ILovePapaSmurf
09-17-2003, 07:48 PM
I thought this might be an interesting read for you all. Spike Lee was in Redlands California yesterday and I was going to go, but declined the invitation. Here is the article about what he said at the event.
</font><blockquote><font class="small">In reply to:</font><hr />
Lee: U.S. needs to 'wake up'
Filmmaker talks to U of R crowd
By LEIGH MUZSLAY, Staff Writer
REDLANDS - He got a standing ovation before he even spoke a word.
And, boy, did Spike Lee speak. About films. About the president. About Iraq, hip hop, standardized tests, Michael Moore and much, much more.
About 750 people crowded into the University of Redlands Memorial Chapel 0on Tuesday night to hear the man behind films such as "Do the Right Thing,' "Jungle Fever,' "Malcolm X,' "Four Little Girls,' "Summer of Sam,' "Bamboozled' and, most recently, "25th Hour.'
Americans, he said, need to "wake up' and stop accepting everything the media and the government say.
"Stop going for the okie-doke,' Lee said. "You have to examine stuff.'
He railed against the war in Iraq, George Bush, Dick Cheney and the apathy of the American people.
"We as a people are more concerned with J.Lo and Ben Affleck than these so-called weapons of mass destruction,' Lee said, adding that 158 soldiers have died since the war in Iraq "ended.'
North Korea, he said, was a much greater threat.
"But they don't have resources,' he said. "We've got rice. We've got all the rice we need. We don't have oil.'
He took stabs at the 2000 election debacle, the National Rifle Association, reality television, stereotypical roles for African-Americans and comedies such as "Bringing Down the House' and "Marci X,' in which "the uptight white person is shown humanity by someone from the hood.'
Lee called Michael Moore's documentary about gun violence in America the most important film of last year. He criticized the culture of violence that musical artists like hip-hop singer 50 Cent cultivate and rang in on the presidential election.
"The only one who's making sense is Al Sharpton, but he's not going to win,' Lee said.
Sharpton isn't the only one in Lee's book.
"I'm convinced George Bush will not win,' he said to applause from the audience.
Lee's future lies in TV. Not his recent battle with Viacom over changing TNN's moniker to Spike TV he's working on two cable dramas.
The first, for Showtime, is about Black and Chinese gangs in San Francisco. The second will likely be ESPN's second dramatic series.
Before launching into a political spiel and taking questions Tuesday, Lee discussed his life in brief.
He was born in Atlanta in 1957 and, like his father and grandfather, attended Morehouse College there. But, as evident in his films, Lee is a New Yorker. He grew up in Brooklyn, went to New York University's Tisch School of the Arts for graduate school and lives in Manhattan.
Growing up, the diminutive Lee dreamed of playing second base for the Mets, "but genetics conspired against that.'
His interest in film didn't develop until after his sophomore year in college when, having returned to New York unemployed, he spent 1977 the "Summer of Sam' documenting the city with a camera someone had given him.
He applied to the top three film schools in the country, but didn't have the GRE scores to get into USC and UCLA. So he went to NYU.
"I'm still against standardized tests being used as the only way to determine if someone belongs,' Lee said.
[/ QUOTE ]
</font><blockquote><font class="small">In reply to:</font><hr />
Lee: U.S. needs to 'wake up'
Filmmaker talks to U of R crowd
By LEIGH MUZSLAY, Staff Writer
REDLANDS - He got a standing ovation before he even spoke a word.
And, boy, did Spike Lee speak. About films. About the president. About Iraq, hip hop, standardized tests, Michael Moore and much, much more.
About 750 people crowded into the University of Redlands Memorial Chapel 0on Tuesday night to hear the man behind films such as "Do the Right Thing,' "Jungle Fever,' "Malcolm X,' "Four Little Girls,' "Summer of Sam,' "Bamboozled' and, most recently, "25th Hour.'
Americans, he said, need to "wake up' and stop accepting everything the media and the government say.
"Stop going for the okie-doke,' Lee said. "You have to examine stuff.'
He railed against the war in Iraq, George Bush, Dick Cheney and the apathy of the American people.
"We as a people are more concerned with J.Lo and Ben Affleck than these so-called weapons of mass destruction,' Lee said, adding that 158 soldiers have died since the war in Iraq "ended.'
North Korea, he said, was a much greater threat.
"But they don't have resources,' he said. "We've got rice. We've got all the rice we need. We don't have oil.'
He took stabs at the 2000 election debacle, the National Rifle Association, reality television, stereotypical roles for African-Americans and comedies such as "Bringing Down the House' and "Marci X,' in which "the uptight white person is shown humanity by someone from the hood.'
Lee called Michael Moore's documentary about gun violence in America the most important film of last year. He criticized the culture of violence that musical artists like hip-hop singer 50 Cent cultivate and rang in on the presidential election.
"The only one who's making sense is Al Sharpton, but he's not going to win,' Lee said.
Sharpton isn't the only one in Lee's book.
"I'm convinced George Bush will not win,' he said to applause from the audience.
Lee's future lies in TV. Not his recent battle with Viacom over changing TNN's moniker to Spike TV he's working on two cable dramas.
The first, for Showtime, is about Black and Chinese gangs in San Francisco. The second will likely be ESPN's second dramatic series.
Before launching into a political spiel and taking questions Tuesday, Lee discussed his life in brief.
He was born in Atlanta in 1957 and, like his father and grandfather, attended Morehouse College there. But, as evident in his films, Lee is a New Yorker. He grew up in Brooklyn, went to New York University's Tisch School of the Arts for graduate school and lives in Manhattan.
Growing up, the diminutive Lee dreamed of playing second base for the Mets, "but genetics conspired against that.'
His interest in film didn't develop until after his sophomore year in college when, having returned to New York unemployed, he spent 1977 the "Summer of Sam' documenting the city with a camera someone had given him.
He applied to the top three film schools in the country, but didn't have the GRE scores to get into USC and UCLA. So he went to NYU.
"I'm still against standardized tests being used as the only way to determine if someone belongs,' Lee said.
[/ QUOTE ]