they expelled her and then she went to the Brit school and she also got thrown out of there but she didn't need it because Amy Winehouse was a force to be reckoned with she's Bowl she she would tell you exactly what she wanted and she was going to get it Brit school theater school or not and she did a very significant step in Amy's musical career was getting her first guitar it was actually a present for her brother Alex but she loved it and started singing and songwriting her boyfriend at the time Tyler James said this girl's good and sent a demo tape to nineteen management Simon Fuller's and company he signed her up they kept her as a bit of an industry secrets they knew she was good didn't quite know what to do with her and then eventually she got publishing deal with EMI amy was then headhunted from 19 management's by darkest bees then a in our director at island Universal by now she had totally aligned herself to the strong RMB in hip hop movement rushing through the British music scene I was very influenced by mm hip hop from Ireland you know for maybe I mean seriously I mean I would knew that it would be the thing the direction I would follow in my life maybe when I was 13 is when I knew that I would have to follow that music because there was nothing else that spoke to me and today you know I'm reminded every day how important music is to me you know people say it means poor Lisa from steps it's just a laugh it just means it and you're like no nothing else speaks to me too i music does that's why I'm doing what I'm doing Amy's first album Frank caused a real stir in the music business apart from two covers every song was co-written by Amy and heavily influenced by jazz producer Salaam Remi when amis music came along there had been nothing like it before she took so many influences from jazz to sixties girl bands she looked incredible to the lyric store at your heartstrings the voice oh my god the voice she was almost like a black blues singer incredible [Music] [Music] most of Amy's material came from personal experience reflecting her rule feelings on romantic relationships with men it's just funny how all my singles are geared on this man you know I mean I've written quite a few songs for this this ex-boyfriend but that's just because I was writing the album at the time you know and it just so happens that all the singles are like heartbreak like they're the three songs from when we split up like serious the serious song I might never be able to get boyfriend the album was nominated for Brit Awards in 2004 for Best British male 'test and best Brit urban act this is song about people it's being with someone that you've been with who knows you and knows what you like and just about a kind of sadness because it's not like it was and a kind of happiness because it is and it's just about that kind of conflicting ex-boyfriend situation [Music] later that year Amy won the Ivor Novello award for best contemporary song with stronger than me and the award nominations just kept coming so how does it feel to be one of the few females and I mean has it fit to be not I mean to be nominated is amazing it's not about whether you're male or female you know I work hard them out you know I'm sure that amazing thing to be recognized without you know is it because I mean you up to to mobos what would you rather win if you could choose one and why I mean you know what just the nominations in themselves to be honest and mobile Mobile nominations and this nomination this is such a an honor you know I thought I'd get overlooked in the mobos I never dreamed I'd party to be nominated for a Mercury silence about such as things surprises you know such as themed things so meaning you go obviously performing in there how do you feel for forming in front of the judges who you know I mean that's where I'm in my element you know I'm much more comfortable talking and talking and I come through when I'm singing more than when I'm talking and you know I took three hours and not saying the same thing as I could in three seconds on a track so I'm really privileged they asked me to perform because I know it's not every nominee get a me sound was a unique and as a songwriter she was gold dust to be compared or even mentioning the same presses and it's a Cheryl you know no one here what Erykah Badu you know that is an amazing thing you know and I'm not I know I'm not the only girl that feels blessed to have grown up in an age where we can have Lauryn Hill's album and Erykah Badu's album and not only where not only in an age where we can hear them but in an age where I'm you know young and we grow to those albums we shape our lives for those albums and how these women profile themselves you know that's real women [Music] she puts so much sold into her music she wrote her songs herself and when she wrote her song it was like putting our blood and guts on the table and and and and that's what made her so special that these this is not like some kind of you know manufactured pop this is Sundy who writes from the heart who sings from the heart who performs for the heart that's really what I'm going for you know as people to just connect to emotionally and feel like I said I'm like they're just getting me you know I mean probably more me with them well yeah more me with the music than I am on any TV thing or any radio thing because it's me is my music is the only area in my life where I'm fully confident and fully embraced everything you know I mean so so yeah one of Amy's greatest loves was sixties girl groups she borrowed the instantly recognizable beehive hairdo and Cleopatra makeup from the Ronettes it was an iconic look that many teenage girls were keen to follow and even got the approval of fashion designer Karl Lagerfeld and I like this how do I took it as inspiration because