CONTROL

Macclesfield, the mid-1970s: Ian Curtis (Sam Riley) is a boy who listens to Bowie in his room and writes poems. He marries young – his wife Deborah (Samantha Morton) is not yet twenty – and forms a band with friends that soon becomes known as Joy Division. Success comes quickly, and with it tours, an affair and epileptic seizures that even medication cannot control. Anton Corbijn traces, in “Control” (United Kingdom 2007), the path from a family man in the north English provinces to a singer who loses control on stage – and off it. The film is based on the memoir by Deborah Curtis.

Corbijn, who had accompanied the band as a photographer in the late 1970s, shot his first feature film in black and white, in the tone of his photographs from that time. It premiered in May 2007 in Cannes, in the Quinzaine des Réalisateurs, where the film won three prizes, including a special mention for the Caméra d’Or. “Control” was shown at Around the World in 14 Films in Berlin in 2007.

Shown at the 2007 edition of Around the World in 14 Films.

All films 2007 · Film Archive