Cobain: Montage of Heck (2015)

Admirable film.

Yes, absolutely, there is fun to be had, as well as many, many things to go boom, all amid an atmospheric urban jungle.

There is definitely an excellent idea hidden in the background of the film. Unfortunately, it's difficult to find it.

A clunky actioner with a handful of cool moments.

I watched this "documentary" without any preconceived ideas about Cobain and Nirvana. I know their music and about Cobain's death, but I followed their story from a distance. The documentary is unsatisfactory, mostly because of the uneven pace, the length and the feeling that the people involved just tried to justify themselves.The story stars slow, with some sweet (and heartbreaking) footage of baby Kurt, interspersed with interviews with his mother, father and stepmother. I knew little about Cobain's life, but I had the impression the three of them tried to justify their actions even before they mentioned that in his teenage years Kurt was shipped back and forward in his family circle, because he was "difficult". His dad and stepmother looked weird, while his mother looked like an older version of Courtney Love (not a compliment).The story includes animated parts of Kurt's journals, photos, artwork, home movies and even some animated "reconstruction" of moments in Kurt's life.The technique is interesting, but there is way too much of it, especially the animated journal, showing the handwritten words forming very quickly. It is a non-stop struggle trying to read the text. Also, most of Cobain's artwork is quite violent and depressing.When it reaches the point of Cobain living with girlfriend Tracy and then forming Nirvana, the pace of the story changes. Enter Courtney Love and the rest is basically about her. We're shown plenty of home movies, with the allegedly happy couple in various stages of undress, looking filthy and living in squalor. Then more footage with baby Frances, in the same settings and nudity, with an increasingly emaciated Cobain and Love showing her tits. As mentioned by another reviewer, that was totally irrelevant, since I wanted to know Cobain's story and cared nothing about Love's tits.With the hijack of Courtney Love, the story takes a turn for the worse and seems to drag on forever. Love also does a lot of justifying, especially about the notorious Vanity Fair interview. She admits to using heroin while pregnant, as if it is perfectly normal. Dave Grohl is not interviewed, while Novoselic gives a couple of anodyne statements. The end is quite abrupt and leaves out the final weeks. I guess a touchy topic for the widow….Whatever happened, Cobain seemed sensitive, artistic and fragile man, certainly not a happy guy. He had the misfortune of growing up in a chaotic family and falling for the wrong woman. Some say that life is the narrative we tell ourselves about the events that happened to us. Unfortunately Cobain told himself a sad, violent and ultimately tragic story.

Never has there been a more intimate film produced about the trials and tribulations of Kurt Cobain until now. Director, Brett Morgen, has been hard at work since 2007 rummaging through Cobain's diaries and home movies to take us through Kurt's trajectory from childhood to super stardom and finally to his untimely demise. Ultimately, Montage of Heck is the most honest window into the troubled and tortured soul of Kurt Cobain.Nirvana bassist, Krist Novoselic, sets the tone early with the heartbreaking and remorseful statement, "With 20/20 hindsight, you think, Why didn't I see it? or Why didn't I say something?" Though a sentiment, his ultimate end seemed inevitable.It is no secret that Cobain's childhood was dreadful and home was broken. This film shed further light on the fact, having been displaced from his and multiple family members' homes in his teenage years. He was an outcast and loner through his formative years, to the point where he attempted suicide for the first time, by way of a train, but fortunately fate went the other way. There is solace that his upbringing inspired such beautiful, though at times, twisted, art.If you're not fond of Courtney Love, this film will add more fuel to the fire. The most uncomfortable scene to watch is an array of clips of Kurt and Courtney clearly out of their minds of heroin, being ludicrous. Kurt and Courtney's drug use was no secret, but seeing the effects is undoubtedly the most troubling and painful scenes to watch.One of the overarching themes throughout Montage of Heck was Kurt's overwhelming sensitivity. Novoselic recounts Kurt feeling humiliated and devastated by a small time critic's negative review of their first single. Courtney echoed Novoleslic's claim in telling the cryptic and infamous tale of the Rome incident. Love sheds light that Kurt felt severely betrayed when his wife almost cheated on him, responding by taking 67 Rohypnol pills, overdosing, and going into a coma. This was a month before his untimely suicide at the age of 27.For better, Montage of Heck, ends without going into any detail of his suicide, as it fades to black and merely states the fact on a plain, black screen.This brilliant film does a splendid job of not withholding the gritty details and benefits from exposing the most intimate view of Cobain. There is no other subject as complicated as Kurt Cobain, but Montage of Heck will live as unequivocally the closest idea of the inner demons of Kurt.

