Caught the atmosphere wonderfully

Rating: 8/10 (15 January 2008)

Speaking as someone 'who was there' - ie a teenage/young man in the late 1970's/early 1980's - the first thing that struck me about this film was the way in which it captured the atmosphere of that age. Dank, grim and often feeling bereft of hope for the future. Into this dark world stormed music which attempted to capture the zeitgeist of the age, groups like the Sex Pistol, The Damned, The Clash etc, and, above all of these to my mind, Joy Division and their strange, troubled looking lead singer Ian Curtis.
In trying to capture the essence of Ian and the band onto film is no easy feat, and director Alan Corbijn has almost pulled it off completely. The dissolution of the times, the soul destroying high rise blocks, grubby clubs (many a night spent in such places!) and a society on the verge of Thatcherism is wonderfully portrayed, and use of music, going from the glam of Bowie to the 'in your face' Pistols creates the atmosphere of society on the turn.
It is clever in the way that Corbijn only shows the reaction to other groups - ie like when Ian and Deborah are watching Bowie as Ziggy Stardust, or the lads - ie Hooky et al - are transfixed by the Pistols. This is repeated when Tony Wilson watches Joy Division for the first time, his reaction is splendid! This allows for the performances by Joy Division themselves to take centre stage, and when they do, WOW! Corbijn captures the live experience in a way that is almost Scoreses/Raging Bull in its intensity.
Needless to say the cast are all fine, with Ms Morton again giving an object lesson in portraying tortured females on the screen - ie 'Longford' and herself as Maria Hindly. But of course, as with anything connected to Joy Division, it is Curtis we have come to watch, and Sam Riley delivers a once-in-a-lifetime performance as Ian. If he does anything better then I REALLY want to watch it! Yes the film is bleak, it was a bleak era, and the humour could be lost on those who were not there - it is typically British Northern, and, speaking as a Southerner, I did find it a little hard to take - but the film does give an insight into a tortured soul without ever being sentimental or cruel.
If the film has a fault it is that it is, maybe, a little too long - 10 minutes could have easily been trimmed, and it is at times a little too bleak, but it is rewarding if you were there, the memories will come flooding back, believe me!, and if you were not, then it shows you what you missed out on!