Continue reading Anton Corbijn’s ‘The American’ Is Complete, Ready For Test Screenings at The Playlist.

The details are pretty heartbreaking and the singer, multi-instrumentalist of creaking, sad/beautiful songs, evidently shot himself in the heart after receiving a text message that brought him over the edge.

We here at the Playlist were huge fans but we’re not the only ones, as an outpouring of grief came from musicians who knew and loved the underappreciated band —described by the NYTimes, not completely off the mark as “psychedelic Appalachian folk slop.” Bands and artists like Radiohead, Death Cab For Cutie, Steve Albini, the Flaming Lips, Califone and more all gave eulogies and reactions to the news of the departed singer who struggled with depression all of his life.

Continue reading Remembering Mark Linkous Aka Sparklehorse at The Playlist.

Back in May it was announced that Anton Corbijn, whose debut feature film was the Joy Division biopic, “Control,” would direct “A Very Private Gentleman,” for Focus Features, with George Clooney in the lead role.

This is still the case, only now the film, a Rowan Joffe adaptation of a Martin Booth novel, is now imaginatively called, “The American.”

It’s essentially a “creepy psychological suspense” story that follows an assassin (Clooney) “to a rural village in southern Italy where he poses as… a quiet artist who paints miniatures of butterflies and has traveled to the area to capture a unique native specimen.” He has one more assignment to carry out, but of course romantic entanglements and local friendships complicate his task.

Continue reading Anton Corbijn’s ‘Gentleman’ With George Clooney Changes Title To ‘The American’ at The Playlist.

However, as we mentioned a few months ago, Toronto indie-rock collective Broken Social Scene appear in the film as a band at a wedding playing a cover of Joy Division’s cutter-classic “Love Will Tear Us Apart.”

Well, it appears that the song will also appear on the soundtrack.

Continue reading First Listen: Broken Social Scene’s Joy Division Cover From ‘Time Traveler’s Wife’ at The Playlist.

Continue reading Anton Corbijn To Direct George Clooney In ‘Gentleman’ at The Playlist.

Last year it was reported — based on one line in a press release — that indie-rock collective Broken Social Scene had participated in the film, “The Time Traveler’s Wife” directed by Robert Schwentke (“Flightplan“) and starring Eric Bana and Rachel McAdams, but there were zero details on their involvement.

But a friend of ours just saw an early-bird test screening of the film and told us four members of the expanding and ever-evolving line-up, including Kevin Drew, Brendan Canning and Justin Peroff are featured in a wedding scene playing undisclosed BSS track which eventually morphs into a quick snippet medley of Joy Division’s classic, “Love Will Tear Us Apart.” Will they be included on the soundtrack or write additional music?

Continue reading Broken Social Scene Seranade A Joy Division Song In ‘Time Traveler’s Wife’; New Cut Looks Good, Film Coming… When? at The Playlist.

–Marshall Berman, All That is Solid Melts Into Air (the opening quote of the film)

Given the chance to gain intimate access to members of New Order and charming, garrulous raconteurs like Tony Wilson, most filmmakers would be hard pressed to not give in to the temptation to simply just present talking heads.

Continue reading Grant Gee’s Vibrant ‘Joy Division’ Documentary Makes ‘Control’ Look Like A Gray And Dreary Manchester Day at The Playlist.

According to Pitchfork, the documentary rolls out to DVD on June 10 in conjunction with Genius Entertainment via the Miriam Collection (though Amazon has a June 17 release date), but it’s also coming out concurrently on the Zune player (what’s that?

Continue reading ‘Joy Division’ Documentary Coming Via Zune And DVD On June 10 at The Playlist.

While no details on the North American version are out yet, the British version which comes out Feb 11 – and which we can cavalierly assume contains the same features – includes the 25-minute featurette “Making of Control” (interviews with Corbijn, star Sam Riley and writer Matt Greenhalgh), directory commentary – covering the Dutch director’s experiences making “Control” -, extended scenes, full performances by the Joy Division actors performing the songs “Transmission,” “Leaders of Men” and “Candidate,” plus JD’s “Atmosphere” ’88 video also famously lensed by Corbijn.

