Amy, the much anticipated Amy Winehouse documentary from award-winning Senna director Asif Kapadia, has been branded “misleading” in an official statement from the Winehouse family. The late singer’s dad Mitch told the BBC’s Newsbeat program that the film is “tainted.”
The documentary includes previously-unseen archive footage and unheard tracks, but the Winehouse family has distanced themselves from the project as they feel it contains “basic untruths.” The singer’s struggle with addiction and the support she received from the people around her are the main points of contention. An official statement from the family explains that, “By misunderstanding the condition and its treatment, the film suggests, for instance, that not enough was done for Amy—that her family and management pushed her into performing or did not do enough to help her.”
Mitch also told Newsbeat, “I was there every day, and if I wasn’t there – because I was working or I was away somewhere or she was away somewhere – she’d phone seven times a day. And there’s no sense of that in the film and that’s what’s disappointing.” The official statement explains that, “Through their work with the Amy Winehouse Foundation, Amy’s family have met many others enduring through the same struggle that they endured and have helped hundreds of disadvantaged young people in Amy’s name. They will continue to do so and hope their work creates more understanding of a terrible illness.”