in fact it was Brigitte Bardot's hairdo from the late fifties and sixties she used to invent it was a French cordis ooh cool and she made it with her dark hair so I thought it was the right moment because for me is the double cleanser is Brigitte Bardot and Amy Winehouse around the time of her meteoric rise to fame Amy met two men who would change her life forever uber trendy record producer Mark Ronson and a new lover called Blake fielder-civil there's no doubt that Blake fielder-civil was the love of his life I think when it was great it was wonderful I think she'd never experienced happiness like that also fair to say that she was the one who had the high-flying career he was a runner and for music videos she loved him she loved the way he looked she loved the hot sea war she thought that he was the male version of her she thought he was perfection they were complete and utter soulmates she adored him he adored her and they almost couldn't live without each other but they also both really destroyed each other Blake of course as creditors if that's the word that you can use but with credited with introducing Amy to hard drugs which was of course so terrible for her and and all I would wonder us how much of their relationship was based on love and actually how much of it was based on pure addiction Mark Ronson's relationship with Amy was more creative and productive Mark Ronson got involved with Amy U and he started playing a couple of demos for instance rehab on his radio show East Village radio station he loved it so did the listeners there was a huge buzz about it he said I want to work with this girl they got together immediately and the chemistry was it was amazing she told him like it was if she didn't think that his work was up to scratch she left him in order and he really admired that and appreciated that about email it became fantastic friends obviously it's Amy's work and she made very clear that it was her work and that mark just helped her with it but I think his help really did push that album to a new level I think Mark Ronson is incredibly talented quirky almost belongs to a different era the way he looks quite eccentric a perfectionist and getting together with some of us you like Amy a match made in heaven because they didn't follow the normal route off let's take the boxes and make a hit they thought no we'll do our we will create something original and something ultimately that will absolutely last the test of time the combination of Winehouse and Ronson was musically electric Back to Black was created and it would go down in history as one of the most highly original al of the 21st century but of course the inspiration behind this album was Blake fielder-civil and the passion that she put into that album was about the her passion for Blake at the time they met Blake had a girlfriend and he would often spend the night with her hence the line you go back to her and I go back to black I won't write anything unless it was directly personal to me just cuz I I wouldn't be able to tell the story right or really fill out the song with wee words because I wouldn't have done it Amy said at the time whenever he spent the night with her I would hit the bottle for comfort I was even drinking first thing in the morning by early afternoon I was a mess the one thing that continues to interest me is human behavior and interaction between two people or even the relationship between me and inside me Amy became more and more dependent on drugs and booze her record company then tried to get her to go to rehab and of course she was having none of it [Music] [Music] rehab was the first single to be released and Time magazine named it the best song of 2007 Amy also collaborated with other artists on singles like Valerie on Ronson solo album version later nominated for a 2008 Brit Award for Best British single along with Ronson's unique production style it was Amy's vocals and lyrics that continue to astound the critics on a deluxe version I think it is of Back to Black she she does an additional version of love is a losing game and and again she sings that with so much heart and so much soul and then when the songs finished she turns round at the end it's a pause you to hear her say it's alright and you can see in that both her brilliance and her insecurities she's just stunned something totally incredible totally magical she's done a rendition of this song that could move a stone statue to tears she's really delivered this and then she says alright because she needed the approval of others she was incredibly and when she was performing on stage she was sometimes looking for reassurance from the band sometimes people who brilliant sometimes don't realize quite how brilliant they are and and Amy was Amy was one of those and and perhaps it was her brilliance in some ways and coping without brilliance and the effect of that woman's ability to change it can be draining when you have written a song about something very very serious here it can be draining but also it gives you energy you can get energy from writing a song about something personal because you kind of shaking it off and once you put it in a song that's it it's done for me or once I have put situations in song I'm cool about them and I can and I think yeah dusted I'm calling her you know it does cut both ways yet welcome to the bridge 2007 on Valentine's Day 2007 Amy won a Brit for Best British female artist she was also nominated for Best British album this set feast your eyes magnificent it looks like one of Amy Winehouse's tattoos very pleased to be acknowledged definitely it's definitely good to be only said to be acknowledged and to even being considered to be honest oh yeah I mean it's snuggly when you will but I'm not expected to be CMM my money's on either Amy on luckily