Director Joe Massot, an American living in the UK, had part-directed a Led Zeppelin concert film and had worked with George Harrison, but it was his son’s passion for the 2-Tone bands that led him to film the series of concerts.

Shot on Super 35 with Steadycam allowing total mobility, it enables us to experience the concerts from the stage. We are up there with the performers rather than watching them from the perspective of static cameras safely anchored in the stalls. Outtakes (1980, 17 mins): a selection of rare clips, many previously unseen, featuring the bands from the film DANCE CRAZE premieres at the Glasgow Film Festival on Thursday 9 March and will be screened at BFI IMAX, the biggest screen in Britain – 65 foot high with a 12-channel sound system – on Wednesday 22 March. The already sold out BFI IMAX screening will be introduced by members of the bands featured. 30 x Picturehouse cinemas are holding a special one-off screening on 23 March. Because 2 Tone was massive. For a short period of time at the turn of the 1980s, it seemed like the biggest thing on the planet. Or at least, on the schoolyard. While the gigs might have been lively, for many kids, they weren’t exactly on the doorstep, and Dance Craze was the ideal substitute.Massot intercuts the bands’ live performances withnuggets of archaic 1950s newsreels, complete with cut glass-accented observations about British pop music and dance crazes. It’s an ingenious way to break up the documentary and set the 2-Tone bands in a historical framework. Shot in 1980 by Joe Massot, who directed the psychedelic and absurdist Wonderwall in 1968, Dance Craze is a concert footage film rather than a documentary although, around the halfway mark, it’s broken up with some old Pathé news reports on dance crazes such as the Locomotion and the Madison, and a man from Harrogate attempting a world record for playing the piano longer than anybody before had managed (a marathon endeavour aided by ‘eggs, glucose, tea and brandy’ together with a hundred cigarettes a day. Don’t try this at home, folks). Often topping the wants list of many people, a Dance Craze movie Blu-ray release has now been confirmed by the BFI.

The material has been newly restored by the BFI from original film materials. The release will feature a brand new Dolby Atmos sound mix supervised by Jerry Dammers and Dermot James (Chrysalis Records). The disc will feature outtakes, a booklet featuring new writing on the film, plus other extras to be confirmed.

Versions

Highlights include The Specials’ Concrete Jungle, a slice of terrace chant ska with social realist lyrics about streets that are no longer safe and only walking at night where there’s lots of lights. Dance Craze was released in February 1981, the idea originally came from American director Joe Massot (who shot the Wonderwall film), when he met Madness during their first US tour. Originally he was going to make a film about the band but when his son informed him of the wonderful world of 2-Tone, Massot expanded his original plans to include the whole movement. The movie doesn’t get many screenings, and it hasn’t had a release on either DVD or Blu-ray. Until now. The BFI has produced a dual-format edition that works as both a DVD and Blu-ray. The movie was directed by Joe Massot, who is perhaps best known these days for the 1960s cult classic Wonderwall ( available as a cheapie on Blu-ray if you haven’t got it). He also directed the Led Zeppelin concert film The Song Remains The Same a few years earlier, and following that, he planned to do a concert movie featuring Madness. Yes, the BFI, no less. Which seems like quite an honour. It didn’t seem quite so high-brow when I was watching this on a Saturday afternoon at Bolton Odeon all those years ago. It was utter carnage for the entire screening.