Brett Morgen’s ‘Montage of Heck’ received seven nominations for the Creative Arts Emmys which took place on Saturday at the Microsoft Theater in Los Angeles, I don’t know how many he actually won but this is revolting,… revolting because Morgen has tried to sell this fiction for the truth, heavily promoting a story that simply is a lie. Didn’t Buzz Osborne say ‘Montage of Heck’ was 90% bullshit?
Contrarily to common belief, if you read informed reports about Cobain, the shotgun blast had resulted in very little visible damage, there was no blood or tissue splatter which are typical in most shotgun blasts to the head, there was curiously no exit wound, and if you have seen Cobain’s death scene pictures circulating on the internet in the past, they were false. Cobain was fingerprinted for identification as a matter of procedure, not for necessity, as it was falsely reported in the press. People who saw the body recognized him immediately and the lack of damage is one of the numerous aberrations of the case
People have gone overboard with song interpretations and I will start with the worst example of all, Charles Manson. The infamous rockstar wannabe was convinced that the Beatles’ White Album was as prophetic as the Bible, he would often quote ‘The Beatles and the Bible’ and considered the fab four as the ‘four angels’ as in Revelation 9
‘I understand that the Plaintiff seeks the public release of death-scene photos of Kurt that show his entire lifeless body, as well as the damage done by the shotgun blast to his head’, reads her legal declaration. ‘I have never seen these graphic and disturbing images, nor do I ever want to. I cannot believe that there exists any genuine public interest which might be served by the public release of these images. Certainly, public disclosure would reopen all my old wounds, and cause me and my family permanent – indeed, endless, and needless – pain and suffering, and would be a gross violation of our privacy interests.’
After noting the strange grading on ‘Soaked in Bleach’ IMDb page (probably demonstrating a manipulation of the data), after knowing about Courtney Love’s direct threats to the theaters screening SIB, I would not be surprised if people were also messing up with these petitions. However, since the previous ones have never lead anywhere, I wonder what they are afraid about?
Anyway, the independent theater hasn’t denied it, it has even tweeted the following a few days ago: ‘Regarding Soaked in Bleach. the engagement was cancelled, Join us for one of the many great #indiefilms we regularly present in #Hollywood’.
In the Smith case like in the Cobain case (both cases have been heavily put in parallel lately because of these two recent movies), suicide is the easy way out for most people, suicide is more convenient, it is the lazy way of thinking since you could not have come up with an easier reasoning than this one: a depressed junky committed suicide, wow why would you believe anything else? And that’s the problem, at the end people pick what they believe, and believes work hand to hand with emotions, feelings, impressions and presumptions.
‘Soaked in Bleach’ is the culmination of the fight of his career, and the movie makes the information available for everyone, in chronological order, killing the myth and exposing the facts. I don’t know if it will make the case to be reopened, but I bet that this time it is totally Buzz-Osborne-approved.
I had told him this before and I basically reiterated, “I think that what you should do is give her everything, and run as if your very life depends on it. Sign everything over to her from this moment and just be gone. And if you need money, just go out and do a fucking solo tour, play acoustic guitar, you’ll be fine.” He felt like he was trapped. He was embarrassed by her. He wanted to divorce her. He wanted to get out of it. But he was too much of a mess to get out of it.’
‘Your post was reported for violating Facebook’s Community Standards on nudity’? Of course it is totally false, Tom Grant has never posted any nude pictures, and he is a very ethical guy who has even deleted comments, if they were too accusatory against Courtney Love or anybody else.
The tiresome theory in this piece is that, blaming Courtney Love for the death of Kurt Cobain and Jennifer Chiba for the death of Elliott Smith is pure misogyny. I know his language,… people who express their skepticism are just ‘murder conspiracy theorists’ or ‘murder monomaniacs’ and he goes on and on, throwing in the text a few references to Greek mythology to make it sound more intellectual
‘If Kurt were still alive, he would be so over Courtney’, she says at one point. There has been a lot of speculation about an eventual divorce, and Alice says she doesn’t know exactly but ‘they had broken up, sort of, he was angry at her, at the way she was behaving’.
