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Derek Malcolm's rating
You can’t have too much joy
By
Derek Malcolm
1 May 2008
This excellent documentary, which supplements Anton Corbijn’s Control, is about the four young men from post-industrial Manchester who went to see a Sex Pistols gig and, after making a dreadful punk record, went on to ignite the Manchester music scene and become one of the most influential bands of their time.
Grant Gee’s film also talks about the suicide of Ian Curtis, their singer and lyricist, about the Manchester scene and the strange fact that Joy Division, before they became New Order, had no idea how good they were. Tony Wilson, the late and legendary Factory Records owner, talks to the camera, as do Bernard Sumner, Peter Hook and Stephen Morris of Joy Division and, for the first time, Belgian journalist Annik Honore, who had an affair with the married Curtis.
The result is both moving and enlightening, well illustrating that some of the best songs of the latter half of the 20th century were made by rock bands rather than classical composers — and that Curtis was a lyricist who could properly be termed a poet but one who doubted his talents and distrusted his fame.
A distinguished effort.
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