The controversial Amy Winehouse biopic is streaming now.
Back to Black has been one of the most talked-about movies of the year, but if you still haven't seen it, it's now available to watch on Netflix in the UK and Ireland.
Directed by Sam Taylor-Johnson, the controversial Amy Winehouse biopic sees Industry star Marisa Abela play the iconic British singer-songwriter as she meets and falls in love with Blake Fielder-Civil.
Back to Black was released on digital platforms in May in the UK, but is now also available to watch on Netflix in the UK and Ireland after being added today (September 12).
If you're not a Netflix subscriber, you can rent Back to Black for £4.99 or buy it for £5.99 from Prime Video in the UK.
In the US, Back to Black is available to stream on Peacock for all subscribers. You can also rent or buy the movie from Prime Video, among other digital retailers.
Jack O'Connell – who plays Blake – defended the movie as a "celebration" of Amy Winehouse's life and music.
"Put it like this: if we were trying to portray her in any form of negative light, then that might be a valid point and I can understand one or two people pre-empting that," he explained.
Speaking to Digital Spy, Abela added that she did "understand" the scrutiny though, partly because she was feeling it herself.
"It was like, 'You know I feel like this too?' No one thought as much as me that this has to be right. All I would say is that if anyone thinks, 'God, this has to be good', it was me," she reflected.
Back to Black is available to watch now on Netflix in the UK and Ireland, and is available to buy or rent from Prime Video now.
Back to Black arrived in cinemas earlier this year as the latest example of the wave of music biopics that has brought us the likes of Bohemian Rhapsody, Rocketman, and the upcoming Robbie Williams CGI monkey movie. Now, it's streaming on Netflix — Back to Black, not the monkey movie.
Back to Black Reviews
On the one hand, this is a great chance for those who missed the movie during its cinema run to catch up on it. However, on the other, it's a chance for Amy Winehouse fans to revisit all of the things the film did wrong in their eyes. It's fair to say that Netflix subscribers haven't fallen head over heels in love with Back to Black.
The film stars Industry's Marisa Abela as Amy Winehouse, tracing her rise to fame in the Camden music scene, as well as her romance with Blake Fielder-Civil — played by Jack O'Connell. Of course, the film also depicts her high-profile struggles with addiction and her eating disorder.
When the movie hit cinemas in April, reviewers weren't kind. Back to Black currently has an approval rating of just 35% on review aggregator Rotten Tomatoes. However, in our own review at Yahoo, we wrote: "It is a serviceable biopic, and though it doesn't stand out quite as much as its subject did during her lifetime it retells Winehouse's story with care and that is something to celebrate."
Now that the film has landed on Netflix, it's picking up a new audience and, based on what people have said on social media, that audience isn't very keen on the movie. One viewer explained: "I really didn't want to hate it, but I did, for all the reasons most people who liked Amy hated it."
Another viewer wrote that, even after just 10 minutes, the film was "the most jarring thing I’ve watched in a long time". A third viewer tweeted that the film "basically reduces Amy Winehouse to I’m just a girl, standing in front of a guy, asking him to love her", but conceded that the acting is great.
It wasn't all bad news, though, with one viewer explaining that the movie had given them a new appreciation for Winehouse's work. They said: "I never really vibed with Amy Winehouse music but just watched the Netflix movie doc thing and suddenly realised I like the lyrics of some of the songs, I've always liked the woman just think the songs were massively over played."
Back to Black Box Office Performance
Back to Black will continue to divide viewers as more and more people see it on Netflix. But there's no denying that the movie did okay at the UK box office, where it earned more than £12m. Globally, though, it struggled and its worldwide total sits at just $51m (£39m).
The Future of Music Biopics
It feels as if this wave of music biopics is passing. Certainly, nothing in the last few years has matched up the cash and awards hoovered up by Bohemian Rhapsody, despite the critical drubbing it received in some quarters. The only thing that can save the genre now is Robbie Williams and his CGI monkey. Watch this space.
Back to Black is streaming on Netflix now.