Cobain’s death was ruled a suicide by the Seattle Police Department shortly after his body was found, but 21 years later, suspicions and theories around the events leading to his death have never been more alive, and a long series of inconsistencies, oddities and plain weirdness (including taped phone conversations with Courtney Love) have let Tom Grant to continue his investigation about the case till this day
The world is messy, my house, my room, my desk are messy, I constantly fight against the entropy of the world around me and each day I am losing the battle… but am I right? Should I even fight it?
I have to accept that his greatness hasn’t managed to survive the decades intact. So maybe he is very much of his time, maybe he was such a cusp superstar, such a harbinger of the new century, he hasn’t quite managed to move forward. But songs as great as “All Apologies”, “Heart Shape Box” “Negative Creep” “About A Girl”… maybe they are ripe for re-discovery for the voice of a generation, beyond it all
Prior to anyone seeing this film, the ‘Holocaust deniers,’ as I like to refer to them, started writing conspiracy theories about my movie,’ he said. ‘Now this is before anyone’s seen a frame
‘[The album of home recordings] ‘will feel like you’re kind of hanging out with Kurt Cobain on a hot summer day in Olympia, Washington as he fiddles about. It’s going to really surprise people. Just to be clear, it’s not a Nirvana album, it’s just Kurt and you’re going to hear him do things you never expected to come out of him.’
We are always told to separate the art from the artist, this should be the norm even though it is often difficult. But when it comes to making movies and writing books about artists, I wonder why directors and writers cheerfully transgress this rule and get away with it?
If Morgen had wanted to make a film about the impressions that Cobain may have inspired him, the overwhelming sensations that a Nirvana concert may have left on him, I would be totally fine with it, and I would even said this is brilliant. Unfortunately he sells us his movie as the first authorized documentary about Kurt Cobain, and this is where I have a problem, because when it comes to documentaries, I care about fact-checking.
‘I found his actual suicide letter, which was unexpected. I just opened up this heart shaped box and there it was. And I was like ‘Based on everything I’ve witnessed, this makes no sense.’ Kurt didn’t have a problem with quitting music; he talked about it openly. If he wanted to stop performing, he would just stop. Nothing was leading up to that suicide letter.’
If anybody has a right to ignore his wishes it is his daughter, who didn’t know, who, through his own selfishness, missed having a father. That’s pretty drastic stuff and surely Francis has every right to claim: “hey, you don’t want to be a famous rock star? Fuck you, somersault in your grave over this, chump”
‘In response to recent articles regarding comments from Kurt’s daughter, Frances, I want to make it clear that Frances is an innocent victim here. The real questions is; What does Frances really KNOW as opposed to WHAT SHE’S BEEN TOLD?’ Exactly!
I see a trend, a real trend of biopics about dead rock stars and I am not sure I like it because this means that a lot of musicians died very young and many of them were probably murdered…. At least according to these new movies coming up.
“Gold Mountain, [Nirvana’s management company], still denies that a suicide attempt was made. A note was found, says a company spokesman, but Kurt insisted it wasn’t a suicide note. He just took all of his and Courtney’s money and was going to run away and disappear.’
Just the thought of that Foo Fighter breaking down in tears while telling how excited Cobain was for Dave’s first solo projects gives me a bad bad feeling. Oh, well, I guess the rich and famous are different than us, they exploit differentl.
rock-pop stars have always wanted to wear stuff for shock value, decades ago many rockers found it was really cool to wear Nazi propaganda, from Sid Vicious to Scott Weiland, Lemmy, Jimmy Page,… while in the 90’s Axl Rose went on stage every night wearing a Charles Manson shirt and that was really stupid
Oh but they were saying, ‘what if you meet Frances Cobain while wearing this shirt and she gets upset’? Yeah, because you meet her at Trader Joe’s every Saturday morning! Plus the girl has Courtney Love for mother, she has seen the most tacky, bad taste, brutal things that can exist
She was hoping to make a film that revealed a deeper understanding of Kurt than had been depicted in the media. While several parties control rights to Kurt’s music, Courtney and her daughter, are the sole rights holders to Kurt’s belongings, which are used quite readily throughout the film
This sounds quite amazing and the most astonishing part is the name of Frances Bean Cobain, as the executive producer. Brett Morgen, who also directed ‘The Kid Stays in the Picture’, will write, direct and produce the documentary, and so far Courtney Love’s name is not associated with it, which could be the best part of the whole story
‘I make enough to live on. I’m financially solvent. I focus on what I make now’, she also told the Times. And this is the same woman who insulted David Grohl for stealing and wasting Nirvana’s money… saying in one of her numerous stage rants, ‘The Foo Fighters are gay. I don’t care what you listen to at home, but if a guy takes off money off my kid’s table, f**k him.’