Lee's gonna clean up this year I should get three but even greater recognition was on its way Amy broke America and was nominated for five Grammys but her wild-child reputation had gone before her and incredibly she was refused a US visa to attend the ceremony does the State Department believe that Amy Winehouse her music or her behavior poses a threat to the United States and if not why did you reject her visa application the State Department believes that she is ineligible for a visa under the terms of the immigration Nationality Act I don't believe anyone ever used the word threat associated with it but there are many reasons for which individuals are not eligible or otherwise need to have a waiver process the main point in this Matt is that she's not eligible under the the basic terms of the law unless a waivers processed for she's asked for one I understand Department Homeland Security is considering it and we'll see what happens how ludicrous is that I think the American music producers were pretty embarrassed by that Amy got round it and thankfully did a great performance from the UK on a live link and the more you look back and it's easy to say this in retrospect the more you look back Amy Winehouse's life you just think she was a living legend who else would do that who else would be banned from America and still be cool and show them that she was here in the UK and yeah her reputation there grew from there too and back in Britain the awards just kept on coming it's cold you know you think about things that you might want to see you know everyone else got picture paper I'm just like you know edge it anyway so like I'm like trying to think of things I'd like to say no people nervous and grab though in your life you know actually I'm gonna give it to my dad because I can't be trusted with anything although on the surface Amy appear to be coping with the trappings of fame and fortune by now her destructive personality was beginning to shine through along with her addiction to grade-a drugs like crack cocaine and alcohol many blamed her on-off relationship with Blake who was a serious substance abuser there's a physiological and a psychological basis to how addiction forms so let's assume somebody feels pain then they take a drug now the drug releases dopamine which is a neurotransmitter in the brain that dopamine is like a feel-good chemical it just makes us feel good and suddenly we have a a euphoric rush of pleasure we think this is a wonderful feeling and the brain thinks you know what like a better again so then we take the drug again and we feel the same euphoric rush and we take it again and again and again for after a while the brain stops producing dopamine so what happens is from a physiological perspective you need more and more of the drug no longer to give you any pleasure but just to keep the pain away of the fact that you haven't got the drug anymore and that's what happens to addiction and that's the cycle Amy Winehouse went on the drug started to have an impact on Amy's personality Amy's relationship the British press really changed from a cheerful girl who was very open and loving because she had nothing to hide this was all new to her this was an amazing experience it's what she always wanted she became more closed when she had more to hide when her management said to her do not talk to press she was out of it so she could have told any journalist a fantastic story and increasingly she would have more and more people around her when she was out in about trying to stop her from from giving people what they want [Music] exciting I dunno it's gonna be fun you know I mean you know I've got a nice meeting my band right sorry quite close so it's gonna be nice energy but I'm not fireworks that I mean you've got a long list of people you need to fast though if you do win one of the awards you're up for tonight everybody want to think about to be honest I think one of Amy's all-time career loads was when a newspaper in the UK actually filmed and then broadcast video of Amy taking crack cocaine and everyone knew just how bad things that got ironically as well Blake who was meant to be the love of her life and who was in many ways sold his story many times on Amy he was so desperate for money he'd make a couple of thousand pounds here and there for spilling the most intimate details of her life now in most normal relationships that would be the end of it but Amy always ran back to Blake no matter what he does it is said that the British press was relentless in seeing Amy go downwards but it has to be said that Amy lived her life out very publicly in London she would go to the pubs in Camden she reads sometimes become quite aggressive the photos we would get in above Amy on a weekly basis during the real depths of her drug addiction and relationship with Blake were just traumatic and I think nothing was more traumatic than the photo of Amy's bail a pump shoes covered in blood most people believe that that was because she had actually been injecting heroin between her toes it was grown it was awful and here was this icon of our times reduced to that the public gets as a song goes what the public wants and the public want to see images of people on the road to ruin they want to see images of Amy Winehouse and they want to look at the passion they may feel for they may feel sympathy for her but sometimes it's a bit too much like gossip and sensationalism in August 2007 Amy and blake announced their engagements and a month later they married in Miami Amy's father Mitch made his feelings about Blake crystal clear to the press seeing his daughter become emaciated covered in tattoos worrying for her her health Mitch said to me I hate that man I would do anything to get him out of her life anything at all and I can understand if I was in