Film Review: Control
- Posted on October 12, 2007 11:34 AM
- 2 comments
- Zarina Raja
‘I exist on the best terms that I can,’ croaked Sam Riley, aka Ian Curtis. Oh, I was in for an intense few hours, not surprising considering the ending – I didn’t even have any sweets to sob into… ‘No, we don’t take cards for under five pounds.’ Five quid’s worth of fudge and chocolate raisons seemed a bit extreme - even by my standards.
A beautiful but ruined Ian Curtis towered over me, dulled by the black and white imagery that turned the film into something of a piece of art, not to mention an hour and a half of Joy Division tracks creating musically luring and visually stirring piece of cinema.
You might wonder whether this film is going to work for you, despite the raving reviews – but it will. Although the tormented rock star, up against the pressures of fame and an impending suicide seem all too familiar, it doesn’t matter. Control plods through the last few years of Ian Curtis’s life, an impassioned musician who struggled with the turmoil of love, fame and a crippling bout of epileptic fits. Some Joy Division fans have openly showed their displeasure for the film, saying it has ruined Ian Curtis’ underground status and more pretentious rubbish like that. As a Joy Division fan myself, I thought it was a startling and effective piece of cinema that managed to carve something beautiful out of something tragic, bringing Joy Division back to life for the duration of the film. What more can a fan want?
1973 – Macclesfield, seven years before Ian Curtis hanged himself. Ian is a normal teenager doing normal things (stealing prescription drugs from old ladies, kissing his best friend's girlfriend.) Debbie, the girl Ian Curtis marries and has a daughter with, takes a prominent role early on in the film, accentuating her significance in his life and sadly the end of his life. ‘Lets have a baby,’ the young and recently married Ian suggests to a painfully sweet and innocent Debbie, and so they dive head first in to the beginning of Ian’s demise, unsuspecting of what path their love would lead them down.
The best thing about this film is the subtle manner in which the directors have approached Ian’s depression, allowing it to creep in and not playing on any tacky dramatics to heighten the effect. The one scene which remains fixed in my mind is after Ian has made love to Debbie. He suddenly rips himself away from her, convulsed in sobs that rack his body. Debbie seems as lost as Ian as she tries to comfort him but is violently pushed away as Ian shudders at her concerned touch.
Control focuses on love, his epilepsy and Joy Division’s music, as the fingers that beckon Ian into the murky mouth of death. Sam Riley, possibly possessed by the spirit of Ian Curtis, engulfs himself with his part. He slams into the ground, shaking and seizing as an epileptic fit takes over or he moves stiffly and sometimes thrashes wildly as he mimic’s Curtis on stage. Riley’s expression is pained and desperate as he tries to come to terms with his fading love for Debbie and the blossoming affair with journalist Annik. Samantha Morton, who plays the character of Debbie, successfully captures the exasperation of a woman trying to cling on to her withering husband. Those scenes which close in on Debbie, crying and alone in a dark room or Debbie pushing the baby towards the house as Ian is whisked away in the tour van to meet his lover Annik, are as heart breaking as the shots of Ian, overwhelmed and annihilated. The last sight of Debbie, shrieking into a churning, grey sky as she clutches her daughter Natalie after having found Ian hanging in the kitchen, is enough to freeze your soul in the dark gloominess of the cinema.
Control allows us to glimpse Ian Curtis’s shadowy and bleak last days. Sam Riley, who is eerily similar to Pete Docherty, makes the film engrossing and infatuating. The live Joy Division scenes are raw and magnetic and there is even a fistful of dry and very comforting British humour entwined into the austere subject of the story. I left the cinema with a lead heart – five pounds worth of chocolate wouldn't have been enough.
What did you think of the film? Please leave us a comment or even your own review!
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Comments (2)
Katie
Oooh, I want to see this BAD. I think you just sold me. I HATE cinemas that don't let you take your own food in... sure, burgers and fries should be left outv - no one wants a stinky film experience but come ON. For the price they charge to GET IN, then for the soggy food they sell outside... it's a disgrace.
Gawd, I'm sounding more like my Grandma every day.
Can't wait to see the film. At least that'll keep me 'yoof-full'.
Posted on October 12, 2007 12:25 PM
Keith Smith
I feel as if I've just been mugged! Personally, I don't like to have to concentrate too much when I go to the flicks, I just want to be entertained and amused, not to have my conscience tickeled and to have to live the agony of a tortured soul! Still it sounds intesting so might just pop along for the laugh. Won't be taking any sweeties with me though, the combination of the film and the excess sugar might cause gastric upset, and that could be embaressing for the people sitting in front of me!
Posted on October 15, 2007 11:38 AM
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