Director Asif Kapadia’s 2010 documentary Senna managed to do what many might have considered impossible: it got the art-house crowd interested in the life of a race car driver. Ayrton Senna, the Brazilian driver at the heart of the story, lived to push the envelope — as a boy, he drove a homemade go-kart powered by a lawnmower engine — before a terrible accident took his life at the age of 34 on the course of the San Marino Grand Prix. It was a tragic death, but Kapadia’s film also brought home the intense joys of doing what one is truly drawn to do.
Now, Kapadia is back with another story of drive and disaster, but with a likely more familiar subject. The film is called Amy, and the woman whose short life — even shorter than Senna’s — makes up its tale is British songstress Amy Winehouse. Gone for four years now — Winehouse died from alcohol poisoning at 27, in the summer of 2011 — the singer’s short, meteoric burst of a career is both inspiring and sobering.
In an unusual twist, it is Winehouse and her friends who give Kapadia some of his best footage. Compulsive videographers, they amassed what turned out to be a true treasure trove of early footage of Winehouse. In those years — and in footage of a teenaged Winehouse singing “Moon River” during a talent competition — there is certainly a hint of what she was capable of with her voice, but the young woman singing on screen seems worlds away from the increasingly hollowed-out figure she became just a few years later. Early on, Winehouse was effervescent and even goofy, like someone getting ready for her first summer of theater camp.
But if things went badly, it wasn’t only on her. Her relationship with her husband was famously troubled by drug abuse, but here Kapadia also shines a light on her father’s behavior — after leaving the family when his daughter was still a young girl, he circled back later, getting a reality TV show that brought a camera crew to his daughter’s attempt at drying out. (Her parents claim the film presents them unfairly.)
It’s impossible to know, of course, what could have been. Would a sober Winehouse, or a Winehouse with a more stable family life, have produced the same wounded-but-proud soul records that made her famous? Would a Winehouse who lived longer have found peace with her own history and moved into a new musical phase? Look for the scenes where she records (or attempts to record) with Tony Bennett to see the difference that simply surviving can make. We can only wish that she did.
Also this week: Film School in 60 Minutes returns to Amherst Cinema for a dissertation on Casablanca. Hosted by Valley resident and film expert Nina Kleinberg, the noontime Saturday presentation hearkens back to Kleinberg’s days as a new transplant to the area, when she would go to movies with her new friends, but leave feeling like they had watched different films. Out of that feeling grew Film School 101, an informal affair that consisted of potluck film nights at friends’ homes; after watching the night’s movie, Kleinberg would present a talk on how it was made.
The one-hour talk covers everything from choice of camera angles and musical themes to the casting of extras used in the scenes at Rick’s Café Americain (many were actual refugees trying to escape the reach of Hitler). For local fans of film, it’s a great way to learn a bit about how the sausage is made. After you’ve learned about the behind the scenes work, take in the 2:30 p.m. screening of Casablanca to see how different this classic suddenly looks.•
Jack Brown can be reached at cinemadope@gmail.com.
