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If we became students of Malcolm X, we would not have young black men out there killing each other like they’re killing each other now. Young black men would not be impregnating young black women at the rate going on now. We’d not have the drugs we have now, or the alcoholism.
Fight the power that be. Fight the power.
A lot of times you get credit for stuff in your movies you didn’t intend to be there.
Right now a lot of people are still choosing to go to Toronto instead of shooting in New York City, something I haven’t done and something I hope I’ll never have to do.
I don’t think I’m a total pessimist, so I think you can find hope in all my films.
Violence is a part of America. I don’t want to single out rap music. Let’s be honest. America’s the most violent country in the history of the world, that’s just the way it is. We’re all affected by it.
My grandmother lived to be 100 years old. Her grandmother was a slave, yet she was a college graduate in the Spellman class of 1917. She taught art for 50 years and she saved her Social Security checks for her children’s education.
I had a great education. From kindergarten to John Dewey High School in Coney Island, I am public-school educated.
It has been my observation that parents kill more dreams than anybody.
Any film I do is not going to change the way black women have been portrayed, or black people have been portrayed, in cinema since the days of D.W. Griffith.