Lovers Rockshows what happens when white people arent looking the rapture in black joy.
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Some nights just unfurl before you.
Theres an amorous mood, like anything could happen, like something good certainly will.
Remember nights so radiant, so alive with wanting, you could float home on their afterglow?
The moment glistens with sweat from all the full-bodied desire in the room.
The party feels alive, its dancers buzzing with the thrill of the ordinary.
Every time I hear your name / Oh, the pain / Boy, how it hurts me inside.
McQueens camera drifts from the main couple to the other faces, the other waists, the other elbows.
Were privy not to a crowd but to a congregation.
Theyre singing like its a hymn.
My grandmother would not allow my aunt to go to these parties, McQueen says.
Dont forget, in those days, people used to work for the weekend, McQueen says.
With this racism and oppression people had to deal with in the week people lived for that Saturday.
I always wanted it, McQueen says.
Its the anthem of lovers rock.
The track defines the romantic, hyperfeminine subcategory of reggae from which the movie takes its title.
The dance floor shakes itself loose to Carl Douglass Kung Fu Fighting, playfully dancing out the songs instructions.
The actors learned from choreographer Coral Messam how to whine and grind as couples would have at that time.
The movement is very grounded in your feet.
The Perfect Scene
Four minutes is never long enough for the perfect song.
The camera glides between couples that look suspended in amber.
The room, together, stretches out the song, keeps the music moving.
They miss some words and miss some notes, but theres such an aliveness to their effort.
Im not too sure what it was, but there was a spiritual element to it, McQueen says.
I cant put my finger on it.
To see Black women looking at other Black women and feeling acknowledgment.
That is what happened.
McQueen compares the movement of the scene to whirling dervishes: They spin to get closer to God.
Basically, here, you spin them and then you step back and you see what can occur.
Because I dont know whats going to happen!
Im not interested in what happens.
Im interested in what occurs.
It was a moment that couldnt be scripted or planned.
As an artist, you could never even hope for it.
You never even think of it.
But the idea of being invited to that situation is what you kind of hope for.
Ill remember that, Bovell says.
Written in the late 70s, Silly Games was always meant to be a hit.
Men are always saying Oooh, lets get together, Bovell says.
He wanted Silly Games to say something different and more tender.
Lets not play around here.
I know you like me, you know I like you, lets get it on, he says.
He wrote in the extremely high notes for little girls singing at home into hairbrushes.
I hadnt thought about that.
When Steve proposed that, I was like, Oh my God.
Eventually, Martha and Franklyn make their way outside to kiss in the moonlight.
The partys DJs prepare the next track.
McQueens eye turns to another story, another room.
