Back to Black

I find myself in an internal argument if I should write about the movie Back to Black. I was in my 20's when Amy Winehouse died and I remember listening only two of her songs: Back to Black and Love is a losing game. In my 20's my idea about artists was that they were living in different worlds than us the mortals, they were feeling everything with intensity and the way they copped with those feelings was through alcohol and/or drugs. Little had I known that one doesn't need to be an artist to feel emotions with high intensity and that addictions have so many colors and faces.

What sparked my interest was a review of the movie mentioning that the focal point of the movie is the toxic relationship between Amy Winehouse and her husband, Blake. Actually, the review was outlining the different types of addictions and co-dependencies. I cross-read the review and I knew I had to check it out.  I went there with my mind set analyze the movie and I ended up in crying most of the movie.

On my point view, the movie has several  highlights beside the toxic relationship between her and Blake. Amy is presented as eclectic and full of life as she was. The person in search for intense love and for a loving hug. The missing relationship with the mother and the extraordinary relationship with grandmother. 

I was impressed on the relationship Amy had with her grandmother. The relationship a grandmother has with her niece is different than the relationship a mother has with a daughter. It is love, friendship and closeness, but the grandparents always offer it in some conditions. When Amy told her grandmother about meeting Blake and it was intense and she felt a connection instantly. While listening her grandmother told her that she has a knack for bad guys and she should be careful. The grandmother was also the person who told her to be careful on the usage of alcohol and to her surrounding people and places. 

As for her relationship with Blake it started as a fling. It was a five story fire. It was cycle of great moments, abusing substances and moments of violence. The intense moments would escalate to fights where she would scratch him and then she would run away. With all these emotions in between, through all the get togethers and let's breakup, they even got married. At some moment, Blake got arrested for a fight. It is the moment where after a while he asks for divorce. In prison he got clean and went to therapy. Under therapy he became aware of how toxic the relationship between them. He explains to her than when he is away from her, he abuses substances les. He has to deal with the world considering him a bad influence over her, he has to deal with her father tantrum and he has to deal with the fear of losing her over dosage. Amy left the prison heartbroken. 

It is more than a day since  I saw and my mind is full of thoughts. In some ways, Blake and Amy mirror each other. What she saw in Blake was her own traumas. It takes strength to end up a toxic relationships. Somehow I perceived the grandmother as the light in Amy's life, the person who offered guidance and love. I cried most of the movie and I don't know why. I may assume I found pieces of an old self in different moments. We all want to live those raw and intense emotions, but can we all contain those emotions? Can we find healthy copping mechanisms?  Don't we all notice the toxic interactions surrounding us? Haven't we all experienced a toxic relation? Did we have the courage to leave?