amy's parents position the one thing I would want to do would be get her away from Blake there is absolutely no question about that but there's a difference in the impulse to want to get a me away from Blake to actually blaming Blake for everything to happen and they're two separate issues what Blake did was make drugs hardcore drugs you know crack came an everyday part of his relationship with Amy and that became everyday life for her very quickly she had a very addictive personality it seemed that they could and they both said as much they couldn't be with each other they couldn't be without each other they almost loved too much and they've been compared to Sid Vicious and Nancy many times they just the feelings were so strong Georgette's who's Blake's mother said that there were soul mates Amy and Blake but they were both as bad as each other they both dragged each other down and it's well known that when two addicts get together and they're in a relationship if one tries to get clean the other will often bring them back it's like if two people smoked one of them smoking the other will give in and see oh I'll have won the war both as bad as each other and they loved each other so much that it destroyed Amy rapport started to circulate that Amy could be violent when she was under the influence when it comes to some of Amy's violent behavior you know it's not a case of whether you can justify it or not she's an addict when she's an addict when she's he's very very wired at the best of times she's always very very passionate and and very driven but when you put the drugs inside her you know that behavior becomes totally unpredictable so yeah she's capable of all sorts of things you know she slapped a photographer I think she spat at Pippa Middleton which like after the Royal Wedding is you cone of shooting Bambi you know that it's totally socially unacceptable of course it's socially unacceptable that's the sort of things that addicts do but actually what we need to understand before we judge the person judge the situation and assess the situation those people find themselves in it's not a case of condoning it it's just a case of saying look you're dealing somebody was under here who has a serious health problem amy was incredibly violent at times and she was under the influence I mean I think a lot of people get like that but one of the differences was amy was that you know she if she went out she was surrounded she was mobbed at times there could be hundreds of cameras around her hundreds of fans as well and I do remember reporting stories where Amy had just waxed fans and these rages when she was trying to get home from one of the pubs and Camden's so during her darkest lowest moments on drugs it wasn't nice to witness it wasn't nice to be around in 2009 Amy assaulted a theater manager at a Cinderella pantomime and a few months later pleaded guilty at Milton Keynes Magistrates Court civil has been given a two-year conditional discharge she's also been ordered to pay an 85 pounds fine and a hundred pounds in compensation then came the shocking news that amy was self harming and that Blake was doing it with her it had been a continuous habit with Amy since a teenager self-harm is a complex phenomenon it's estimated that one in 15 teenage girls sometimes more as he self-harm to some degree or other some people have been sexually abused will South harm or some people have gone through some traumas children they'll begin to self-harm it's just another strategy to ease the pain and that too could become a compulsive behavior pattern just like any other addiction when Amy was self harming and that happened when she was in her relationship with Blake and at times they even appeared to do it together that was one of for me one of the most unsavory parts of her decline because you just knew something was really really wrong to be doing that I mean she was just married she was with the guy she had all the success she wanted in the world so why was she self harming it just and it made no sense the couple's marriage became more and more volatile and in August that year amy was rushed to hospital after a heavy binge of heroin ketamine cocaine and ecstasy as they spiraled into addiction Amy and Blake's lies became like a soap opera Blake was arrested a few weeks later for assaulting a barman and carrying an imitation firearm he was sentenced to nearly 3 years in jail in the end Amy would do anything for Blake she was desperate to keep him out to prison and there are rumors that she even tried to pay people off to keep Blake out of the police cells but it just didn't work she couldn't do it he was a bad apple and he was always going to go down the next chapter in the Amy Winehouse story saw Amy retreat to the Caribbean island of st. Lucia in an attempt to get her music career back on track meanwhile Blake remained in prison she did actually spend weeks and weeks on end in st. Lucia I think the record company thought this would be a good opportunity for her to finally work on that third album so they did set her up in a record studio on the island but in the end but from what I was told the material they were getting was just not up to scratch and most of it was scrapped the word on the street was that amy was off the drugs but they're serious addiction now seemed to be alcohol word filtered back through tourists that she was on her hands and knees every night crawling around because she was so drunk she was a girl who clearly was tortured no matter where she was I mean she drunk every day she'd have tequila for breakfast there were loads of reports about her getting freaky with some some of the locals there and obviously she had some romances on the island as well which weren't necessarily a bad thing but I think the fundamental point was is that it showed