The Cannes Film Festival’s Directors’ Fortnight slate is supposed to be announced on May 3rd, but Variety‘s Alison James is reporting now that the sidebar’s opening-night pic will be Anton Corbin‘s Control, a biopic about the late Ian Curtis, the Joy Division singer who hanged himself at age 23. Bono, members of New Order and Depeche Mode will attend (and may perform at) the opening- night party on Friday, 5.17, following a gala screening of the black-and-white film.

Curtis and child on May 13,. 1980 — five days before he hung himself in his bedroom.

The Becker International production is based on “Touching From a Distance,” a reminiscence by the singer’s widow Deborah Curtis (played by Samantha Morton in the film). The book describes Curtis’s life from his early teen years to his early death, and tells how –with a wife, child and impending international fame — he was seduced by the glory of an early grave. What were the reasons for his fascination with death? Were his dark, brooding lyrics an artistic exorcism?

The Variety story passes along an opinion that a “love triangle” between Curtis, his widow and his mistress may have been a factor.

The Curtis suicide was dramatized in Michael Winterbottom‘s 24 Hour Party People, the well-received faux-doc. Control , however, is said to be a “totally different” film. Directors Fortnight honcho Olivier Pere told James that “it’s a surprising love story about someone who was very ordinary and very modest…it’s very close to English cinema from the 60s and 70s, with a political and social backdrop.”