A sad exploitation of a talented man. As a film sanctioned by his estate, it was clear this was only part of the story and only the part that they wanted to put the spin on. What a disgrace to paint Kurt Cobain as nothing but suicidal long before the success of Nirvana. The 2 1/2 hour documentary is tolerable for only about the first hour. After that, the backstory of Kurt Cobain is polluted by the relationship choice he made and a highly biased or third-party influenced (or paid for?) fallacy that this young man, despite having fulfilled his goal of being a recognized musician and having the possibly unexpected pleasure of being a father, wanted nothing more than to die. The snippets from his journals seem taken very much out of context, again to push the idea this man was suicidal for years, and the Pink Floyd "The Wall"-esque animations are cheesy and make this overly-long film a burden to continue to watch until the end. The saddest part for me was watching Kurt Cobain's mother and father, who both rejected him and would not allow him to live with him while he was a teenager, snivel about their loss. You didn't want him then, but you want him now? Many authoritative sources have debunked some of his mother's statements in this film. Very sad. Others who knew him personally adamantly have denied events portrayed in the film, even as the words came from Kurt himself, the sources noting that Kurt was quick to embellish or make up stories to cause subterfuge in the rampant media coverage at the time of his popularity.Also very telling is that Krist Novelic was interviewed for the film but not Dave Grohl due to "scheduling conflicts." In other words, he did not want or was not invited to participate and some PR firm concocted a reason for his absence that some may choose to believe. Watch the first hour to see some precious moments of Kurt as a youngster, skip the last 90 minutes unless you enjoy being manipulated.

I generally like the music of Nirvana, but I don't consider myself a fan of the band. Nevertheless, it's impossible to deny the huge influence they had over the music and popular culture. In the early '90s, the "hair metal" had degenerated into an empty spectacle in which the make-up and the fixative spray were more important than music itself. So, Nirvana appeared as an alternative which changed the face of rock and popularized "grunge" movement, lacking of artifice and with a renewed emphasis on the value of music (even though, like any other movement, it eventually became a victim of the same over- merchandising which has suffocated an uncountable number of musical styles). However, like its title indicates, Cobain: Montage of Heck doesn't pretend to deal with the History of grunge and even less of Nirvana, but with the singer, guitarist and composer who became an icon of a generation. This narrow focus definitely intensifies the vision of the documentary... but at the same time, it makes it feel a bit incomplete, omitting part of the historical frame which would seem indispensable to complete the story. On the other hand, director Brett Morgen fulfilled with his mission, deeply digging into Kurt Cobain's past until getting a detailed audiovisual tapestry of his life. Home videos, personal recordings, public interviews and Cobain himself's copious notes integrate with each other into a narrative which is a bit diffuse on its shape, but not less representative of his tortured existence and the traumas (and vices) which probably contributed to his depression and eventual suicide. The result is simultaneously interesting and painful. Maybe too painful. There are passages of the documentary which, in my humble opinion, cross the line of morbidity and feel tremendously uncomfortable. I appreciate the fact that Morgen decided to depict the raw reality behind the legend, but I think he should have invested less time on that. Speaking of which, Cobain: Montage of Heck includes numerous musical interludes accompanied by animations which bring Cobain's writings and diaries to life. These animations might be a bit disturbing (we couldn't expect less in a biography of this artist), and they are always accompanied by songs of Nirvana and other artists. The problem is that I felt them a bit longer than they should; they are visually attractive and they are useful to separate the numerous interviews and "talking heads", but they tend to extend themselves for more than they should, inflating the running time to 145 minutes. Nevertheless, I found Cobain: Montage of Heck an interesting documentary, even though it will definitely have more value to the fans of Cobain's. Besides, this film renewed my respect for Cobain's legacy and generated me unexpected compassion for his tortured spirit (even if part of that torture was self-inflicted).