"What Happened, Miss Simone?"

[NormanD]

Upcoming. The trailer looks good
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=moOQXZxriKY

A Netfilx pic - does that mean download only and no terrestial/cinema release?

[John Leeson]

FWIW, it played this week in Toronto at the Hot Docs documentary festival.

[Garth Cartwright]

Wow! I saw Nina only once - Bishopstock Blues Festival, her final UK performance (I think). She was dreadful - out of it and her voice ruined - but she must have been formidable in her prime. That said, I don't often listen to her, finding her a little mannered as a vocalist. Stil, I would like to see this film - her career was forged across incendiary times.

[Adam Blake]

I've often thought that Nina Simone should have married Miles Davis and raised a bunch of monstrous brats.

I know what you mean about mannered, Garth, but I can't help loving her. If for nothing else than the chuckle at 2:54 on this - the most romantic record ever made.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CiVDzTT4CbE

[john poole]

Nina's daughter Lisa was interviewed on R4's The Film Programme in connection with the documentary, which it appears Netflix subscribers can see from today
http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b05zld8d

No sign of a DVD release at present, I assume that there will be one eventually. A couple of cinema screenings in Sheffield and at the Barbican appear to have already taken place.

There was recently a short BBC4 tribute with Laura Mvula which I'll have to have a look at while it is still available (only until 8 pm on Sunday)
http://www.bbc.co.uk/iplayer/episode/b0 ... aura-mvula

[Rob Hall]

I think Netflix costs £5 per month. There is rarely anything on it worth watching, and I keep meaning to cancel the subscription, but this film made me glad that I didn't. Quite simply, there was no one like Nina Simone before and there's been no one since: as a talent, as a person, as a star. Her daughter's testimony features quite heavily in this film and it's her words that really gives us an insight into her mother. I've always been a fan but this film opens Nina Simone, the artist, up in ways that I wasn't aware of. At one point, in a clip from a live concert, the camera cuts to her face as as she sings the word 'pain', and she holds the camera with her eyes. The effect is stunning.

In years to come there will be a biopic, along the lines of 'Ray', or 'Walk The Line', but it won't be as good as this.

Highly recommended.

[Edit: I see now that the biopic is already planned: good luck to them.]

[alister prince]

I agree completely Rob. The doc didn't sensationalise (wasn't prurient) her mental health problems, and was all the better for it. Her personal history and the devastating effect of the American zeitgeist at the time were well described. Worth many a BBC4 repeat. Coincidentally I was listening to Young Gifted And Black a couple of hours ago. I've always been a great fan (I'm not worried about her vocal styling), but she was the one performer I would never go and see live. I just didn't want to witness one of her 'problem' gigs and possibly erode my fandom.
Aly

[Adam Blake]

Fabulous documentary. Quite apart from the compulsiveness of the material, it allows the viewer to draw their own conclusions. The period footage is so well handled. Really very impressive.

A bit like Julie Burchill saying "without slavery there would have been no Tamla Motown", you can't help wondering what would have happened if Nina hadn't been turned down by the Curtis Institute in 1951...

[john poole]

Upcoming. The trailer looks good
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=moOQXZxriKY

A Netfilx pic - does that mean download only and no terrestial/cinema release?

There will be a Saturday afternoon screening at the NFT on the 13th next month in connection with the Oscar best documentary nomination.
https://whatson.bfi.org.uk/Online/defau ... s%20Simone

[john poole]

The Alan Light book of the same name, which followed on from the film, was serialised on Radio 4 last week; a 4 Extra "omnibus" edition is now available -
http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b08hrgfd
https://www.theguardian.com/books/2016/ ... ook-review

A DVD of Liz Garbus' film was made available last year.

[NormanD]

Certainly worth listening to. I'll look out for the book.

I found the last episode disappointing. The last years of her life (at least in the digested radio episode form) were compacted into a few minutes, and the story felt incomplete.