I WAS amazed and astonished to discover the film Control had been overlooked when the BAFTA nominations were announced recently.

"But it wasn't overlooked," I hear you cry. Yes, it got a nomination for Best British Film but that's barely a consolation when you consider it was overlooked for almost every other main category.

Samantha Morton deservedly got a nomination for Best Supporting Actress but otherwise the film has been criminally ignored.

For those of you who are un-familiar with this particular flick, it told the story of the tragically short life of Ian Curtis, lead singer with the Manchester based 70s cult band Joy Division.

The group became New Order when Curtis took his own life at the age of 23, leaving his legion of admirers wondering what might have been had this phenomenonally gifted lyricist continued to practice his craft.

Directed by Anton Corbijn, Control was an engrossing and revealing film and it was also a visuual masterpiece, with the director re-creating some of the iconic images involving this important, influential and short lived band.

There were also five-star performances from Sam Riley, who made a terrific job of playing the complicated Curtis, a character who felt the slings and arrows of outrageous fortune, or should that be misfortune, more keenly than most.

Curtis could laugh and joke with fellow band members over a pint in the pub and yet go away and produce lyrics that burned with an emotional intensity that belied his age.

Morton played his wife Deborah, a woman who spent a lot of time with her nose pressed up against the window as music took over her husband's life.

So, apart from the stunning visuals and equally stunning performances, why else should Control have been nominated for the Best Film BAFTA?

Another reason is because of its documentary-like style. The film is so well acted and so well shot you feel like you're actually there as these events unfold.

You've travelled back to a time when it was possible to make music that meant something rather than music that was simply bubblegum for the brain.