Starring: Kurt Cobain, El Duce, Tom Grant, Hank Harrison, Courtney Love Average Rating: Aspect Ratio: 1.33:1 Audience Rating: R (Restricted) Binding: DVD Format: Color, DVD-Video, NTSC Label: Fox Lorber Number of Items: 1 Picture Format: Academy Ratio Release Date: September 28, 1999 Running Time: 95 minutes Theatrical Release Date: February 27, 1998
Amazon.com: Watching a Nick Broomfield documentary (Aileen Wuornos: The Selling of a Serial Killer, Heidi Fleiss: Hollywood Madam) makes one not just want to shower, but to scrub oneself raw like Meryl Streep did in Silkwood. Going where even the tabloids fear to tread, the controversial Kurt & Courtney could also be called Courtney and Me. Investigating the apparent suicide of grunge icon Cobain, Broomfield runs into a formidable obstacle, namely Cobain's widow, Courtney Love. She blocked permission for him to use any of Cobain's music and ultimately got the film yanked from the Sundance Film Festival. Can't really blame her, as Broomfield follows the lead of a motley crew of conspiracy theorists, grudge-carrying former boyfriends, and estranged parents who suggest that Cobain was actually murdered at Love's behest. For those who watched bemused as Love reinvented herself as a Hollywood glamour girl, this is luridly entertaining stuff--albeit suspect. How much stock to put in S&M rocker El Duce (where does Bloomfield find these people?), who claims to have been offered money by Love to kill Cobain, and then offers to tell more if Broomfield will buy him a beer? Broomfield paints a much more sympathetic portrait of Cobain. In the film's most touching moment, an aunt plays a tape of a 2-year-old Cobain singing. "He's a prettly loud little guy," she says. These scenes will be nirvana for Cobain fans. --Donald Liebenson
Great Movie I am a huge fan of Kurt Cobain and Nirvana. This is a great doc. type of movie, if your like me and love Kurt Cobain, then you'll def. fall in love with this film. I've watched it about 4 times so far.
" I SWEAR I DONT HAVE A GUN " YOU LIED KURT Really interesting.The filmmaker seems to interview every loser that crawled out from beneath a rock in Washington state.When word circulated that there might be some money to be made for them telling there stories of Kurt Cobain.You really have to see this film to appreciate just how bizarre people are and can be, not to mention Greedy.As a big fan of NIRVANA and Kurt Cobain, I really found myself getting pissed off at The bottom feeders,who are still trying to make a buck off Kurt Cobain.I never thought it was possible, but I really understand why Courtney Love is the way she is.Her father has to be one of the most wretched men I have ever had the displeasure to listen to.I felt like reaching through the TV screen and grabbing this sack of sh**t and screaming into his face ( THAT'S YOUR DAUGHTER YOU FREAK,DO YOU THINK THIS IS HOW A NORMAL LOVING FATHER BEHAVES?) I gained some real insight into why Kurt did what he did from watching this film.If these were the type of friends and loved ones he had around him, he must have felt like the loneliest young man in the world.A wife that took full advantage of him being an emotional cripple, friends that dint seem to care if he lived or died, just as long as the cash and China kept a coming.The interview with what was declared as Kurt Cobains best friend was interesting and sad at the same time.Do these people seem strange to most of us? well yes they do. But just because there strange and grubby does not mean all that comes from out of there mouthes is lies, nor for that matter the truth.Another interesting point to me was the tidbit( if true) about El Duce,being offered 50,00 dollars to kill Kurt, by Love.And again I say if true and that's a big if true. Interesting point two was that El Duce apparently passed a polygraph about the incident.I would like to hear more about that polygraph, like who administered it, where and when did it take place, like I said previously, lots of if it's true.And Not so Love can be put on trial for some silly murder for hire conspiracy theory. But rather just to show, how little she really cared about Kurt.I believe if the El Duce story is true.Love let her true feelings slip on just how she felt about her new Husband and there relationship, in a drunk or doped up state. I do not believe for one moment that Courtney Love killed or had Kurt killed or wanted him killed by El Duche, it was simply " En Vino Veritas".Oh she was involved in his death all right, by the simple fact she dint love him or care about him past his check book and his fame and how she could promote her own career.I hate to believe this about any human being, but I have no problem excepting that she might have even egged him on to kill himself.Kurt cobain was an amazing artist, fantastic song writer and musician , but sadly also suffered from sever depression, drug abuse,a loveless relationship ,non existent home life and emotionally distant parents.Also keep this fact in mind, Cobain was the third member of his family to commit Suicide, so it was in his Blood.Another intresting point brought up in the film was about Kurts home life or lack of it.Kurt stayed with his, ex principles family for quite awhile, and in the whole time that Kurt was with this family, there was never one attempt by Kurts parents to contact the man that had taken there Son in. I am sorry but that speaks volumes to me, about the relationship that Kurts parents had with there child.Kurt Cobains Personal and family life was just a complete Train wreck. what I really gained from this film was not information about some Looney murder for hire conspiracy ,but rather about Kurt Cobains true killers Emotional isolation and the people around him that dint care or even try to offer him a hand out of the dark emotional swamp he was fast sinking into. REST IN PEACE KURT APRIL 5 1994
This loss is a crime to our musical pleasure A very strange documentary about the death of Kurt Cobain. Is it a suicide as announced or is it a murder as suspected and asserted by several people and is Courtney the origin of this murder? Quite a few question that are not that easy to answer and actually the documentary does not get to no answer, no final answer and it is maybe better like that. What would it bring into the picture if these hypotheses were true? Nothing. The loss of Kurt Cobain will not be repaired by a police investigation and then a trial. No matter how strange this death was one thing seems to be sure: Kurt Cobain was being pushed into some extreme depression by the castrating and controlling obsession of his wife Courtney. She did get a huge profit out of this death but that could have been a good motivation but it is in no way a proof or a piece of hard evidence. So let's cry and lament and let's hope what Kurt Cobain left behind will be stronger than the loss of his future.