even when you removed Amy completely from the lifestyle that she was used to actually there was no getting away from the fact that this was an addicted woman an addict and the true sense of the word people have said ordered sent me was st. Lucia a good or a bad thing for for Amy Winehouse but you know it's just a place you know Amy Winehouse took herself and her problems in her addiction wherever it was she went and and there were some things that were better for her than others there was no doubt that her codependency with Blake was very destructive for her and there was no doubt there was some people like a relationship with Mark Ronson which was which was actually very good for him or beneficial for her but actually at the end of the day she's fighting her own addiction and whatever she goes she takes that addiction with her she takes her emotions with her she takes her feelings with her she takes everything internal all that baggage with her and sender she was no different I remember speaking to her during that time and she'd just come back to London and all she wanted to talk about was simon cowell she wasn't interested in talking about her career or what problems she was going through everything was just a big joke and a big laugh to her the absence of a third album was also highlighted by the fact that Amy had contracted emphysema a lung complication aggravated by her chronic abuse of crack cocaine and smoking by now her record label was in despair I think in the end the record company just gave up on Amy in a lot of ways they didn't want to put any pressure on her to release a third album or to record a third album because they knew how emotionally vulnerable and fragile she was so actually because I think they felt the stakes were so high Back to Black was such a brilliant record they weren't gonna release something until they knew it was spot-on after nine months on the Caribbean paradise Amy came back to Camden in the summer of 2009 Blake's new partner was now pregnant and after Amy admitted adultery Blake filed for divorce but it said that Amy didn't really want it and even fought against it she said at the time I won't let him divorce me he's the male version of me and we're perfect for each other there's no doubt there was an addictive side to the relationship between between Blake and Amy I mean ordinary couples who've been in a relationship and split up can sometimes really find it very difficult to let go you know some of they would get back together again or maybe they just sleep together once or twice more or it's very difficult to let somebody go when you're an addict which both of them were it becomes even more so especially when when you're living your relationship in the glare of the global media Amy could never let go of Blake I remember writing about her divorce at the time and I broke a lot of stories around the fact that Amy just didn't want to let Blake go she didn't want the Stovall's it was something that was almost forced on her and Blake and me and didn't want it either and he was with other woman and sort of flaunted it in front of Amy's face but when it came down to it everything they did was to affect each other and they did have some almighty bus stops but fundamentally they loved each other they were a bit like Romeo and Juliet nothing could keep them and heart upon their divorce and at his own request Blake received no money in the settlements [Music] by now Amy's dad Mitch had carved out a name for himself as a Frank Sinatra style crooner it was clear where Amy got her musical drive from Amy said to me five or six years ago dad why don't you do an album and the we kind of agreed to do it but then Amy because he's well-documented became ill and the timing wasn't right and then the time then she got better the timing got better so you know we decided to do the album now mitch is a huge personality as well and actually you can see where amy got a lot of her personality from because he was a normal black cab driver who actually became famous off the back of Amy and then launched his own music career off the back of Amy now look some people think that wasn't a wise thing for him to do but the fact of the matter is he was taking the opportunities that came asome I mean some people have said to me I've leveled the accusation you're only doing this because sure Amy's dead it's hot it's true I am only doing this because I'm Amy's dad I won't get the chance at all I could be the best singer in the world but a 59 nobody else would give me a shot you know I'm only getting this shot because her mom is dead [Music] are people going to want to come and see that's what I'm nervous about I'm when I get up there I'm not nervous to the actual singing but that minute moment when you open the curtain you go [ __ ] it's three people sitting in there and and one of them's my aunty you know it's a bit that I find a bit daunting but sadly Amy wasn't as reliable a performer admit if you have a ticket to her gig you don't know if she's going to turn up you don't know what you're going to get when she came on stage sometimes though when I've spoken to friends who a couple of months before her death watched her at the hundred club and said it was a great night that she was perfect she was lucid and she was as talented as ever why often she would make impromptu performances I remember once a couple of years Beckett the V Fest which was one of the main festivals in London over the summer and Amy just turned up on stage with the roots and ended up drinking backstage with me and a whole load of other people who just happened to be at the festival that day and no one had any idea she was going to be there on that occasion amy was just out to party she wanted to have fun she wanted to get up on stage she wanted to have a few drinks backstage