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Reviews
Amy (2015)
Not an easy watch.
'Amy' (the film) highlights the obvious perils of pop music fame, sex, drugs, alcohol and every rock n roll cliché, with one main underlying current. No matter how great the person, how strong the voice, how catchy the songs, if the people closest to you aren't playing with a straight bat, you're in trouble. Alcohol and drugs played a massive part in Amy's demise, the film will also let you draw your own conclusions on who else was responsible and why she was allowed to get to such levels of addiction and despair before any real help was forthcoming. Watching 'Amy' is a macabre experience as you allow yourself to smile during her pre-headline innocent years. I find myself waiting for the dark days, not wanting to get attached to the upbeat teenage jazz singer smiling at me from the HD cinema screen. Early live footage reveals just what a talent in waiting AW was, young, confident, funny and a voice that could floor an elephant. But behind the scenes we learn of her bulimia, father Mitchell's infidelity, her mothers lack of control and how the pair's lack of any parental discipline molded her own life. Enter Blake Fielder-Civil, the love of her life, her dark inspiration. The relationship with Blake is laid out in all it's distressing glory. Blake confesses to introducing Amy to Crack, Coke and Heroin, a regular user himself before they paired up. Then he left her for his previous girlfriend, leaving Amy an emotional and physical wreck. Friends and managers begged her to go to Rehab, she left the final decision to her father, who said she didn't need it. A hit song was born and her life as we see, is ended. The missed window of opportunity of getting Amy into rehab early in her addictions proved a massive turning point in her life, personally and professionally. Chart success on both sides of the pond, reconciliation and marriage to Blake, Grammy's, artistic recognition and a house in Camden, for a time she thought she had everything she had ever wanted. Then the footage becomes harder to watch as Amy deteriorates. She becomes a Red top superstar, each disaster spread out for the nations titillation. If handled correctly Blake going to jail could have been the saving of her, for a time she was clean then plummeted. Footage of a one off concert in Serbia, (possibly the most ill advised trip since Hitler's winter invasion of Russia). Amy makes it on stage but refuses to sing, a drunk, stumbling, shambolic mess, it's not easy to watch. In fact it's utterly depressing. The films final shots of a body bag leaving her Camden home put a rotten cherry on this whiskey and coke soaked cake. Ultimately 'Amy' is a painfully insightful film, Blake and Mitchell may want to avoid it, they are (rightly or wrongly) cast as the villains, a pair of emotional and financial vampires. Their misplaced arrogance in interviews does nothing to help their cause. Amy Winehouse was one of the most original female artists this country has ever produced, period. She deserved, in life and love, better.
Guy Shankland 16/07/15
We Are Twisted F***ing Sister! (2014)
The real story of Twisted Sister!!!
WE ARE TWISTED F**KIN SISTER !
A Film By Andrew Horn.
I was fifteen years old when I saw my first concert, Twisted Sister, March 25th 1986 Hammersmith Odeon London. The 'Come Out And Play' tour, it changed everything, a door was opened and some three decades later it's still ajar. For me, like so many, TS first came to my attention via the 'Were Not Gonna Take It' and 'I Wanna Rock', singles of the Stay Hungry album. It was (for me) new, angry, anthemic, exciting and bizarre. The now famous promotional video's made them the darlings (for a while) of a new MTV generation. Before the fame, MTV, Atlantic Records and sold out world tours there was the 'Club Daze', ten years of working the nightclubs and bars of the Tri-state area of New York, between 1972-1982. This crowd funded film by Andrew Horn has been made with the bands full approval and co-operation. WATFS concentrates on the bands pre mass fame years 1972-1982, the making of the Twisted Sister. WATFS is not your usual heavy metal/rock band clichéd sex, drugs, divorce, suicide rehab, Bimbo's and TV's out of windows tale.
This is the real world of a hard working band, focused, hungry (stay), on their own struggle to 'make it'. To get a record deal and break out of the confines of the New York area and one day rule the rock world. No stone is left unturned, no detail missed, the stories from past, present and sadly departed members (Drummer AJ Pero unexpectedly passed away earlier this year from a heart condition while on tour with rock band Adrenaline Mob.) are told with a refreshing pride and honesty. The two main interviewees are singer Dee Snider and founding member, guitarist and CEO Jay Jay French. TS is Jay Jay's baby but Snider's child, the two talk openly on their internal battle to seize control of the band. Snider won the song writing, lead vocals, and costume choice, JJ remains the bands pragmatic business brains, historian, and media spokesman. We hear from Journalists, record executives, club owners, promoters, managers, road crew, rival bands and the original hardcore (SMF'S) fans. As an unsigned band they played five nights a week, performing between two and four sets per night. The band performed (at their height) to between three hundred and three thousand fans per night, earning up to ten thousand dollars an evening. T-shirts, posters, stickers and self made seven inch singles were all sold in vast numbers making TS a full time wage paying band. They sold out the New York Palladium in 1979 without a record deal or any real promotion, Three thousand two hundred fans. Even with this manic following they needed to cross the pond to finally get a record deal, of sorts. The UK saved TS then drowned them and saved them again, Sounds music paper, Secret Records, Lemmy and The Tube TV show all gave the band credibility and exposure on a nationwide scale. The band never looked back, high profile live dates mixed with their sheer determination finally paid off. Within two years of getting signed by Atlantic they were to become the multi platinum selling artist they always believed they should and would be. As a music documentary it works a number of levels, you are transported back to the late 70's, the club flyer's, live footage, early band photographs, all draw you back to a much tougher but simpler social media free, time and place. For Twisted Sister fans this is a 'must see', for everyone else a 'you really should see'.
The next chapter also needs to be told, the commercial success, Tipper Gore's PMRC, Senate hearings, Beau Hill, break ups, Dee's other musical projects, 9-11, reunions, The Xmas album!! (my pet hate), their 2016 final ever tour and the tragic loss of AJ Pero.
Play It Loud Mutha!
Guy Shankland
02/06/2015
For more information regarding 'We Are Twisted F**king Sister The Movie', including release dates, screening, trailers etc..please check https://www.facebook.com/TwistedSisterTheMovie