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Amy Winehouse’s father condemns singer’s biopic as ‘preposterous’

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Amy Winehouse's father Mitch has criticised the makers of a biopic of his daughter’s life.

Speaking on ITV’s This Morning, he said that the film was unfair and unbalanced.

The forthcoming documentary Amy - The Girl Behind The Name is due to make its world premiere at Cannes Film Festival.

But Mr Winehouse said the film was "preposterous" and accused the filmmakers of "picking chunks out of her life to suit them" on top of misrepresenting his relationship with her.

He said: "It’s the narrative that is the problem.

"They say there is only a certain amount of time they can have in a film, but they’ve got time for a sound engineer in St Lucia to say that I was ‘money grabbing and self serving.’"

One part of the film is believed to describe Mr Winehouse as an absent father, he said: “It’s preposterous.

“When I split up with Amy’s mum, I was with the kids every day. I was with Amy when she was ill all the time.

“I, and the family, were the ones that convinced her to go to rehab and detox. The real story is twenty times better.”

He criticised the director Asif Kapadia, who previously made the award-winning biopic Senna for not including Amy’s partner Reg, who she was due to marry before she died.

He said: “There’s no time for Reg in the film at all - this was the guy that she was going to marry… there’s just two pictures of him at the end.

"There’s just no balance, it’s portraying me and my relationship with Amy in not a very good light. They had a pretty clear agenda of how they wanted this film.

“The last three years of her life they have portrayed as lonely and unhappy and nothing could have been further from the truth.

“She was clear of drugs and she had wonderful relationships in those last three years with Reg, and all of her friends that were with her right until the end. But they are not in the film.

“These guys have got a duty as her biographers to portray her life, not to pick chunks of it to suit them - which is basically what they’ve done.”

Mr Kapadia, and his production team defended the documentary.

In a statement, they said: "When we were approached to make the film, we came on board with the full backing of the Winehouse family and we approached the project with total objectivity.

“During the production process, we conducted in the region of 100 interviews with people that knew Amy Winehouse; friends, family, former-partners and members of the music industry that worked with her.

“The story that the film tells is a reflection of our findings from these interviews."

When asked if Amy’s fans should go and see the film, Mr Winehouse said: “It’s a good question.

"I know it’s a silly thing to say, I would go in to watch the videos but put a headset in and listen to Amy’s music because for a documentary it's a great work of fiction - the people that should be in the film aren’t in it.”

The six-time Grammy award winner made two critically acclaimed albums, Frank and Back to Back.

But she struggled to cope under the attention of the media and its interest into her private life and subsequent battle with drink and drugs.

Amy died from alcohol poisoning in July 2011 at the age of 27.

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