Amy Winehouse's family slam biopic about the dead singer

A biopic about Amy Winehouse has been slammed by her family ahead of its Cannes film festival premiere.

Considered one of the most talented artists of her generation, Winehouse struggled with drug and alcohol problems throughout her career. She died of alcohol poisoning in July 2011 at the age of 27.

The film is the work of British director Asif Kapadia, who won a BAFTA for his documentary on the late Formula One racing driver Ayrton Senna.

Winehouse’s father complains that the doc offers a black-and-white portrait, treating him, his daughter’s former manager and her ex-husband as villains.

“What they’ve tried to do is they’ve tried to do a film which is a Hollywood blockbuster. They’ve forgotten it’s a documentary, so there’s a hero, a villain, me – in the main – and Raye (Amy’s manager) and Blake (Amy’s ex-husband Blake Fielder-Civil), obviously, and there’s the heroine who dies at the end, which is Amy. I mean, they’ve deliberately shown me at my worst, saying things that are taken out of context, saying things that are heavily edited,” says Mitch Winehouse.

Winehouse’s family have disassociated themselves from the film, saying it does a disservice to individuals and families suffering from the complicated affliction of addiction.

“I’m not just fighting for me, I’m fighting for Amy,” says Mitch Winehouse. “Because this is not the film that Amy would have wanted. She would want her true friends to be recognised, which they’re not, she would want the man she was going to marry to be mentioned in the film, which he’s not. She’d want me not to be portrayed in this light because she knows what we all went through. So we have now withdrawn our approval of the film. On the credits, it shouldn’t have any reference to us because we don’t support the film in any way.”

The filmmakers claim they approached the project with total objectivity, conducted some 100 interviews with people who knew Amy Winehouse, including friends, family and former partners, and that the film is a reflection of their findings.

One of the most hotly-anticipated releases of the year for music fans, ‘Amy’, the documentary about the tragic life and death of British singer Amy Winehouse, is being screened at the Cannes Film Festival in May.

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Sweet tooth's heaven: chocolate festival in Obidos, Portugal

Welcome to Obidos and its International Chocolate Festival.

Whether they like it dark, milk or white, each year around 200,000 visitors gather in this medieval Portuguese town to indulge on chocolate, chocolate and more chocolate.

The theme of the festival this year is love.

“Obidos is a romantic town and many people come here to be with their significant other,” said Ricardo Ribeiro, the festival’s organiser.

“Obidos is a land of passion. When we like someone we offer them chocolates, so I think it’s the perfect connection. And here is the place of the great love story between Pedro and Ines – so you have Obidos, chocolate, and their common denominator, love: it’s the perfect connection.”

If there’s a real-life equivalent to Romeo and Juliet in Portugal it’s indeed the forbidden romance between Prince Pedro and Ines in the 14th century.

Pedro’s father, King Afonso IV, opposed the union and ordered to kill Ines, but Pedro swore to avenge her and launched Portugal into civil war.

The tragedy has inspired many artists and poets across the centuriers. Today, it is being celebrated in Obidos with some mouth-watering sculptures.

But chocolate is not the easiest material to work with, as artist Diogo Esteves explains: “We need to be careful with humidity, because water ruins chocolate just like heat does. This is why we use air conditioning to control the room’s temperature. The sculptures cannot stand variations in temperature, otherwise they can be completely ruined.”

Children here get their own house of wonders where they can combine their favourite foods: pizza and chocolate, complete with marshmallow and candy toppings… Yum.

Meanwhile grown-ups can drink up a traditional sour cherry liquor – in a chocolate cup.

The Obidos Chocolate Festival runs until May 3rd.

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Paris exhibition marks centenary of Edith Piaf's birth

An exhibition dedicated to French singer Edith Piaf, whose ballads about love and sorrow turned her into an international icon, has opened in Paris to mark the centenary of her birth.

Among the 400 objects on show at the Bibliothèque Nationale de France are posters, letters, manuscripts, photographs, film clips and even her signature black dress.

“Thanks to this layout and to the audio-guide, which offers an extra sound dimension to the exhibition, you get a real taste of Piaf’s universe, or should I say of her universes, and we hope that visitors will really enjoy the show from beginning to end,” said curator Joël Huthwohl.

Edith Piaf had a song for every occasion, most of which mirrored the drama of her colourful life.

The daughter of street performers, she was abandoned by her mother and spent part of her childhood in a brothel run by her grandmother. The singer later said she believed her weakness for men came from mixing with prostitutes. I thought that when a boy called a girl, she would never refuse, she would later say.

“I feel very emotional, I find that she’s a remarkable woman, everything she went through in her life and all that she achieved in such a short time, it’s amazing. Her voice is just so strong and powerful,” said one visitor from Switzerland.

“I was lucky to live in Menilmontant, in the very same street as Edith Piaf, which is why I really wanted to see this exhibition, which is very good as it gives a truthful account of her life just the way it was,” said another.

The singer died in 1963 at the age of 47.

‘Piaf’, an exhibition chronicling the iconic French singer’s life, runs at the Bibliotheque Nationale de France in Paris until the end of August.

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