Kurt Cobain: Montage Of Heck

Cashing in from Kurt Cobain, typical!

Produced by Kurt Cobain's daughter Frances Bean Cobain herself, Kurt Cobain Montage Of Heck, contrary to what many critics, journalists and fans think, is a poorly executed attempt at making a documentary based upon somebody's life. That somebody is Kurt Cobain, lead singer of Nirvana, maybe one of the most famous alternative rock bands to ever come out from Seattle in the early 90's.

The title "Montage of Heck", was taken from one of Kurt's old sound collages, that after he took is life, became widely available in the late 90's in the bootleggers market. The film makes use of several clips from Kurt's home videos, drawings, notebooks, poetry, love letters and more, hence the proper title. The editing in these montages is gorgeous and alluring, and there are some animation segments that are absolutely beautiful. Nonetheless, these sections of the film often dragged on too long and felt like they were unnecessarily repetitive, distracting from the narrative instead of serving it and over-selling us on parts of Kurt's mind and inner turmoil which were already very clear.

The masterminds behind this garbage.

Your music legacy will live on.

Speaking of narrative, the one story this film tells is a story we already know and understand too well. The film has a single theme only, which is to use personal media graciously offered from the Cobain family to tell the story of a talented, hyper-sensitive tortured soul and drug addict who killed himself, and the cloud of chaos that lead up to that point. There is little to no insight on his art, only the struggles that propelled him to make his art, which are much less interesting because as an audience we are well aware of what negative habits can do to the psyche or physical health, but the real intrigue is what a person creates or does despite those issues. Perhaps that's my opinion, though.

The irony here is saddening. This film, somehow managed to spend over 2 hours on highlighting the product of a failed marriage and broken upbringing, drug abuse, Courtney, ridicule and the pressures of press, all of which are the exact same things that ultimately lead to the recluse Kurt became and fed into his tragic suicide. This film somehow managed to become the enemy and mirrored everything Kurt tried to run away from.

The animated parts are the best out of the whole piece.

Every teenage kid was once Kurt Cobain.

Long time Nirvana fans will find nothing new through watching this documentary. There are no rare performances, no home videos of musical interest and even some of the demos we get to listen, are all known too well or either different versions of the same song (Sappy appears several times as background music but in different editions) Nevertheless, it's true Brett Morgen said the documentary would be about Cobain's life and not Nirvana's but let's face it, he was Nirvana and we don't get any interesting shots at what was like to be fronting the most hyped 90's band besides all the stuff we already know. Now, when it comes to the "intimate portrait" of his life well, uhmm, do we really need to see home videos of Cobain after shower routine? do rock stars have rare rituals when brushing their teeth or drying their hair? No, I don't think so. And what about Courtney Love showing her breasts three times? Oh, yeah that must really be a thing only rock stars do.

And what about other Nirvana members? Well, there's Chris Novoselic, and his presence runs about five minutes. His words are memorable and idiotic as fuck. Let's paraphrase what he said "All these signs and messages about his suicidal tendencies were always there, in the songs' lyrics, in the album art and yet we didn't notice" I mean, for real, where you or where you not a close friend to him? did you really care about his mental state? The problem behind Kurt Cobain's tragic ending had clearly more to do with his upbringings than any other thing. In psychology terms (I'm a teacher with studies in psychology among other things) if a person suffers from an early age trauma, like he did when his parents divorced, this trauma will cause severe damage if not treated properly at the right time. What happened to Cobain wasn't that he hated fame, or didn't stand being called the voice of a generation. What happened to him happens everyday to hundreds if not thousands of people who suffer traumatic experiences in their childhood or in their adolescence. Cobain had everything his family didn't have: money, fame, an apparently happy marriage and even a baby girl, so what went wrong? He simply couldn't withstand the ghosts of his past, the feeling of lovelessness he got from his parents and family. He became a junkie because people around him didn't care (like in most cases of drug addiction) and finally he became suicidal once he realized the awful truth: he had no family, no friends. All he had was a bunch of people trying to cash in off of him, and this bad documentary proves it once more. Nevertheless, people around him are not necessarily the ones to blame. It's been proofed by psychological and psychiatric studies that a person who grows up in an environment of lack of affection and ultimately indifference, develop serious difficulties when establishing social relationship with other people (Cobain hated everyone according to him) and let's not talk about self destructiveness and drug abuse.

We're all free while we're kids.

Adolescence: end of innocence.

And where's Chad Channing? Where's Dave Grohl? Where's Pat Smear? Why no Cobain's friends like Mark Lanegan, Buzz Osborne & Kim Gordon? and what about Charles R. Cross or Michael Azerrad? 

Why does this documentary feels like another money grab behind Cobain's life?

Biased for Suicide.

In interviews, Brett Morgen (the director) promotes that it doesn't have anything to do with the death angle, but the movie very clearly emphasizes several writings (with jarring music, no less!) and parts to suggest otherwise. There are more than a few written mentions that could be taken out of context, for example, one writing that was zoomed in on, said "KILL YOURSELF KILL YOURSELF" at least four lines repeated, all caps-- but then right below that, "RAPE IS GOOD RAPE IS GOOD" which is obviously something Kurt didn't believe. So I am very much inclined to say that emphasis, on the "KILL YOURSELF KILL YOURSELF" portion, is beyond out of context, to the extent of being misleading. They half-cut-off the "RAPE IS GOOD" part but you can still see it.

Furthermore, they took a few things out of context in terms of timing. While there are general themes of youth to adolescence to growing up to being a father, there are anachronisms throughout, mostly stemming from the aforementioned death theme. Referenced far later in the film, "I hate myself and want to die. Leave me alone" as signed by Kurdt, a name he went by early-mid in his career (as noted in the Bleach release). Let alone that this might have been satirical; even if it was literal, this was far earlier than when he died. With the misplacement at the end of the film, this forges (in every sense) the connection that Kurt felt that way then, when in fact not only do we not know if he did, but when. The film then assumes a sense of forced examples, for the writing to be accompanied by visuals via home video or slowed-down concert footage, as if to prove something. But it's completely out of context and it's bothersome. 

Two junkies with luck, or not?

They music can save us, then why didn't it save himself?

Now, to be fair, the documentary may be of interest to those who are relatively new to Kurt Cobain & Nirvana or to those who have brief knowledge on the subject. However, the whole "myth" and God-like portrayal of Cobain is absolutely biased and definitely wrong. Cobain was a human being, he didn't have the help he needed to stop living in his saddened past, and that's happened, is happening and will happen to many as long as people do not understand love is a very delicate layer that needs to be watered no matter how hard your life is. What made Cobain special, was his music which was definitely his ultimate art form despite many paintings, collages and dolls he's a part of our world of legends because of that and yet the director focuses on spending more on screen time with a father he never liked, a mother who abandoned him, a stepmother who didn't do much, and a wife and a band member who didn't care and didn't take action to aid him to stop living in the past and start enjoying his present and bright future.

All that being said, I guess in the spirit of Rock and Roll, there is no real justice. Kurt won't get the movie he deserves, even after his death we seem to continue to focus on the obvious redundant clichés of the dark sides of his life. Although those things are real and an important part of his story, they are indeed only one part. That isn't definitive at all. As Kurt always said, "Just listen to the music, everything I have to say is there". He wasn't lying and that will always be his ultimate legacy because his music was his and his alone and it will remain untouched forever, so the "corporate whores" will never change that no matter how hard they try, or how hard they cry in the Rock 'n' Roll Hall of Fame induction ceremony.

Here's the documentary trailer:

Here's the complete and unreleased "Montage Of Heck" sound collage from which the documentary takes its name: