The nutty boys were never known for doing anything by the book. After Madness hit the big time with their debut album One Step Beyond..., there was little concern about difficult second-album syndrome. Suggs, Mike Barson, Lee Thompson and the rest of the band apparently ploughed some of their first big royalty cheques into making a film about their meteoric rise. In their own words: “We’ve done it all now, let’s make a film of our story.” And make a film of their story they did.But Take It or Leave It is no ordinary music biopic.There are no flights of rock ’n’ roll fantasy, no Hollywood rags-to-riches narrative or traumatic childhoods overcome through the transformative power of music. Instead, this is the story of how Madness formed in a rainy Camden, from three young men - Thompson, Barson and Chris Foreman - who started playing music because there was little else to do.Told by the band themselves, who all play fictionalised versions of themselves, with even minor roles filled by their real-life counterparts, this is almost the Ken Loach version of a rock biopic. We follow the painfully slow progression from garden-party covers band, through a revolving door of potential singers, to recording a demo - which is almost derailed by a misplaced motorcyclist - and eventually playing a gig as the fully-formed group currently taking the UK charts by storm.It’s a strange film, but the almost kitchen-sink mundanity is very much the point. Madness wanted to show that there was nothing particularly special about their journey and that, in theory, anyone could get where they had. Beyond the occasional comedic misadventure involving vans and low bridges, however, this feels like The Commitments without the humour.The acting is inevitably questionable given that the stars are the band themselves, and with even the barest narrative trappings stripped away, this is very much a film for the diehards. Shot handheld in gritty 16mm vérité style, it does authentically capture a time, a place and a band, but its commitment to the no-frills, low-key nature of Madness’ own story makes it feel less like cinema - or even an extended music video - and more like an old-school fly-on-the-wall television documentary.And despite featuring several of the band’s songs, it isn’t even wall-to-wall Madness. When the film finally abandons its story and allows the band to perform, there’s an inescapable feeling that Take It or Leave It was as much an ingenious marketing exercise and sales platform for their third album as it was a successful piece of cinema.For Madness obsessives, however, that authenticity may be precisely the point. Everyone else might reasonably take it or leave it…
