THE British premiere of Asif Kapadia's documentary came on a Saturday afternoon at the Edinburgh International Film Festival on June 20.

Playing in plush Filmhouse 1, it was the hottest ticket of the fortnight, such was the anticipation, even if it felt odd watching this creature of the night on screen at that time of day.

Such is the mark left by Amy Winehouse that a documentary could be called Amy, like Jimi, Janis, Jim and Kurt, those other members of the 27 early grave club. Likewise, the film poster captures the iconic image as we remember it best: the misbehaving beehive, the impasto eyeliner as wide as wings; the eyes focused maybe somewhere else, somewhere beyond.

How many "stars" of recent ilk could be defined as if by a caricaturist's pen and ink? Once more, as a nervous Florence Welch stepped in as Foo Fighters' late deputy headliners on Glastonbury's opening night, you were left thinking...if only. If only, if only, if only.

We've been thinking that ever since July 23 2011 when the least surprising death in recent rock'n'roll was pronounced from Amy's Camden home. Asif Kapadia's documentary doesn't pass judgement, nor does it suggest there could ever have been an alternative ending, if only...

Instead, as he did so arrestingly with Senna, his 2010 documentary about Brazil's golden boy of Formula One motor racing, Ayrton Senna, he lets the story tell itself.

Senna lived his sporting life on the edge, the nature of his sport, where speed was the thrill and the potential killer too. Kapadia's film, told with Senna constantly on the screen, managed to climb inside the cockpit and inside Ayrton's head.

Amy Winehouse grew to live her life on the edge too, but that was not compulsory for her occupation. Unlike Senna and his need for speed, the boundaries of her chosen profession were not enough for Amy; the drugs, the booze, the bulimia, everything outside of singing, were the risks in her broken life as she "treads a troubled track".

When her best friend recalls how Amy's reaction to winning a Grammy was to say it was boring without the drugs, the epitaph was written there and then. This moment is fellow Londoner Kapadia's most illuminating snapshot, told with the friend's despairing voice accompanied by lingering footage of Amy, who had cleaned up for the ceremony, suddenly looking enervated, rather than basking in the afterglow. No-one could get inside her head.

Kapadia's technique is to never apply a narrator's overview but to frame Amy's rise and fall from childhood days with voiceovers accompanying footage, where, just like in Senna, Amy never leaves the screen until she is removed from her home, the body inevitably covered in black.

We learn of Amy being prescribed anti-depressants in her early teens and her mental scarring by her parents' separation; we see the bright spark; the outspoken humour; the songwriting precocity; the voice of an older woman both in lyrics and vocal delivery. We see the self-destruction; how she and Blake loved, damaged and "sabotaged" each other, fatally attracted and equally incapable of withdrawal once hooked on drugs and romance.

We see Amy truly invigorated for the last time by singing with her hero, Tony Bennett, such a gent to her kittenish nerves, Amy so eager to impress, hooked for the last time to the music.

If only? No, it was only going to finish this way. The end.

Charles Hutchinson