In 'Groove' with the rave

Director: Raves are a 'very basic human experience'

Groove

June 23, 2000
Web posted at: 4:47 p.m. EDT (2047 GMT)

In this story: 'People wanted to add guns' 'Chaotic and spontaneous' An answer to something? RELATED STORIES, SITES

ATLANTA (CNN) -- Atlanta's Hartsfield International Airport is like a rave in some ways -- there are lots of people crowding into small spaces, lots of energy being expended, and lots of noise filtering through it all. There's probably even some drugs.

At least, the parallels between an airport terminal and a midnight dance party seem apparent when talking to Greg Harrison, writer-director of the new rave movie "Groove," just before he boards a jetliner to Miami.

As if caught in the maelstrom of his own rave, Harrison has been constantly on the move as of late. He and producer Danielle Renfrew have been traveling from city to city to promote their independent film that has found distribution with Sony Pictures Classics. The movie is embarking on a staggered release throughout the summer.

Set in San Francisco, where Harrison lives, "Groove" follows the lives of a group of young people as they head to a multi-DJ, secretly-located warehouse rave that lasts into the early daylight hours of the next day.

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During the in-between hours are one man's acceptance of the idea of just letting go and having fun, a woman's realization that she's been having fun while life is passing her by, a marriage proposal and a gay experience -- along with a constant tide of drugs and techno-electronic-dance music, including spins by DJ legend John Digweed.

Harrison, who hangs out in San Francisco's rave scene, calls the movie "an authentic document of a time in youth culture history." He says he was just trying to create a movie that captured the essence of this subcultural phenomenon that has become mainstream entertainment for a turn-of-the-millennium generation.

"I think raves are being embraced because ... it's a very interactive experience," Harrison says at the Atlanta airport gate. "The party is the people, and the people are the party. And the music is inherently a participatory type of music. The DJ needs the crowd as much as the crowd needs the DJ, and there's a real interplay there.

"You can experience a joy and catharsis that I'm not sure you can experience anywhere else in modern-day society, where you can actually let go and lose yourself in the one-ness of the dance floor, going off to the same beat," Harrison says. "It's a very primal, very basic human experience."

Groove

'People wanted to add guns'

Harrison spent a number of years in Hollywood as an editor, and moved to San Francisco to become a writer-director. When he finished the screenplay to "Groove," he used his Hollywood connections to try to sell his product.

"It turned out not be the right world for this film," he says of Hollywood. "People wanted to add the guns, the overdose, the more traditional Hollywood elements and really infuse the script with a moral message, and I was more interested in exploring the reality and truth of what really happens."

Refusing to sell out, Harrison eventually hooked up with Renfrew through a San Francisco rave acquaintance. Renfrew has made a name for herself in the documentary world by co-producing and directing "Dear Dr. Spencer: Abortion in a Small Town" (1998).

Although Renfrew didn't consider herself a regular in the rave scene, she says the project immediately interested her.

"I really connected to the script when I read it," she says, "but it wasn't because it rang so true to my life. There's just so much honesty there."

'Chaotic and spontaneous'

To raise money for filming, Harrison and Renfrew found dot-commers in nearby Silicon Valley who were flush from the Internet gold rush and eager to invest in the arts.

Groove

When the 24-day shoot began, they relied on hundreds of extras from the rave scene. Using one camera, Harrison brought his script to life in methodical fashion, skipping from sweaty dance floors to languid "puppy piles" of people lying on couches.

The dance scenes were challenging to create in authentic fashion, he says.

"What appears very chaotic and spontaneous on camera was very tedious and exact on the shoot," he says. "We'd throw a rave for 30 seconds and then yell, 'Cut!' and say, 'OK, it was great. But when you freak out, make sure you freak out a little to the left.'"

An answer to something?

The characters in the movie are based on people Harrison knows, including himself: David, played by Hamish Linklater, is a technical writer who attends his first rave. At first, he's a bundle of nerves. By the end, he has found a meaning in the rave.

"You get the sense that the scene is an answer to something," Harrison says. "It can be such an epiphany and that's what's so powerful about it. But the danger is that the very epiphany that you have initially can ultimately lead you into a trap, escaping life."

That's exactly what has happened to the character of Leyla (Lola Glaudini). There's also the characters of Colin (Denny Kirkwood), who proposes to his girlfriend, Harmony (Mackenzie Firgens), then takes Ecstasy and discovers another side of himself.

The finished product has immediate competition. "Better Living Through Circuitry" is a documentary about the electronic culture, and "Human Traffic" is a comedy set in the rave scene.

"Groove," however, is Harrison's snapshot of his experiences. At the end of the film, there's little resolution.

"It was very important to me to make it a human film and slow down the chaos and stop and see what human moments are transpiring in the chaos," he says.

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'Groove'
Sony Pictures Classics

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