HIT THIS SPIKE LEE JOINT
Staying in theme of paying tribute to the Gods:
Spike Lee Receives AFI Honor
It’s a testament to the power of one five foot nothing filmmaker that any joint Spike Lee is in somehow becomes a Spike Lee Joint. The crowd that packed the American Film Institute’s Silver Theatre in Silver Spring, MD last night to honor Spike Lee couldn’t have been more different from the crowds that packed opening night screenings of his early films two decades ago. This crowd, largely white, cultured, and self-consciously artistic, bore a closer resemblance to the audience at a Radiohead concert (or, ironically enough, an ’08 Public Enemy show) than to the hip-hop fueled urban masses who stood and cheered in the aisles when Mookie hurled that trash can through the front window of Sal’s Famous during that long hot summer when 1989 was the number. Yet, by night’s end, not only was that same crowd getting down to the brass-gospel sounds of the House of Prayer church band, but a gaggle of revelers had even congregated outside the fenced in patio of the sleekly modern headquarters of Discovery Communications, suddenly making newly corporatized Silver Spring feel like Bourbon Street before the levees broke.
Lee was in town, minutes outside the Nation’s Capital, to be honored by the Guggenhiem Symposium, for excellence in documentary film making, as part of the AFI’s Silverdocs festival. As old as it may make those of us who grew up on his work feel, after twenty-two years behind the camera, nineteen theatrical releases, plus forays into commercials, music videos and episodic television, Lee certainly is at a point where awards for his cumulative work are warranted. Yet, as we made our way through the winding line into the theatre, several attendees expressed skepticism at Lee, primarily known for the vibrant characters and incendiary story lines of his narrative films, receiving one of the country’s most prestigious accolades for documentaries. But as a clip reel at the beginning of the program illustrated, Lee has quietly culled just as diverse and compelling a collection of stories from the real world as from his own mind. His documentary work ranges from 1997’s 4 Little Girls, an account of the Birmingham church bombing that helped energize the Civil Rights Movement to We Wuz Robbed, a ten minute short delving into the 2000 election in Florida, and culminating in 2006’s When The Levees Broke: A Requiem In Four Acts, now seen as the documentary of record about Hurricane Katrina and the consequences of the government’s delayed response.
“Whether it’s a documentary or [fictional] narrative, it’s still telling a story,” Lee explained in his signature quiet monotone during a question and answer session with film critic, Lisa Kennedy. “It’s a narrative. You’ve still got to give it shape.”
In large part, that is what has kept Lee so relevant and vital throughout the years; a burning desire to tell the stories that so often get buried and ignored, but that in many ways have shaped our society. In making 4 Little Girls, Lee says he aimed to go beyond simply recounting the bombing and its galvanizing effect on the civil rights movement. He also took great care to tell the stories of each of the girls who died; stories that tragically ended prematurely.
“I wanted to talk to the people who knew them. Let them, in their own words, tell what they might have become.”
Never one to shy away from controversy, Lee reiterated one of the central themes of When The Levees Broke, placing it in the context of today.
“A lot of people got tricked into thinking it was the hurricane [that caused the destruction]. It was the levees. The same levees that are breaking now in Iowa. [The government] needs to fix it, but the money is going elsewhere.”
Pausing for a moment, Lee then played directly to the self-congratulating liberal leanings of the AFI crowd.
“But all that’s about to change.”
On a night that was all about him, ironically, it was talk of Barack Obama that got Lee most animated.
“When. There is no if,” Lee talked over a question about the possibility of an Obama presidency.
“It changes everything...how the world looks at us. There’s gonna be B.B. and ‘After Obama’, A.B...It’s gonna be a new day, a better day, and I’m gonna BE at the inauguration...It’s gonna be chocolate city for real!”
So will a better day mean a lack of material for a filmmaker who has been at his best when delving into society’s ills? Don’t count on it. Spike’s got more joints than Cheech and Chong coming to a screen near you in the next year, including documentaries on Michael Jordan and Kobe Bryant, as well as his twentieth feature film, Miracle at St. Anna, a World War II epic about the all black 92nd Division aka the Buffalo Soldiers, opening September 26th. If the extended preview the AFI audience received was any indication, Miracle at St. Anna’s has the broadest scope of any Lee project since Malcolm X, and could prove to be his most lavish visual production to date.
Lee also plans to return to New Orleans in the not too distant future to show the continuing effects of Katrina.
“What the press isn’t talking about is the mental state of the residents. Suicide rates, a lot of the self-medicating, no [treatment] facilities”.
By the time the crowd made its way across Georgia Avenue and into the Discovery lobby for the post-event reception, there were no more questions as to why Spike Lee was this year’s Guggenheim honoree. As we snacked on a buffet of cajon-chic cuisine and grooved to the band’s inspired renditions of “Shout” and “When The Saints Come Marching In,” it was hard not to think of the characters he introduced us to so poignantly in When The Levees Broke and the resonance of the stories they told. “Maybe I need to go to New Orleans,” said a sixty-ish white lady, swaying back and forth to the sounds. “I’ve been once, but that was before... I need to go back”.
Twenty years after School Daze, Spike Lee is still waking us up, and for that alone, his 2008 Gugggenheim honor is well deserved. Ya dig? Sho ‘nuff.
