A powerful study of a disturbed, creative genius. Really worth watching.

Rating: 9/10 (31 August 2017)

This was a truly outstanding film. Granted I am a huge fan of this genre, period, and feel that some the music that came out of the UK in the 1970's and 1980's was hugely influential, important, and absolutely timeless. Of course, there is no arguing the influence Joy Division had, and their subsequent follow up act, New Order. Curtis was able to evoke such emotion, such power, more than likely due to his state of mind, and the chaotic emotional state he had to endure.
Shot in gorgeous, classic black and white, the Ian Curtis biopic doesn't seem to care if you like Joy Division, the influential post-punk band Curtis fronted. It simply presents a taut, emotionally wrenching narrative. And I never really got the post punk genre title. Is that the best they could do? How about pre-electronica? Or crazy inventive. Or mind numbingly stupendous?
Joy Division released only two proper albums in its short history, but the group disproportionately influenced the music that followed. Fans will enjoy the re-creations of seminal shows and recording sessions, staged with authority by director Anton Corbijn, who photographed the band and its peers in the '70s and '80s.
But even non-fans will appreciate the cinematography and note-perfect performances, which seem to evoke a certain dread of 1970s working-class England. We see young Curtis, played with appropriate understatement by Sam Riley, worshiping David Bowie, Iggy Pop and Lou Reed in his bedroom in Macclesfield, England, in 1973. He tries on makeup, smokes endless cigarettes and carefully organizes his darkly poetic writing into binders. Who knew what an extraordinary songwriter he was to become?
Riley's performance immediately sets the tone, his giant, uncertain eyes rejecting our sympathy and attempts to reduce him to an archetype. He marries his high school crush, Deborah (Samantha Morton), at age 19 as his band (first called Warsaw) slowly ascends.
Curtis' inner life, rendered through rich, stifling close-ups, is wracked with guilt and self-doubt, whether it's for cheating on his wife with the beautiful French gal Annik Honoré (Alexandra Maria Lara) or dealing with his worsening epilepsy and obsession with mortality. He is obviously in a lot more pain that we know, and does a reasonably good job of showing it.
The film is a quiet study. It is ponderous at times. But, in the end, it is a strong, self assured film, that really hits the mark.