Silverdocs Plans to Honor Spike Lee
Filed under: Documentary
Silverdocs, the annual documentary film festival in Maryland hosted by AFI and the Discovery Channel, announced today that it plans to honor Spike Lee at the eight-day gathering in June. It's an interesting choice. Anyone active in the documentary community can rattle off a ton of accomplished filmmakers in the field whose degrees of visibility will never reach Lee's celebrity stature. Nanette Burstein? Marina Zenovich? Nick Broomfield? All talented directors with growing bodies of work deserved of recognition, especially by the doc-friendly crowd. But I'm not complaining. Lee has proven himself just as competent in the arena of non-fiction, and he rarely gets the same kind of credit for it. When the Levees Broke was the essential survey of Hurricane Katrina's crippling impact, and 4 Little Girls mourned death and persecution without negating the perseverance of human spirit. With the unique sort of rabble-rousing Lee has been known for, he's a sort of documentary film himself: During previous public appearances, he has lashed out at a number of targets ranging from George W. Bush to 50 Cent. Silverdocs plans to put him onstage this summer after screenings of his films for a discussion of his career, but who knows what sort of controversy he'll stir up? A good one, no doubt.
Black Friday Movie Deals: Best Buy
Sex and Nudity Don't Draw You to the Movies?
What Makes a Real Vampire?
Robert Downey Jr. Wants to Retire?
Jaycee Dugard's Horrific Story to Get a Sleazy Adaptation
_thumbnail.jpg)
Reader Comments (Page 1 of 1)
4-25-2008 @ 1:09PM
kevjohn said...
Lee is very talented and his docs are even better than the typical film he puts out. You're right though, there's a slew of documentarians that are more deserving of this honor than he is. But organizations and festivals like this bring in Big Names like Spike Lee to increase publicity for themselves as well. I, for one, had never even heard of Silverdocs until now. I'm sure his presence won't exactly hurt their ticket sales to the event.
Reply