With the embargo now up on Back to Black reviews, opinions have not been spared on the new Amy Winehouse biopic - which has (rather expectantly) divided reviewers thus far.

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While the premiere of the film isn't until this Friday (12th April), initial sentiments surrounding the Sam Taylor-Johnson directed movie are middling, and lean more on the negative side.

As film and TV fans will know, though, it's the Rotten Tomatoes score that can dictate whether a release will really sink or swim.

In what will likely be unhelpful for many people deciding whether or not to give Back to Black a watch, the Rotten Tomatoes score is currently at 53 per cent at the time of writing.

So, while it's certainly far from perfect, it's not exactly at the bottom of the new releases pile.

To put it into perspective against another recent release, Dev Patel's directorial debut of Monkey Man has achieved an impressive 88 per cent score on Rotten Tomatoes, which came after its premiere at SXSW on 11th March.

Marisa Abela as Amy Winehouse in Back to Black singing
Marisa Abela as Amy Winehouse in Back to Black.

Back to Black sees Industry star Marisa Abela take on the role of the iconic singer-songwriter, while Jack O'Connell is Winehouse's ex-husband Blake Fielder, Eddie Marsan is Amy's father Mitch Winehouse and Lesley Manville is her granny Cynthia Winehouse.

RadioTimes.com's own review of the film put it at an average three stars, stating that screenwriter Matt Greenhalgh "struggles to get under Amy’s skin", but adds that Abela does "an extraordinary job of inhabiting that skin, her portrayal of Amy at turns funny, headstrong, vulnerable and tragic".

While recent clips of the film have gone viral and spawned a largely negative reaction to the singing and tone of the film generally, actor Marsan did admit to RadioTimes.com that there is a "collective trauma" when it comes to Winehouse's death.

He said: "When someone dies so young and so tragic[ally], there's a collective trauma. And the way we deal with trauma is to make sense of it and to create a comfortable narrative that we can latch on to."

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Marsan continued: "The comfortable narrative for this kind of trauma is to find someone to blame – because it's reassuring to find someone to blame. Because if my daughter doesn't meet someone like Blake, or if you don’t behave the way they say Mitch behaved, then it won't happen to us.

"But addiction doesn't work like that, addiction is arbitrary. It's random. It's cruel, and it's chaotic. And so, what I hope will come out from this film is that people will have more compassion for people with addiction and their families.

"That's what I hope this film comes out with, and also a celebration of Amy."

Back to Back will land in cinemas in UK and Ireland on Friday 12th April 2024.

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Authors

Morgan Cormack
Morgan CormackDrama Writer

Morgan Cormack is a Drama Writer for Radio Times, covering everything drama-related on TV and streaming. She previously worked at Stylist as an Entertainment Writer. Alongside her past work in content marketing and as a freelancer, she possesses a BA in English Literature.

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