No one walked away in silence

Rating: 8/10 (11 October 2007)

Attempting to marry the rock film genre with sincere romance is perhaps as ambitious as expecting a teenage marriage to survive rock fame, yet all four of those elements drive this passionate work.
Control focus's on the life of Warsaw / Joy Division's lead singer Ian Curtis from the release of Bowie's Aladdin Sane in April 1973 until the 18th May 1980. Along the way, we have fun with 70s male underwear, witness love  and a band - germinate and grow, before pressure from both see the skies darken and life rains on everyone's parade.
A brief word of warning; take what 40+ year old English reviewers say about this film with a shovel of salt; professional or amateur, we all have too much emotional attachment to the time and place to be anything other than, as Peter Bradshaw says in The Guardian, "walking on air".
Concerns first, it felt like script opportunities were manipulated to ensure posterity smiled on the still living. There were scenes that felt worryingly akin to 'product placement' Examples; we learn Bernard Sumner designed the iconic 'An Ideal for Living' EP cover  check, Tony Wilson 'discovered' the band and even gave blood to sign them  check, it was Ian's idea  not Deborah's  to get married so early, to have a child when they did and, lets not forget, it was also Deborah's money that financed the studio time when they were no names and penniless  check, check and check.
So do lets remember Ian's wife Deborah Curtis wrote the book (on which the film is based) and co-wrote the script, that the reputation of Tony Wilson and Factory Records is not unassociated with the subject matter.
Also, the storyline was simplistic; reduce the plot to essentials and it's a BBC kitchen sink 'Play for Today' drama circa 1965 in which hometown boy jumps in a minibus with the lads, goes off to a rugby tour / European Cup final / stag weekend, falls for an exotic foreign lass and well, we know the rest - in genre or, in this case, literally.
Turning to the strengths, there is a determination to avoid sentimentality that is close to heroic. Nothing contaminates. Thus we don't see Deborah's life outside the house  friends, family, work  with one exception, a colleague's housewarming party, though even this momentary context also serves as the device by which Ian implicitly informs Deborah of his infidelity. There's little more of Ian's life beyond Deborah and the band, and that which we do see is relevant (to his lyrics as much as anything).
Yes it worked, it really worked, but I'm still left with a simple and familiar love story embellished with a blindingly good soundtrack and lots of cool images.
Oh, did I mention Bernard let Ian have his spare room "for as long as you need", that Deberah, the domestic martyr, struggled with a twin tub into the 1980s, that Ian and Hooky seemingly never had a cross word . . . Overall the film is like the band: tight, spare, committed and in black and white, but there was also a sense of people not walking away in silence.