Viewing notes

• Opening sequence...
• Intertitle card ‘North London 1998’

  -Establishes location + time

  -Narrative temporal marker 
• Opens with Lauren’s digital archival footage on shaky handheld camera -DVR 
• V.O from interviews with family and friends 

  Narrative exposition told through dialogue
• Bleached tones (camera quality) mark age 


  Emphasises it’s an intimate and private moment from their past
• Crowded frame 3 shot 

  Feeling on closeness and intimacy
• Lauren speaks to camera (audience) “my 14th birthday”


  -Letting audience into special event

  -Signification of innocence and youth which will be later juxtaposed 
• Camera pans to Amy and lingering shot from LA centre framing as she sings ‘Happy Birthday’ 


  -Talent from young age highlighted --> Kapadia's subtle subjectivity of his admiration of Amy’s talent
• Montage of still black and white shots of Amy performing/Jazz stars performing (Tony Bennett)


  -Kuleshov effect --> draws comparison between them

  -Encourages preferred more subjective reading from audience, likening Amy to a jazz great
• Non-diegetic audio ‘Moon River’ by The National Jazz Orchestra and Amy Winehouse 
• VO interview of Amy herself (age 16) as opposed to VOG narration 


  -Difference between Kapadia and Broomfield

  -Aligned with Amy
• Purple lens flares 

  -Digital addition --> seamless feel
• Back to Black scene...
• Filmed on DVR: 2006
• Onscreen graphics


  Narrative –temporal/geographical marker 
• Mark Ronson (producer) recording session (he was

  recording a session for another artist then heard Amy singing and panned over)
• V.O of Amy ‘remember what his neck smells like’ (interview) and Ronson 


  Subjective access into her thoughts
• Cuts out non-diegetic backing track, non-diegetic singing, then brings it back in
• Onscreen lyrics

  Create meaning
• LS to zoom to CU handheld 

  Intimate 
• The Brits...
• Image still media portrait of Amy looking healthy backstage just before winning brits 

  -Taken on digital camera

  -Captures intimate moment

  -Cusp of fame
• J-cut/sound bridge to archival professional media footage of awards ceremony 
• Intertitle card (Feb 2007)


  Geographical temporal marker –highlights significance of moment in her life 
• Diegetic sound of audience clapping dips, overlaid with non-diegetic interview with Amy as she discusses fame “If I thought I was famous I'd go top myself”


  -Dark irony/foreshadowing

  -Kapadia uses VO with footage to manipulate narrative and suggest Amy’s feelings in this moment
• Slomo, diegetic track of crowd dips, VO interview 


  Digital editing
• Smash cut to paparazzi footage photographing Amy, pleonastic sound of cameras amplifies shutters 


  -Overwhelming and invasive

  -Puts audience in position of cameras obstructing her –complicit in violence

  -Shows impact of digital technology being overwhelming and instant 
• "Camera goes from being her friend to being quite violent” -Kapadia 
• Amy’s cover of We’re still friends by Donny Halaway plays with lyrics onscreen alongside sequence of paparazzi shots as stills as Blake reappears 


  Digital editing, lyrics reflective and constructs narrative 
• Blake's flat...
• Archival footage -MLS centre-framed canted angle/handheld from the camera on Blake’s phone she’d bought him


  Intimate, personal life 
• Mise-en-scene of drug paraphernalia 


  Drugs overtaking her life 
• VO of interview with Blake “It completely eradicates any negative feelings”

  Completely honest 
• Eden project –Amy singing onstage but out of it, slapping herself 


  Kuleshov effect juxtaposes previous shots and shows her decline 
• Lyrics onscreen 

  -Kapadia said narrative formed around the music like a musical/Bollywood

  -Digital editing to emphasise importance of her musical genius 
• Archival paparazzi footage recorded digitally

  -Intimidating, overwhelming

  -Immediacy of digitalisation presented as negative 
• H/A CU of still of Amy linked to Lauren’s VO “she looked like a child” 


  -Vulnerability

  -Kapadia's skill is in choosing visuals to support the stories
• Ending scene...
• Whirring non-diegetic sound 

  Amplifies and influences emotion –climax of narrative 
• Still of Amy smiling alongside Nick VO interview talking about how excited Amy was to go to his wedding 


  -Furthers emotional impact

  -Full circle –goes back to the people interviewed at the beginning of her journey