Control Ian Curtis Film

Last night I went to see Control - the new film about the life and death of Ian Curtis, lead singer of Joy Division by Anton Corbin. Many people have described it as a beautiful film and, strange to say, despite the grim subject matter of a young man's suicide, it was. For those of us who loved him (and we did love him) watching his descent into depression, his increasingly severe bouts of epilepsy and the turmoil caused by his being torn between love and duty was harrowing. Fortunately, Corbin saved us the horror of watching his actual suicide, although we see the events leading up to it and the aftermath. The settings in black and white bring out all the grimness of Manchester/ Macclesfield in the pre 'Madchester' days.

Ian died two years before I discovered his music and seeing this film makes me realise why it spoke to a troubled young boy that I was then. Despite all the hype surrounding him it was all about the music and particularly his darkly poetic lyrics. The picture that emerges of him was that of a basically good man torn to pieces by his inability to handle his emotional life. No doubt these days he would have been banged full of Prozac and who knows whether he would have been able to produce such sublime music.

And just to remember HOW sublime there's a You Tube clip here of them live. Awesome.