Continue reading ‘Control’ DVD Coming March 25; Engaging, Exciting Film Not Included at The Playlist.

Continue reading ‘Joy Division’ Trailer Looks To Make Up For Bust That Was ‘Control’ at The Playlist.

However, despite their critical hegemony, neither film was nominated for Best Picture. Instead Paul Thomas Anderson’s “There Will Be Blood” picked up four important nominations including Best Picture, Best Director, Best Actor and Best Screenplay.

Continue reading London Critics Loving ‘Blood,’ ‘Atonement,’ ‘Control’ at The Playlist.

The grainy, black and white drama has gained tons of accolades BIFA has given the film 10 nominations for it’s upcoming award ceremony including Best Picture, Best Director, Best Screenplay and nods for lead actors Sam Riley, Samantha Morton and the real highlight of the film, Toby Kebbell (he steals almost every scene he’s in as JD’s hilarious manager Rob Gretton).

Continue reading Most Overrated Film Of The Year Earns 10 British Film Indie Award Nominations – Control at The Playlist.

Not that he isn’t the man for the job, but as rock stories go, they’re generally exaggerated and it turns out Corbijn barely spoke English when he met Ian Curtis, let alone got to know him well.

Continue reading So Contrary To Popular Belief Anton Corbijn Barely Knew Ian Curtis & Other Joy Division Tales at The Playlist.

As for the silly Reeler question asking why Harvey Weinstein would be interested in a film about Joy Division, Corbijn drops the wry, “I think [Harvey’s] been seen dancing to Joy Division.” We were fairly disappointed by “Control,” but you should probably still see for yourself [ed.

Continue reading “[Working With Actors] Was The Scary Part Of Filmmaking” – ‘Control”s Anton Corbijn at The Playlist.

As you’ve likely heard by now, David Cronenberg’s new, how do I make violence that more shocking film, “Eastern Promises” won the sort-of prestigious Audience Award at the Toronto International Film Festival.

Continue reading Short Cuts: Joy Division Doc, Eastern Promises, David Wingo, Wes Anderson Goes AT&T at The Playlist.

While we were greatly anticipating the Joy Division film “Control” and have much admiration for the photographic work of director Anton Corbijn, his directorial debut was nothing short of disappointment.

No disrespect to Ian Curtis, but “Control” wasn’t really a story worth telling – at least not the one in this script. Let’s face it, if this band didn’t happen to be famous and cherished, their story would be pretty unexceptional (again if we’re going by this story).

Continue reading Review: Don’t Believe The Hype – Corbijn’s Not So In ‘Control’ at The Playlist.

The soundtrack tracklist for the Joy Division biopic has been leaked via a fan made Myspace page. Though what’s making it to this movie isn’t a huge revelation, the songs used in the movie have been floating around for sometime (though it was an impartial list).

As we noted, the list off songs originally posted by the fan Joy Division site was missing David Bowie’s “Warsawa”, and the tracklist reveals what we knew, but had failed to yet post (stupid, we’ve seen the movie and were saving it for our review.

Continue reading Control Soundtrack Tracklist Leaks Via Fansite at The Playlist.

Continue reading New Control Trailer & Extended Scenes Are Out at The Playlist.

Wilson’s risk-taking and visionary mid-70s TV program “So It Goes” (he was one of, it not the first person to ever put the Sex Pistols on TV) helped set the stage for Manchester’s post-punk scene and his Factory Records aided and abetted the likes of Joy Division, New Order, the Happy Mondays, A Certain Ratio and the skeletal and underappreciated, Vini Reilly, aka, the Durutti Column.

Continue reading So It Goes… Tony Wilson 1950-2007 at The Playlist.

Continue reading Ian Curtis Film Leaks… Ummm, Killers Track? at The Playlist.