Friday, March 7, 2008
Moving Pictures 3, 5, 0, 1, 2, 5, GO!
Posted by Matt Sullivan on Fri, Mar 7, 2008 at 10:46 AM
Control is screening at the Belcourt until next Thursday. Mr. Maloney and myself went and saw it last Tuesday. Anton Corbijn directed it (the same guy who directed the video for "Atmosphere"). It looks amazing but still falls into the some of the same traps that snare a lot of biopics (read: brief bouts of cliché sentimentality). There are a couple of cheesy moments, like this exchange:
"When you say things like that it makes me think that you don't love me anymore."
"I don't think that I do."
Cue "Love Will Tear Us Apart"
If you've seen 24 Hour Party People or read Touching From a Distance, you probably won't gain any new insight into the inner workings of Joy Division, but you'll probably feel obligated to see the movie all the same. The tortured artist angle wasn't overplayed, which was a relief. There's a funny slam on The Fall's Mark E. Smith. The actor who played Bernard Albrecht did an excellent job mimicking the guitarist's butchered technique. The concert scenes seemed to be performed by the actors themselves, so the songs don't sound exactly right. But then again, if the actors were able to sound exactly like Joy Division there wouldn't be much point in making a movie.
