The story of Ian Curtis and Joy Division now ranks as one of the seminal moments of music in the early 1980s.Anton Corbijn has written a love letter to that moment with his stunning new film, Control, chronicling the band's meteoric rise and Curtis' concurrent spiral into depression.
After experiencing Control tonight, the myth of Ian Curtis has now been enshrined in one of the most visually stunning movies I have seen in a while. Seeing it on a big screen in glorious black-and-white was surprisingly breathtaking.
It is clear now, that Corbijn's longstanding relationship with the surviving members of Joy Division has served him well. You get the feeling, watching the story slowly unfold, that his longstanding relationship with the people who surrounded Ian Curtis gave him the insight to stick with quiet subtle moments instead of easy melodramatic flourishes.
Corbijn's signature cinematography dances across the screen for two hours, intermingling songs and images to propel the tragic story along. Already knowing how it has to end, you find yourself getting lost in the small clues laid along the way as to how such a talented musician found senseless self-destruction his only escape.
Playing Ian Curtis, newcomer Sam Riley is a revelation. While his impersonation is uncanny at times, the performance is subtle, bringing a softer humanity to a forever-young rock legend. This is in large part thanks to the pitch-perfect counterbalance Samantha Morton provides as Curtis' wife who bears the brunt of the singers meteoric rise and descent.
Control is a dark, haunting, visual masterpiece.
It is showing this week at the fantastic new Neighborhood Flix movie theater on Colfax, here in Denver. Catch it while you can.
For a trailer and some background I wrote a while back, click HERE
No comments:
Post a Comment
I can choose to randomly remove comments on here at will, with no explanation.