but actually on a day like there that was actually a mere - abyss because there were a lot of industry people around she had her security guard with her and because it was at a music festival and she was in a an artist area she wasn't going to be mobbed too much but you know I remember all of the members of other bands who were there at the time the only person they were actually interested in talking to was Amy Winehouse she was such an icon even to celebrities the thing about an addict is their lives are chaotic and it's not just the external manifestations of that chaos that people see their unreliability the inability to sustain relationships their codependency on destructive with people who who are in a destructive relationship with them they would draw from relationships like with their family etc their inability to create it's also the inner chaos it's the chaos we don't see that when they put their head on the pillow at night that chaos that's running through their heads despite all of Amy's problems music producer Mark Ronson now a rising star was still keen to work with her Mark Ronson Amy Winehouse always had an electric relationship when they work together it was so inspiring and also of course they were very good friends and Mark was horrified as he watched Amy's decline and he did everything he could to try and help so for example he wanted to record the theme song with Amy Ford the James Bond movie Quantum of Solace she'd be perfect at it the big booming Shirley Bassey esque voice but done in Amy Winehouse style but when she turned up the drink the drugs affected her performance she couldn't perform it'd be another Bend or should fall asleep in the studio it was a disaster for him said you fans who worried about I know that talked about that so and then actually it was really tragic that in the final days Amy even very publicly dressed marked down on Twitter she'd read an interview that he had done where he claimed some of the credit for Back to Black but in actually quite a nice way and Amy talked to a personal Twitter page and basically told him that Marc was trying to take half the credit for her work and that he was trying to build a career out of her and that machine he needed to get over it brethren her words behind all the drugs there is a person you've got to understand who's speaking it did the drug speaking or was it the person speaking and I believe that my ransom was not only obviously great for Amy Winehouse and they had a very close bond but I also believe that when she attacked Ronson deep down she loved him and she felt very connected to him and that's the drug speaking he was devastated because it was like he was being cut off from one of the best people he'd worked with but a great friend he had to think though well the girls ill and I don't think that it actually affected the way he thought of her in the end because when Amy died he said I've lost my little sister there's the famous song you know you always heard the ones you love you know and and with an a date-date they always hurt they hurt themselves far more than they hurt anybody else but they always hurt the ones they love because you know most addicts are covered with his guilt or shame or they feel they judge themselves very harshly but then they resent others for judging them they withdraw from social contact they feel sometimes incredibly hostile towards people who are simply trying to help them [Music] in her final two years Amy seemed to find some former security with film director reg Travis although many believe she could not break the bond with Blake there's no doubt amy was still in love with Blake at the end of her life she really couldn't accept that he was with another girl that he had a child what's really heartbreaking is the Amy Winehouse said I love singing but I was put on this earth to be a wife and to be a mother and she was a wife too bleak but she never got to be the mother that she saw craved to be and she had to watch the love of her life have this child with somebody else indeed Blake's partner came forward to say that he's absolutely devastated about her death and that she kind of knows that she's always going to be second-best to Amy she saw them together Amy and fluke and said there were soulmates which is quite hard for a woman to accept that you're never going to match up to the love of your partner's life Amy's mother Janice had never been as damning as Mitch in her criticism of Blake and in many ways she had become resigned to Amy's wild lifestyle now Janice loved Timmy she looked like Amy it's heartbreaking when you see the two of them very similar facially Janice I think faced heartbreak well before his death because she said that she felt her daughter was playing Russian roulette with her life she met Amy the day before she died and what she can take with her at least is the Emmy said I love you mum when they were parting however Janice said I don't know how long she'll go on because she really was out of it still only 27 by now Amy had pushed her body to its limit amy was completely ravaged by her years of drug addiction crack cocaine and then she had emphysema which was really made particularly difficult for her from a health perspective and meant that her addiction to alcohol became even more traumatic to her physically there the impairment of cognitive capacity the impairment of judgment it wrecks your body drugs wreck your body but the point is every addict knows that you know it's no secret Ami's decline was obvious at her final appearance on stage in Belgrade now what her manager did was give her small gigs where she was the support act he didn't want to put her in a stadium with tens of thousands of people because that would be too much for her but even the small give she was playing she couldn't handle there