Yahoo Movies Back to Black debuts with soft Rotten Tomatoes rating after first reviews
Amy Winehouse biopic Back to Black has received a mixed score over on Rotten Tomatoes.
At the time of writing, the movie's rating stands at 53%, with the majority of critics left spellbound by Marisa Abela's performance as the soul-singing sensation, while they were rather less impressed by the story's depth.
Below, you'll find snippets from the current reviews.
Related: Back to Black review: Amy Winehouse biopic fails to hit the right note
"It's a movie with the simplicity, even the naivety, of a fan-tribute. But there's a thoroughly engaging and sweet-natured performance from Marisa Abela as Amy – though arguably taking the rougher edges off. The only time Abela is less than persuasive is when she has to get into a fight on the north London streets of Camden.
"Back to Black is essentially a gentle, forgiving film and there are other, tougher, bleaker ways to put Winehouse's life on screen – but Abela conveys her tenderness, and perhaps most poignantly of all her youth, so tellingly at odds with that tough image and eerily mature voice."
"Perhaps the issue is the film's concept: the script draws its inspiration from her lyrics in Back to Black, and [Blake] Fielder-Civil was the subject of this second and final album. But while the songs act as a musical-like narrative of her life, no time is devoted to showing us how she made them (pouring them out fully-formed in her bedroom with an acoustic guitar doesn't count).
"We see none of the artistic decisions she made in the studio that led to her becoming a phenomenon, or the complicated but powerful singer-songwriter who won five Grammys in one night. In Back to Black, Amy Winehouse is just a girl singing about a boy."
Related: Why Marisa Abela was cast as Amy Winehouse in Back to Black
"Since Bohemian Rhapsody took home four Academy Awards in 2019, it feels as if music biopics have been coming down the slop chute thick and fast, with debates around their ethics, impersonations and omissions becoming ever more tedious. Sam Taylor-Johnson's Amy Winehouse biopic, Back to Black, might just be the defining stench emanating from the pail."
"The film doesn't land the same emotional impact as Asif Kapadia's Oscar-winning documentary Amy. Instead, it works best as a love story between the singer and Fielder-Civil – their tumultuous time together inspiring songs like 'Back to Black' itself. Knitting it all together is a terrific turn from Abela, who not only looks the part (tattoos, beehive hairdo, etc.) but gives a remarkable vocal performance, sounding uncannily like the singer on record."
"By the end of Back to Black, we've observed Amy rise to fame, fall in love, get heartbroken, and die but we never really get to know what makes her tick. There's a lot of emphasis on her familial relationships, not just with Mitch [Winehouse] and the mother (Juliet Cowan) who barely features, but also with her grandmother Cynthia (Lesley Manville, moving).
"But the film doesn't examine how this seemingly happy clappy North London Jewish family singing Yiddish songs around the piano might have shaped Amy in any way apart from instilling a love of music and getting her into performing arts school."
Back to Black is released in UK cinemas on April 12 and in US cinemas on May 17.
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