ControlThis didn't really work, unfortunately. While Anton Corbijn's tribute to the Joy Division frontman is clearly a labour of love, it fails to give an incisive account of what Ian Curtis was like. The film always keeps a respectful distance from its subject, and that's a big problem.
Of course, it's questionable whether there was sufficient incident in the short life of the singer to fill up a two-hour film. Even so, I was struck by how superficial the early stages are - it whizzes through the formation of Joy Division, and gives little insight into why these four men decided to form a band. Likewise, there's little attempt to explain the importance of the band's music - casual filmgoers, with little knowledge of JD's cultural significance, would find no explanation of how the band fitted into the post-punk musical environment. Nor would they understand why this film is so timely, given that their massive influence on future musical generations also remains undiscussed.
From the point of view of this fan, there was plenty of sloppiness to endure. There were obvious historical inaccuracies (for example, Curtis did not actually know Barney and Hooky when the Sex Pistols played Manchester) and unsatisfactory casting. Almost no-one looks like the person they're portraying; in the lead role, Sam Riley looks disturbingly like Pete Doherty, while Craig Parkinson portrays Tony Wilson as a bizarre Wildean fop. On the other hand, at least the band can play properly, and their recreations of live performances prove the principal reason to stick with the film initially; these are designed with a fine eye for detail, and are genuinely exciting to watch.
But is this enough? The film certainly looks good, with clean, gleaming monochrome images, but perhaps this is overdone. One repeated image sees Curtis trudging up a Macclesfield street to his house, the scene symbolising a dead-end provincial life. However, Corbijn can't help sabotaging this mood by ensuring a beautiful Peak District backdrop is always in shot; this just looks too pretty to establish the required mood.
The film does, however, improve in the second half, and it's largely to the female roles. Initially struggling with an underwritten role playing Curtis' widow, Samantha Morton finally shows show effective actorly fireworks in the later stages. Even better is the astonishingly sexy Romanian actress Alexandria Maria Lara as Belgian temptress Annik Honoré. I feel a picture is in order:
Blimey. Anyway, she has real chemistry in her scenes with Riley, and these quiet scenes ultimately provide the best moments of the film. (Of course, it's unsurprising that they work well together, given that they later got married in real life...)
So the film is something of a mixed bag. As a portrayal of a complex icon in British rock, it's a failure, and, for that, you'd be better off watching Grant Gee's magnificent documentary
Joy Division instead. Yet the final scenes do present a believable and touching portrait of a man stuck way out of his depth. So, despite my disappointment with some aspects of the film, I did feel it was worth watching.