was a feeling with her management that come on she's ready there were glimmers of hope there that she was back on her feet but she couldn't handle the pressure [Applause] when she was booed that night in Belgrade well it's a vicious circle she probably took drinking drugs to bolster her confidence and then when she was on stage people booing it shattered her confidence so much now again is there an argument to say actually maybe she was safer when she was on the road and performing because at least she had her support network around her at least she was doing something as Eric Clapton once said to Pete Townsend Pete Townsend said oh yeah he really creates better when he's on drugs no said Eric you think you create better when you're on drugs and and sometimes because addicts become unreliable and because their lives are chaotic and then there's external pressures on them to do what they used to do before which is write great songs or create great books or perform brilliantly in public and they can't do it anymore the shot they can't do it and then that create an added pressure and that's the cycle that goes on and undoubtedly happened with Amy [Music] despite all the fears news of Amy's death still came as a terrible shock and immediately the press started to ask who if anyone was to blame Janice Amy's mum had seen her on the Friday before her death and Amy's last words to where I love you mum Mitch who was a New York promotion his own music career when Amy tragically died had tweeted just 11 days earlier before the death saying amy is fine so clearly I think they thought there were glimmers of hopes but the fact of the matter is you can as a parent you can't be with your child 24 hours a day 7 days a week when that 27 years old and that truly devastated truly devastated and it must be heartbreaking because you go through that high of having your daughter as the biggest star in the world and look how quickly it turns the devastation I bet they wish Amy had never even got into that world Amy Winehouse herself said if you can't sort something out yourself no one can help you and she's absolutely right you know ultimately you can say and I'm sure her parents you know Mitch and Janice I'm sure they will be going over and over and over again if only we've done this if only we've done that if only we've done the other but there's one thing you can be sure of Amy wouldn't want him to do that because ultimately it wasn't their fault they did the best they could they handled an extraordinarily complex situation an emotionally traumatic situation for them which is to watch their child destroy herself in the final analysis most people were quick to point the finger at Blake for Amy's demise Blake got a bad press and some times it was deserved what is wrong was to blame anybody for somebody else's death amy was an addict every addict is introduced by someone and ultimately they have to take responsibility georgette who's Blake's mother said that there were soulmates Amy and bleak but the report as bad as each other they both dragged each other down I don't think Blake will ever get over this I think Blake loved Amy every bit as much as Amy loved him and it is unfair to paint him as a callous character who killed her people to see that and it's very unfair because here is a man who asked not to get a penny in divorce and who says that he loved her so much but couldn't be with her couldn't be without her they were both exactly the same others looked to blame her management when I saw her on stage during that shambolic performance in Belgrade I just thought this is not right this is not a woman who should be on stage she should not be performing something has to be done here our Chris isms been leveled at Rico's by her manager but an already very well and he loved the ghetto like she was his daughter he said to me and that weekend the losing her was like losing his parents that's how close he felt to and he did everything for her and he loved her and if he could have stepped in and stopped all of this happen and he would have done but ultimately he was our manager I'm not a father you can't tell a Grammy winner a multi-millionaire how to lead their life she makes the decisions ultimately and if she wanted to go into it was her call he's kicking himself that he wasn't in Serbia and in Belgrade the night when she fell off the rails the people in need to ask questions are the friends who supplied over the drinking the drugs that brought her off the rails I mean ami had been given a lot of help for a lot for a long time so she was seen a doctor up until she died she was ironically an outpatient at of the Priory the big rehab facility in the UK at the time of her death so there is an argument that she was being looked after at the same time I believe there will always be questions about whether enough had been done I mean why wasn't she sectioned for it sampled that's a question that I think will potentially haunt some of the people close to her did she need more people around her 24 hours a day she had one bodyguard but maybe she needed more caregivers in the house checking on her once an hour I mean look it's one of these things where it's very easy in hindsight you don't want to blame anyone but I do think some questions about whether she was being looked after in the right way obviously valid because for whatever reason it didn't work many had seen Amy's new fiance reg Travis as a beacon of light in her otherwise chaotic life rich Travis top film director and he was the man who everyone in Amy's life hoped and actually prayed would be able to turn her around he was a respectable guy in a lot of ways he wasn't involved in that Camden lifestyle and he did genuinely seem to care for her but of course in the end he even he and his influence just wasn't enough