Cobain: Montage of Heck

This documentary told me little I didn't already know about the great Kurt Cobain. With supposed access to numerous home videos, journals and members of Kurt's immediate family, friends and band mates, I find it curious the aspects of Kurt's life the director chose to focus on. It is evident that the aim of the documentary is to portray Kurt as a troubled and depressed soul, yet it doesn't provide any real insight into the events that created such a feeling in him. One such oddity is the interview with Kurt's mother which never delved deeper than the surface points of some of the major events of Kurt's life (ones that we've already learned more about from other journalists in years past). For instance: They touch on Kurt's homelessness as a teen, yet don't venture into the circumstances that caused his homelessness or have any depth of discussion about this major point in Kurt's life. How Kurt came to be the man and artist that captivated so many is still as mysterious now as it was before I watched this documentary.

Apart from the documentary's questionable focus and content, the style in which the story is told is well done, with fluid interchanges between Kurt's journal entries, old home videos, photos, sound recordings and interviews. The use of animation helped pull everything together and added a dreamy dimension to the story telling.

All in all an enjoyable, well made film, but an informative and insightful documentary it is not.