New Kurt Cobain film 'will challenge mythology of the Nirvana star'

Kurt Cobain: Montage of Heck is the first fully authorised film about the musician and will use material specially released by his family to “challenge the existing mythologies” around him, according to director Brett Morgen.

Frances Bean Cobain, daughter to the late grunge star and the singer Courtney Love, has signed up to be executive producer of the film, which will screen on HBO next year. She called it “an intense yet wonderful examination of Kurt’s life and art”.

Mr Morgen never met Cobain but has worked on the project for eight years and was initially sceptical about unearthing much new material for the documentary.

“However, once I stepped into Kurt’s archive, I discovered over 200 hours of unreleased music and audio, a vast array of art projects, countless hours of never-before-seen home movies, and over 4,000 pages of writings,” he said.

The film’s name is taken from a mixtape Cobain made in 1988, which has not been released. The new material paints an “intimate portrait of an artist who rarely revealed himself to the media”, said Mr Morgen, who also directed the Rolling Stones documentary Crossfire Hurricane.

“After going through the archives I could barely recognise the guy in context of the images of him that have been disseminated by the mainstream media,” he told Variety.

“The way Kurt expressed himself in interviews was a pale reflection of who he really was. His warmth, his humour, his creativity was stifled in those interactions.”

Nirvana songs and performances will feature in the film, as well as unheard tracks, home movies and his painting and sculpture.

The director also had access to Cobain’s photography, demos, journals and family archives. “These pieces show a world view that no one has seen,” Mr Morgen said.

Love, Cobain’s widow, was interviewed in depth for the film, and also his mother, Wendy O’Connor, and Nirvana bandmates Dave Grohl and Krist Novoselic approved the project.

It is the latest in a string of documentaries about the musician, including A J Schnack’s About a Son, Nick Broomfield’s Kurt & Courtney, and Soaked in Bleach, which is yet to be released.

Independent.co.uk