The man has been immolated and sand has covered all traces of his city, but the memory of Burning Man 2003, the annual free-spirited festival held in the middle of the Nevada desert, lives on for the thousands that attended this year’s event.

This Friday, the event will also be able to be seen by those who couldn’t afford to go when a new documentary, "Confessions of a Burning Man", is released in San Francisco.

The event has a reputation for being a drug freak-out where people can find whatever illicit substance they are seeking. While attendees don’t deny drug use, they insist that Burning Man is not about drugs, but art and free expression.

“It’s a psychedelic experience even if you’re sober,” says fine arts major and two-year participant Zachery Wetzel.

Wetzel, who specializes in fire sculpture and has a hazardous material license to carry explosive material, has been going to Burning Man for the past two years with the sculptor collective Therm. He goes to event to be inspired by other artists and their creations.

The art, from giant whale art-cars to religious temples, has become an integral part of the event, which was once just the immolation of a wooden man. Artists can spend up to a year working on a project that will be seen and used for one week but will be dismantled or burned at the end of the event. Though this might seem like a waste, most attendees like the idea.

“I really like the ephemeral idea of Burning Man. That all this work will disappear at the end of the week,” says Suzanne Klein, a fine arts major, who attended Burning Man for the first time this year.

Wetzel agrees, saying, “It’s very cleansing. It’s a way to start anew.”

The documentary "Confessions of a Burning Man", which begins a San Francisco theatrical run this Friday at the Sony Metreon, tries to correct the misconceptions about the event.

“Not to say drugs and nudity are negative, but we didn’t focus on that,” explains Paul Barnett, who with co-director Unsu Lee, chose to feature the more creative side of the event.

The film takes four first-time attendees from different walks of life to the event. As the film progresses each person comes to a realization about themselves and Burning Man.

The documentary, which feels more like a travel video at times (It is the only film about Burning Man to be officially sanctioned by its creators), has many memorable moments and scenes including an odd kinship between Getty heiress Anna Getty and Hunters Point resident and film director Kevin Epps. The two make wildly different entrances. Epps comes to the event directly after being released from jail, while Getty flies to the desert in a private plane. The two form a friendship that comes to symbolize the spirit of unity that pervades Burning Man despite the mostly white make-up of its attendees.

“There aren’t that many black folks up there. Do I need a pistol? I don’t know if they are going to sacrifice the nigger out there, for real,” jokes Epps, who is also the director of the San Francisco hip-hop documentary "Straight Outta Hunters Point", about his initial hesitation when he was originally cast. Upon his arrival, Epps began to connect to the community of artists and realized that the event was about far more than race.

Even though it now takes place in Nevada, Burning Man’s originally started in 1986 at Baker Beach when San Francisco resident Larry Harvey built a wooden man and burnt him. Rumors abound that the wooden man was supposed to represent Mr. Harvey’s ex-girlfriend, but the official Burning Man Web site denies this. The event was forced to move in 1990 to the Nevada desert after San Francisco Police Department cracked down on it.

The current location, Black Rock City, is actually only a city for the two weeks of Burning Man and disappears back into the dust by the end of the event. During the two weeks of its existence, up to 40,000 people will live there. The city even boasts its own DMV, although it stands for Department of Mutant Vehicles.

One thing that most attendees, from Epps to Wetzel to Klein, agree on is the indescribable nature of Burning Man. All agreed that words and pictures do not do justice to the event, and that the only way to experience it is to go. Klein attempts a description, saying “It’s as if Mad Max was bisexual, poly-amorous, on acid, in Disneyland, on fire.”