many believe that the famous the line ‘it’s better to burn out than to fade away’ taken from his alleged suicide note (it is actually a line from a Neil Young song) was a bye-bye to the music industry rather than to life, as Cobain had become really fed up with the fame game
How much would you pay for a pair of old moldy-rusty benches covered by graffiti? No less than 10 bucks right? The bid on two like the one above has
It’s written on some San Francisco hotel stationery paper, it is undated and we don’t even know who wrote it, Kurt or Courtney? Was it a joke, was it a real sentiment than Kurt had for his wife before his death?
Most importantly, I wanted you to know that this request is not based on a desire to exploit you in any way. I realize that stories in the press regarding my drug use may make you think that this request comes from a desire to parallel our lives. Let me assure you that this is not the case
I have no idea what the hype is; I never liked Nirvana and always thought Cobain was kinda twat. Going as far as to google, “why do people like Kurt Cobain”, it still blows my mind. I mean, all you really know to determine the fact that he was a moron was that he stated stated that the Sex Pistols were “one million times more important than the Clash”
Even his voice sounded like his generation, a pained tender rasp of terror and aloneness, it sounded like somebody breaking down before your eyes. It sounded like that boy in “Sliver” but panicking for the world.
I have been aware of this movie for quite some time, and, at last, we have a trailer. ‘Soaked in Bleach’ explores Kurt Cobain’s last days and the possibility that he was murdered, or if you prefer conspiracy theories, as people like to call them!
I have to say that Richard Lee gives bad press to people who are trying to find the truth in this sort of cases, to give you a taste of this curious character, this is how the Stranger described one of his numerous and very public interventions
I profoundly dislike the term conspiracy theory, it evokes a crazy middle-age guy/gal in front of a computer with a lot of time on his/her hands, a tinfoil hat on the head and a basement filled with food items to survive for a year
Ciesynski insists on the huge amount of heroin Cobain took that day and says ‘He killed himself because of the shotgun blast but the heroin did the trick also?’ Does he realize how overkilled it looks?
Let’s see, could a guy, even with a high level of tolerance, shoot himself in the head while having such a large dose of heroin in the system (Cobain had three times the lethal dose of heroin)? Keep in mind that the level found in Cobain is among the top 2% of the highest blood morphine levels ever discovered
It might not be fair to lay the blame for the hell that is 21st century rebellion at his feet, but he personifies it so perfectly. He is such a cheerful shill for organized crime known as the music business, it offends me to look at me. Grohl is the rock and roll star as Amway salesman.
Will they invite bands to cover Nirvana songs? Will the Foo Fighters be there? Will they screen that dreadful Gus Van Sant’s movie? And most important, will Courtney Love be invited? I hope not, and anyway she is currently way too busy crying at the stand
Sachs Media Group, in collaboration with photo restoration and manipulation company Phojoe, has published a series of portraits of musicians who died young, trying to figure out how they would have aged. And the results are quite realistic
It was described as a film which ‘explores the death of Kurt Cobain and its aftermath, examines the competing opinions and theories surrounding his death (suicide or foul play/murder), as well as the various people tied to those theories.
Justice always matters but past the question of the LAPD either investigating or closing the file on Elliott, or punishing wrongdoers if indeed there are any, what does it matter whether Smith jumped or was pushed?
Really difficult to understand that he was dead 9 months later in the circumstances that we all know. Almost 20 years after his tragic death, Cobain continues to fascinates us, and the animation is quite well-done
