DVD of the week: Control

DVD of the week: Sound and vision are blissfully married in Anton Corbijn's note-perfect evocation of the short life of Ian Curtis

Control 2007, 15, Momentum £19.99

Sound and vision are blissfully married in rock-photographer-turned-film-maker Anton Corbijn's note-perfect evocation of the short life and troubled times of Ian Curtis.

Using carefully orchestrated monochrome compositions that echo old rock-mag images, Corbijn brings us close to the unknown pleasures of Joy Division. In the process, he paints an engaging yet solidly unsentimental portrait of the artist as a tortured soul, a young man wrestling with the physical strains of epilepsy and the anguish of existentialism, while simultaneously holding down a job at the local labour exchange. That Curtis's artistic abandonment and personal self-obsession should prove ill-suited to domesticity and fatherhood is no surprise. What's more intriguing is how ill-prepared he seems for success, his early demise cementing a cult reputation as the post-punk voice of doom.

It is this voice that newcomer Sam Riley captures with aplomb, superbly handling the film's vocal chores, maintaining a crucial continuity of performance as his speaking voice seamlessly slips into stage song. Curtis may never have been much cop as a 'singer' but (like Nick Cave) he could 'talk' a great tune, a talent that Riley channels beautifully during the physically frenetic live performances. Helpful, too, that Joy Division's songs were so simple, allowing all the other actors in the on-screen band to play their respective musical roles to the full.

And then there is Samantha Morton, reminding us again why she has become one of Britain's most treasured actresses, effortlessly embodying long-suffering spouse Deborah Curtis, on whose memoirs the film is based. In other hands, this role could have been incidental, even cliched, but Morton gives her heroine real heart and soul, providing light and warmth amid the darkness, softening the picture with her sympathetic eye.

Contributor

Mark Kermode

The GuardianTramp

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