Dr Jacques COULARDEAU, University Paris Dauphine & University Paris 1 Pantheon Sorbonne
Haunting and Interesting Kurt & Courtney is the haunting documentary, about the death of Nirvana guitarist/singer/lyricist Kurt Cobain. Everyone knows the story of Kurt Cobain, but here director Nick Broomfield presents us with a different story. As everyone knows, Kurt Cobain was found in a greenhouse above the garage of his home in Seattle in April of 1994, dead of an apparent self inflicted gunshot wound. There was a high level of heroin in his system. Kurt Cobain was married to singer/actress Courtney Love and had a young daughter named Frances Bean. Before seeing this movie I had heard all sorts of conspiracy theories about the death of Kurt Cobain that all went back to the theory that he was murdered by Courtney Love. I always dismissed these because while Courtney Love does appear to me to be a little whacked out on drugs, she doesn't have the appearance of a killer. One of the things that I admired about this film is that it doesn't try to swing your view one way or the other, but instead just tries to give you the straight facts. I'm still undecided on whether I believe Cobain was murdered or not, but this movie does present some interesting facts. Broomfield has meetings with several people during the course of the film; including Courtney Love herself briefly. First he talks with Kurt's aunt Mary, who believes Kurt commited suicide and talks about the poems she found when he was a kid and some of the recordings he made. We meet a woman named Amy who claimed to know Kurt and Courtney and offers to show Broomfield pictures. Pictures that we never see...Then, in an interesting turn, there's Courtney Love's father Hank Harrison; who has written two books about the death of Kurt and believes that he was murdered, but not necessarily by Courtney. There's Private Detective Tom Grant who has gone bankrupt trying to prove that Kurt was murdered by Courtney, and who claims that someone with that high a level of heroin in their system could not have possibly manipulated a shotgun into their mouth. Problem is, Grant insists this fact even when medical experts say otherwise. In what I believe to be the most interesting turn is El Duce, a singer of an underground punk rock group called The Mentors. When Broomfield introduces us to El Duce, he's drunk and insists that Courtney offered to pay him 50 g's to whack Kurt Cobain. A few days (or weeks) later El Duce was found dead, hit by a train. Finally, while Courtney is at an awards show Broomfield takes the stage to ask her some questions but is quickly thrown off the stage by the president of the awards, a good friend of Courtney's. I do believe that a lot of the people in this documentary were trying to just get some fame and didn't know Cobain. But there's definitley some interesting evidence presented here. I almost forgot to mention how Tom Grant actually searched the house that Kurt killed himself in with Kurt's best friend (I forget his name) and belives that the man purposefully made sure Grant didn't search the Greenhouse. This film was set to play at the Sundance Film Festival but was pulled due to pressure from Love's attorneys. Why would Love want this movie pulled so badly? As I said, I don't think everyone here is honest; but I believe at least parts of Aunt Mary, El Duce, and Hank Harrison's stories. The Nanny interview is interesting too and seems to be true. Kurt & Courtney is one of the most haunting, entertaining, and interesting documentaries in a while and anyone who has ever doubted Cobain's death or just doesn't know a whole lot about it should check it out. Whether this movie steers your opinion one way or the other, it's nice to have some facts.
GRADE: A
Spinal Tap Meets True Hollywood Stories There are some classic hilarious moments in this documentary. The director taking the stage at Courtney's speaking engagement? Hilarious! El Duce? You couldn;t ask for a more bizarre, surreal interview. And then, too, I'll never forget that pity me Kurt clip where he laments that he can't go into second hand/thrift stores anymore, because he's so famous. It ranks up there with that amp that goes to 11. And after seeing this movie a second time, I don't think the director is leaning towards one verdict, because even those who claim that Kurt was murdered, a lot of them are made to look at times dubious. If he wanted to push one side, he would not have included this. Fascinating, with worthy humor.
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