- Jeff Harvey
It’s a testament to the power of one five foot nothing filmmaker that any joint Spike Lee is in somehow becomes a Spike Lee Joint. The crowd that packed the American Film Institute’s Silver Theatre in Silver Spring, MD last night to honor Spike Lee couldn’t have been more different from the crowds that packed opening night screenings of his early films two decades ago. This crowd, largely white, cultured, and self-consciously artistic, bore a closer resemblance to the audience at a Radiohead concert (or, ironically enough, an ’08 Public Enemy show) than to the hip-hop fueled urban masses who stood and cheered in the aisles when Mookie hurled that trash can through the front window of Sal’s Famous during that long hot summer when 1989 was the number. Yet, by night’s end, not only was that same crowd getting down to the brass-gospel sounds of the House of Prayer church band, but a gaggle of revelers had even congregated outside the fenced in patio of the sleekly modern headquarters of Discovery Communications, suddenly making newly corporatized Silver Spring feel like Bourbon Street before the levees broke.
Lee was in town, minutes outside the Nation’s Capital, to be honored by the Guggenhiem Symposium, for excellence in documentary film making, as part of the AFI’s Silverdocs festival. As old as it may make those of us who grew up on his work feel, after twenty-two years behind the camera, nineteen theatrical releases, plus forays into commercials, music videos and episodic television, Lee certainly is at a point where awards for his cumulative work are warranted. Yet, as we made our way through the winding line into the theatre, several attendees expressed skepticism at Lee, primarily known for the vibrant characters and incendiary story lines of his narrative films, receiving one of the country’s most prestigious accolades for documentaries. But as a clip reel at the beginning of the program illustrated, Lee has quietly culled just as diverse and compelling a collection of stories from the real world as from his own mind. His documentary work ranges from 1997’s 4 Little Girls, an account of the Birmingham church bombing that helped energize the Civil Rights Movement to We Wuz Robbed, a ten minute short delving into the 2000 election in Florida, and culminating in 2006’s When The Levees Broke: A Requiem In Four Acts, now seen as the documentary of record about Hurricane Katrina and the consequences of the government’s delayed response.
“Whether it’s a documentary or [fictional] narrative, it’s still telling a story,” Lee explained in his signature quiet monotone during a question and answer session with film critic, Lisa Kennedy. “It’s a narrative. You’ve still got to give it shape.”
In large part, that is what has kept Lee so relevant and vital throughout the years; a burning desire to tell the stories that so often get buried and ignored, but that in many ways have shaped our society. In making 4 Little Girls, Lee says he aimed to go beyond simply recounting the bombing and its galvanizing effect on the civil rights movement. He also took great care to tell the stories of each of the girls who died; stories that tragically ended prematurely.
“I wanted to talk to the people who knew them. Let them, in their own words, tell what they might have become.”
Never one to shy away from controversy, Lee reiterated one of the central themes of When The Levees Broke, placing it in the context of today.
“A lot of people got tricked into thinking it was the hurricane [that caused the destruction]. It was the levees. The same levees that are breaking now in Iowa. [The government] needs to fix it, but the money is going elsewhere.”
Pausing for a moment, Lee then played directly to the self-congratulating liberal leanings of the AFI crowd.
“But all that’s about to change.”
On a night that was all about him, ironically, it was talk of Barack Obama that got Lee most animated.
“When. There is no if,” Lee talked over a question about the possibility of an Obama presidency.
“It changes everything...how the world looks at us. There’s gonna be B.B. and ‘After Obama’, A.B...It’s gonna be a new day, a better day, and I’m gonna BE at the inauguration...It’s gonna be chocolate city for real!”
So will a better day mean a lack of material for a filmmaker who has been at his best when delving into society’s ills? Don’t count on it. Spike’s got more joints than Cheech and Chong coming to a screen near you in the next year, including documentaries on Michael Jordan and Kobe Bryant, as well as his twentieth feature film, Miracle at St. Anna, a World War II epic about the all black 92nd Division aka the Buffalo Soldiers, opening September 26th. If the extended preview the AFI audience received was any indication, Miracle at St. Anna’s has the broadest scope of any Lee project since Malcolm X, and could prove to be his most lavish visual production to date.
Lee also plans to return to New Orleans in the not too distant future to show the continuing effects of Katrina.
“What the press isn’t talking about is the mental state of the residents. Suicide rates, a lot of the self-medicating, no [treatment] facilities”.
By the time the crowd made its way across Georgia Avenue and into the Discovery lobby for the post-event reception, there were no more questions as to why Spike Lee was this year’s Guggenheim honoree. As we snacked on a buffet of cajon-chic cuisine and grooved to the band’s inspired renditions of “Shout” and “When The Saints Come Marching In,” it was hard not to think of the characters he introduced us to so poignantly in When The Levees Broke and the resonance of the stories they told. “Maybe I need to go to New Orleans,” said a sixty-ish white lady, swaying back and forth to the sounds. “I’ve been once, but that was before... I need to go back”.
Twenty years after School Daze, Spike Lee is still waking us up, and for that alone, his 2008 Gugggenheim honor is well deserved. Ya dig? Sho ‘nuff.
- Jeff Harvey
1 comments:
sho nuff. spike is a genius. do the right thing changed everything.
Jesus shuttlesworth is risen.
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