to stop amy's pull into that very dark lifestyle when the news broke that Amy had been found dead at a Counting home on July 23rd 2011 shocked fans set up a shrine to her the tributes to Amy are very touching from fans who really cared about her who loved her music you have handwritten letter as many seeing you touched my life and I'll always remember you there are vodka bottles whiskey bottles packets of [ __ ] and actually I think it's very respectful because what they're trying to do is sure little light see that you were a livewire you were somebody who lit up life and we're just trying to remember you as a legend I wasn't surprised by the huge volume of fans who wanted to pay tribute to Amy it was a bit like Princess Diana but it was a very different sort of fan who was coming up it was young people it was people who had been affected by her life some people I think really related to Amy's battles people kind of identify with that kind of struggle people think you know what there but for the grace of God go I and some way they just want to give her tribute well you might not have made it but you did you best and that's what matters in the midst of his grief Mitch was still keen to talk about his daughter you people in the street I can't tell you what this means to is it really is making this a lot easier for us you know I knew was about one thing and that was love a whole life was devoted to her family and her friends we're devastated and I'm speechless thanks for coming thank you Amy's funeral service at Edgware Barry took place soon after her death in accordance with Jewish tradition and her cremation at Golders Green Crematorium in London was a sad and somber affair I met Mitch twice and interviewed him extensively both times the first was the first time he'd actually publicly been interviewed and it was maybe six years ago when amy was really quite ill and i said to him it must be heartbreaking for you to know that people have almost pinned her obituary because they're waiting and he said you know Martel is something I've done myself mentally I've pinned her Abba true many times what's tragic is that that came to pass [Music] of course it was Mitch who gave Amy's eulogy at the service [Music] the one person conspicuous by his absence was Blake fielder-civil it's not surprising that report suggests that he didn't attend out of respect for Amy's family he never thought he would see the day when the love of his life wasn't there anymore we all knew it could happen and he was in touch with her until the end because she wanted him back and if he could have found a way he would have been with her he just couldn't find that he said that his tears will never dry he will never ever recover [Applause] Ami's voice has been compared to some of the greatest singers of all time but what's likely to happen with the material she has left behind she still had so much more to give you know she had the potential to be the Edith Piaf of her generation there was still so much more to come and there is talk of a third album that's finished but whether they choose to release that or not it's a massive question I think there is a real argument about whether her material that she recorded before her death should be released I mean it obviously wasn't up to scratch enough to be released while she was alive but I do think there's gonna be such a clamor there's gonna be such demand from fans I think probably the people around Amy will try and put together a package that does her justice I think what they will want to be very careful about is that we don't end up having an album that doesn't do Amy justice and so in fact you don't want to water down her musical legacy Amy's dad Mitch has confirmed that the multi-million dollar home where Amy died in Camden is to become headquarters of a new rehab foundation it will be boosted by profits from a new jet single body in Seoul recorded just weeks before her death with music legend Tony Bennett's [Music] ever controversial this was amy winehouse brilliant tempestuous unpredictable and funny she was also the most original and sparkling talents of her generation compared to the likes of Janis Joplin and Judy Garland she was an icon in Britain especially for 20-somethings in Britain she represented a new breed of pop star Amy's legacy will be to last forever the terms legend and genius when it comes to singer songwriters are way too overused Amy deserves them she absolutely does there's only one album that was amazing but my god what an album it was it will beep lead forever she had her Luke she had her sound and she was loved I also think she should be remembered as a songwriter incredible lyrics incredible melodies and also she was groundbreaking Adele Lady Gaga and Rihanna have all said that if it wasn't for Amy Winehouse they wouldn't have had their success so I think that's one of the reasons she is so significant and so iconic because she actually changed the music industry and that's what music icons do do a parent she'll be just be the daughter they they loved and always will love you know Blake it'll be the woman he felt most connected to and possibly more connected to anybody else who ever get connected to in his life and to our fans and to music critics she'll just be remembered as somebody who produced some of the best most soulful and wonderful music any one of her generation truly comfortable is writing music and singing you know one thing is for certain she will go down in music history as one of the greatest female singer songwriters of the 21st century [Music]

Channel: FREE MOVIES

Views: 1,741,489

Keywords: amywinehouse, rehab, full documentary, full movie, music, free movie, free documentary, documentary, 1091, on demand

Id: zXt99I_F5Sg

Length: 70min 47sec (4247 seconds)

Published: Fri Apr 20 2018