Spike Lee Quotes - Page 4

I'm trying to keep up with what's happening in this turbulent world.

I knew I was never going to play professional sport, but I loved playing and I went to all the games I could afford to.

Any time you talk about the look of the film, it's not just the director and the director of photography. You have to include the costume designer and the production designer.

And one thing Hollywood does well is sequels.

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 get offered to do stuff where the money's nice but it's not something I want to do - I get offered a lot of commercials too.

I don't like to use the word 'remake', I think reinterpretation is a better word. It's just a matter of respecting the source, and then trying to make your own film, and trying not to be inhibited by being so beholden to every single thing... We respect the source, but we make changes to it.

I don't see any negativity with what Brad Pitt is doing with his Make It Right Foundation, or what Sean Penn is trying to do in Haiti.

I'm surprised that Hollywood and networks have not been diverse as other industries.

I tend to favour films that have multiple plot and story lines, multiple characters and ensemble pieces.

Most human beings will not stand in front of a stage and tell you about the bad things they did.

He revolutionized music videos. Before Michael Jackson, MTV refused to play African-American artists.

I like people to look like they're floating.

If you have a talented family, you should be shot if you don't use them.

I used the principles of Kickstarter to make 'She's Gotta Have It.' We filmed that in 1985 to 1986. The final cost was $175,000. I didn't have that money. It was friends, grants, donations. We saved our bottles for the nickel deposit.

Do the Right Thing' was my first union film. I looked at the rosters, and for the most part, it was white males. Especially the Teamsters. So we had some conversations.

This film [Chi-Raq]is a declaration. It's a scream. It's a warning. And I can really break it down to one scene. That's the scene where we have the eulogy and sermon that is given by the great John Cusack.

There's an unwritten law that you cannot have a Jewish character in a film who isn't 100 percent perfect, or you're labeled anti-Semitic.

I didn't dream about being a director. I didn't know I wanted to do something with film until the summer between my sophomore and junior years at Morris College in Atlanta, Georgia.

People sometimes forget all the films that we've done. They remember the likes of 'Malcolm X' and 'Do the Right Thing.' But I've been working since 1986. From the beginning, I was determined to not just be a flash in the pan. I've got to keep up with Woody Allen. He's lapping me.

You know that first of all your films have to make money no matter who you are.

I'll be vilified if I shoot a film in Toronto for New York. And rightfully so!

I live in New York City, the stories of my films take place in New York; I'm a New York filmmaker.

I am a hybrid. I do independent films and also do Hollywood films - I love them both.

Because many advances have happened, we've lost the urgency (and that's just human nature) that we had before, when we couldn't vote, couldn't use mass transportation, or drink from the fountains.