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The Review - AT THE MOVIES with WILLIAM HALL
Published: 1 May 2008

Talented Manchester band Joy Division – all mean streets and pasty faces

What puts Joy Division in a league of their own?

JOY DIVISION
Directed by Grant Gee
Certificate 15

THERE must be something special about the 1970s Manchester rock group Joy Division that makes them worthy of having not one but two mainstream movies made about them.
Having sat through both and emerged considerably depressed by the mean streets, pasty faces and often incoherent dialogue, I have to say their appeal eludes me, and that there’s very little I found joyous about this film.
Legends they may be in some circles. The first tribute last year was called Control, a dour study of the northern band whose hit album was Unknown Pleasures.
It centred on Ian Curtis, the charismatic lead singer who burned out and dramatically hanged himself in 1980 at the age of 22, leaving a nation of young mourners in his wake.
This revealing documentary digs a little deeper, backed with a pulsating soundtrack of their hits with director Grant Gee bringing to life evocative images of Manchester, part black and white newsreel shots, with its crowded streets and the inevitable driving rain.
Full marks to him for that.
The result, visually speaking, is a positive collector’s item.

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