Your Company
 

Control

✭ ✭ ✭ ✭   Read critic reviews

United Kingdom, United States, Australia · 2007
Rated R · 2h 1m
Director Anton Corbijn
Starring Sam Riley, Samantha Morton, Alexandra Maria Lara, Joe Anderson
Genre Drama

This drama tells the story of Ian Curtis, the lead singer of the English rock band Joy Division, and his marriage to his wife Deborah. The film shows Ian's rise to musical success, his struggles with epilepsy and depression, his extramarital affair, and his death by suicide in 1980.

Stream Control

What are people saying?

What are critics saying?

50

Village Voice by

Despite excellent performances from Samantha Morton, Craig Parkinson, and the radiant Toby Kebbell, along with a noble effort from pretty newcomer Sam Riley as Curtis himself, Control is like a wake where the guests forgot to bring the booze and, for the most part, have nothing very nice or even particularly interesting to say about the deceased.

80

The New Yorker by Anthony Lane

Those who worship Joy Division may bridle at Corbijn’s film for its reluctance to mythologize their hero. Speaking as someone so irretrievably square that I not only never listened to the band but didn’t even know anyone who liked it, I can’t imagine a tribute more fitting than this.

75

New York Daily News by Jack Mathews

Morton's as good an actress as any working today and in Control, she overcomes an age gap to give one of the year's most heartbreaking and honest performances.

75

ReelViews by James Berardinelli

In essence, Control is a standard order biopic of a tormented artist. What makes the film interesting, if not unique, is the style in which director Anton Corbijn has elected to present it.

75

New York Post by Kyle Smith

A rock bio minus the fun. The sex is guilt-stricken, the drugs are used to treat epilepsy, and the rock 'n' roll is about isolation and despair.

88

Rolling Stone by Peter Travers

It's Corbijn, shooting with a poet's eye in a harshly stunning black-and-white, who cuts to the soul of Ian's life and music. You don't watch this movie, you live it.

Users who liked this film also liked