Control is finally out on DVD this week! However there is no Blu-ray. This just might have been the movie to push me over the edge and buy a Blu-ray player. I still am not completely sure what a film looks like on Blu-ray since I have yet to see one, but I imagine that this film would look amazing in high definition. It seems like it was out in theater like forever ago, but I guess it was only last November. The film was scheduled to come out a month or 2 ago but was pushed back until this week. I am really excited-- as excited as I can be about one of the most depressing films that I have ever seen. If you are in the mood for another depressing movie you should also check out The Bridge. I had been wanting to watch this movie ever since it hit the theater last year, but I just could not bring myself to watch it until recently. I normally love intense and disturbing documentaries, but this one was especially hard for me to watch. The movie is about people who have committed suicide by jumping off the Golden Gate Bridge in San Francisco. Maybe it was hard to watch because I love that bridge so much. I guess this is sort of selfish, but I have spent many days walking across it and I just didn't want to associate it with death. I will for sure not feel the same next time I cross the bridge.

At least you know what you are getting with the Joy Division movie. You know how it ends. And if you are a fan of the music then you know how the music can affect you. Joy Division is a very unique band for its fans. Many of us didn't even start listening to the band until after Ian Curtis killed himself. I was still too young to be listening to anything but Sesame Street and Mickey Mouse Club records when Ian Curtis took his own life, so I never had that period of enjoying the band while he was still alive. At least with bands like Nirvana there was a significant period when Kurt Cobain was still alive for his fans to still enjoy him. So Joy Division is always associated with death in my mind. I always can hear his depression and confusion in all of his songs, but for some reason I can completely disassociate New Order from that feeling, maybe because they ended up sounding so different.

If you did not have a time to watch this movie in the theater. Now is the time. Just get it over with it. I guarantee that you will like this film if you like Joy Division even a little bit. The film is shot so beautifully that you could even appreciate it without liking the movie. I was a bit worried about the movie since I knew it was based on the book by the wife of Ian Curtis. Deborah Curtis consulted on the film so I really worried that the film would not be completely accurate in regards to the relationship between Ian and his wife. While I am sure that it is not really completely accurate, the film does not exactly portray Deborah Curtis as a saint. I tend to always side with the female character in movies, but this was not the case in Control. The movie really made you side with Ian and feel bad for him. I really just wanted to jump into the movie at certain points and tell him that it was going to be OK. We all have had our own relationship problems. Of course, it becomes a bit more serious when you throw marriage, kids, fame, drugs, and epilepsy into the mix. While the movie ends like you would expect with his suicide, I was surprised at how they portrayed his final moments with his wife. It almost seems like it was her fault and as if it could have been avoided...but even if she had acted differently in these final situations, it also seems like he would have eventually killed himself regardless.

The film is cast perfectly. Sam Riley is absolutely amazing as Ian Curtis. He seriously amazed me by how fantastic he was in this film. The whole film just looks like one continuous amazing black and white photograph. They managed to find four guys that looked very similar to the actual guys in Joy Division, if not a bit more attractive and movie-like. The film somehow captures the feeling of a Joy Division song. It seriously gave me shivers as I was watching it. I ended up forgetting that this was a cast of actors and not the actual people.

I saw Control with Morten. It's the movie about Joy Division and more specifically Ian Curtis. It's funny because the first I heard of it was critics tripping over themselves to point out that they liked it though they'd never heard of the band. The point is always pretty much, "I'm a square. I'd never heard of these guys but I liked the movie, although for a rock band, they sure weren't that much fun." I wonder what those critics were listening to back then. To me, Joy Division is one of those bands that, if you have taste, you should've at least heard during their existence if you were teenage or older. I mean, how separate are the worlds of music and movies that you'd have us believe you've got great taste and an ear to the underground if you still haven't heard of Joy Division? What bigger independent bands were there in the late '70s? And didn't you review 24 Hour Party People not five years ago?

Back to the 24 Hour Party People then. When that came out I saw a lot of dour Raincoats leaving the theater expressing their wish that whole film had been about Ian Curtis and not those awful acid house Blue Tuesdays or whatever was going on after Ian Curtis' death, at which point their lot zoned out 'til the credits. Pity them. And I thought of how awful that would be -- a film about Joy Division. Biopics are so suspect. Made For Cable movies that sit in the wings like vultures to be released in theaters only in the event of the subject's death because what is an awful film will likely reap the awful rewards at the Oscars.

Control is directed by Anton Corbijn, which I didn't know till the end. Whatever you think of the guy, and I love his videos, you've got to admit that his images always have to easy to appreciate visuals. I mean, Bryan Adams got him to direct "Have You Ever Really Loved a Woman," after all. He's f---ing Dutch, for Christ's sake.