The Prague Post
July 7th, 2008
Endowment Fund     Book of Lists ONLINE      Reservations      Classifieds    Subscriptions
Hotel Prague Centre

Home » Archives » Night & Day

Post-punk daze

An impressive first film by a video master
Cinema Review | Search restaurants | Archives

By Steffen Silvis
Staff Writer, The Prague Post
March 19th, 2008 issue

COURTESY PHOTO
Between rock and a hard place. Sam Riley eerily captures the damaged Control subject, Joy Division's Ian Curtis.
enlarge
Control


Directed by Anton Corbijn
With Sam Riley, Samantha Morton, Alexandria Maria Lara, Joe Anderson and Craig Parkinson
The Dutch photographer and video director Anton Corbijn couldn’t have chosen a better project for his impressive first film. Control is a biopic of singer Ian Curtis, who fronted the influential band Joy Division, and who committed suicide at an all-too young age. What makes Corbijn ideal for the subject is that he was a firsthand witness to Curtis’ rise and fall, having covered Joy Division for NME magazine in the late ’70s and early ’80s.
Control could equally serve as a secret diary for Corbijn himself, since, like Curtis, he came of age in the British music scene as it was moving from the androgynous glam rock of Bowie and Eno into the full-throttled anger of punk. As with Joy Division, Corbijn became part of the hybrid post-punk/new wave movement, and the photographer (“accidentally” he claims) segued into directing videos, especially for groups like Depeche Mode and Echo and the Bunnymen.
Corbijn has made good on his accidental career change, becoming a highly respected video director who has worked with Nick Cave, U2, the Red Hot Chili Peppers and, more recently, Coldplay. His video for Nirvana’s “Heart-Shaped Box” won a number of awards and accolades.
Prior to the synth-scored years that Joy Division would soon rule, there was the unquiet desperation of a spent Britain. Curtis hailed from the grim reaches of Macclesfield, a brick labyrinth of row houses, with outcroppings of breeze blocks, in the north of England.
Curtis (expertly played by Sam Riley), a born truant, has the full ’70s kit to complement his flawless pallor: black trenchcoat, pipe-legged trousers, touch of eyeliner. He spends his time at home half-naked in bed, smoking cigarettes while listening to Bowie. He also keeps a bit of faux fur on hand when he’s feeling reckless enough to lip-synch his hero in front of a mirror.
Curtis is directionless, taking whatever comes his way. He soon finds himself falling in love with a mate’s girlfriend, Debbie (Samantha Morton), whom he soon, unthinkingly, marries and impregnates. But just as he’s embarking on married life, Curtis has an epiphany after catching a Sex Pistols concert. Meeting musician friends later, he decides to form a band with them, becoming the lead singer.
Corbijn masterfully captures these roiling times in stark black and white. We follow Curtis’ band, first called Warsaw before switching to Joy Division, as they make their way into the same scene with other new groups like the Buzzcocks and Cabaret Voltaire. Their break finally comes when the famed new music impressario of Manchester, Tony Wilson (Craig Parkinson as a spitting image), puts them on his Granada TV program.
Curtis, flailing and trashing epileptically when not clutching the mic stand like a lifesaver, becomes a sensation. Tours, albums and pressures result, and the newly discovered young poet of angst begins to feel life getting out of control. A cancerous self-doubt gets hold, which further puts stress on his marriage to the suddenly provincial-seeming Debbie. Curtis momentarily finds some solace with a young Belgian groupie, Anik (Downfall’s Alexandra Maria Lara), though this only creates further turmoil. Tragedy looms.
As fine as Corbijn’s film is, it begins to fall apart in the last half hour. Anyone who knows Curtis’ story will know how it ends. Corbijn, who holds tight control on his film up to its denouement, suddenly allows melodrama to swamp it. There’s a moment of clumsy dramatic foreshadowing, which will inevitably lead to a clichéd (and dully drawn-out) conclusion.
Still, as an examination (if not autopsy) of an era, Control is never less than fascinating. It makes an excellent companion to Michael Winterbottom’s 24 Hour Party People, which also deals with the same Manchester music scene, and which features a terrific performance by Steve Coogan as Tony Wilson.
Riley, dynamic as Curtis, is a young actor to watch. And Morton, as always, has a way of becoming a film’s bedrock, however marginal her role. Control’s cast also includes the talented Joe Anderson, recently featured in Julie Taymor’s very different excursion into music, Across the Universe. There’s also a great cameo from punk poet John Cooper Clarke as himself, popping up again as an opening act, as he did for the Buzzcocks, The Fall, and Joy Division back in the day.
The film’s faults are those of a first full-length feature production. But these are few within an otherwise striking debut for Corbijn.
    

Steffen Silvis can be reached at ssilvis@praguepost.com


Other articles in Night & Day (19/03/2008):

Browse the Current Issue

If you enjoyed this article, why don't you subscribe to the print version!
We accept secure online transactions provided by PayPal and Moneybookers

Be the first to add a comment!


Full Name: *
City: *
E-mail: **
This comment can be published in the print version of The Prague Post
Enter the text on the right:
 visual captcha
Comment: *
* Required field. In order to be approved for display, comments must have a first and last name and a city.
** E-mails are required and will only be used for internal purposes.

Most visited in Book of Lists

Provokator
Hotel booking
The Prague Post Online contains a selection of articles that have been printed in
The Prague Post, a weekly newspaper published in the Czech Republic.
To subscribe to the print paper, click here.
Unauthorized reproduction is strictly prohibited.