Heavier Than Heaven

[Just Jeans]

According to MSNBC (http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/16585050), Courtney Love is currently trying to cut a deal to see Heavier Than Heaven (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Heavier_Than_Heaven), the Kurt Cobain biography, turned into a motion picture.

http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/f/f2/Heavierthanheaven.jpg

LOS ANGELES - Access Hollywood has learned [that] late Nirvana singer Kurt Cobain may finally be immortalized on screen with the permission of his widow, rocker Courtney Love.

Love has acquired the rights to “Heavier Than Heaven,” author Charles Cross' biography on the late grunge singer, a source close to the star told Access. According to our source, several studios are in discussions with Love to bring the book to the big screen.

The rocker also confirmed the project is “in an embryonic stage,” with a post on a Courtney Love fansite MoonwashedRose.com. "[It] has no script and no director attached, let alone stars," she added.

If deals are made and reached, this will be the first authorized look at the life of Kurt Cobain, his band Nirvana and his relationship with his wife. Love, who is currently preparing her second solo album tentatively titled “How Dirty Girls Get Clean” added in her post that if the movie is made, “it will of course be [an] A list and high end film.”

[BlakeTyner]

Eesh. Why?

I enjoyed Cross's book. He's a nice guy, and we traded emails right after it came out. Still, it treats Courtney far, far too well - understandable since she was instrumental in Cross getting access to Kurt's journals, tapes, and family. And, even though he had access to the studio recording of "You Know You're Right," he still managed to fuck up major details about it, including the false title of "On the Mountain."

He didn't ask the hard questions: why has nobody seen the supposed "suicide note" that Courtney says she has? Why does the public version sound nothing like a suicide note, except for that coda tacked on the end, in different handwriting? Etc. etc. etc. I'm not really a big believer in the murder theory, but he didn't even acknowledge its possibility - one that Courtney's own former friends believe to this day.

And, really, HTH just isn't a very good book to try to translate onto the screen. Kurt, for all the love he has, was fucking weird and creepy.

The best Cobain biopic, even if it the character wasn't "Kurt," would be Gus Van Sant's "Last Days." No backstory about Kurt's childhood or adolescence, no "Behind the Music" style look at the tension within Nirvana, just 2 hours of a really fucked up guy living out the final hours of his life in a spooky, drafty and dank mansion and ultimately ending up dead in the greenhouse above the garage. Hell, "Kurt" doesn't really even have dialogue. The mood of that film captures everything without having to rely on movie cliches or watered-down details (courtesy of Ms. Love.)

Bah. No good can come of this.

~Blake

[The Dream Master]

Blake, you pretty much summed up exactly what I was going to post about this. Have either of you seen the documentary Kurt and Courtney? Even though I'm not as big into the whole consipiracy surrounding Kurt's death anymore, I recall enjoying that documentary a few years ago.

[D-Lo]

Courtney Love must need some green to finance that new Bentley.

Anything to make a buck off of her deceased husband's genius.

[Just Jeans]

It's a cash trip, and that's all it is. That's why various Nirvana songs are turning up on TV commercials and Late Night With Conan O'Brien. I remember a time when it was impossible to secure a Nirvana song for use in a film/commercial/guest appearance on a late night talk show.

Courtney needs that money, son. Simple as that.

I hope this film ends up like Sid & Nancy -- extremely inaccurate and controversial, but really entertaining to watch.