Control (feature film)
Anton Corbijn is a logical choice perhaps as the director for a music biopic: he has an extensive CV both as a photographer and film maker in the company of rock and pop artists, not to mention having first-hand experience with working alongside Joy Division, the earlier incarnation of the band that would later be known as New Order. His style makes an interesting transition to Control, an unavoidably gritty and ultimately tragic adaptation of Touching from a Distance, the story of Joy Division’s frontman Ian Curtis told from the point of view of his wife Deborah. It charts their first meeting as teenagers and follows Curtis’ tragically short life as a young husband and father, then vocalist of an upcoming band through to his eventual suicide from a combination of illness and personal demons; most importantly it is keen to portray Curtis the man rather than Curtis the rock icon.
To date, Depeche Mode’s high water mark has always been 1990’s Violator LP but their 1984 effort, Some Great Reward, can also be considered a milestone in their career. The fact that it was recorded in partly in Berlin may have heightened the influence of electronic trendsetters Kraftwerk but the main reason why this record is, for me at least, a turning point in their back catalogue is where it hones the dark yet catchy signature sound that they are known for today. Much of the lyrical content turns away from the politics and social commentary (such as Construction Time Again’s Everything Counts) towards a stance that is more personal and introspective; this increased emotion is juxtaposed with a crisp, almost industrial synthesised sound that is very much a product of its time but somehow still feels fresh nearly a quarter of a century later.
I’m a fan of fiction that deals in world-building - the creation of not just foreign lands but entire alternate worlds and universes holds so much room for the writer’s imagination. My appreciation of the likes of Pullman, Tolkein and Le Guin does not stem purely from the portrayal of fantastical environs far-removed from our own though. Such fiction often incorporates ideas and issues of our own world but in doing so presents these ideas and issues in a refreshing and different light that helps us understand them in a new and possibly more productive way. Ursula Le Guin for example has addressed topics as far-reaching as politics, organised religion, racial and gender prejudice and the balance between humanity and nature in her fictional work centred on the world of Earthsea.