American Cinematographer - May 2020 - 23

Clockers unit photography by David Lee, courtesy of Universal Pictures.

The Importance of Inspiration

that realization. You've said before
that seeing Spike Lee's School Daze
[1988; shot by Ernest Dickerson,
ASC] was a big moment.
Young: That's an ongoing
[question] that I've been having with
myself for some time, and its current
iteration has a lot of layers. My
movie-watching experience as a
young Black person in America -
and I'm homing in on that word Black
with a capital 'B' - has colored my
engagement with an understanding
of film. I'm responding to that now in
my current practice. Without it being
known to me, the films I saw before
School Daze were actually doing
things I didn't know they were
doing. I didn't see myself in the films
- I didn't see my family or my
community or things I cared about.
As an American child, [I felt] they
[offered] a certain amount of
escapism and gave me joy - made
me laugh and cry - and that all felt
right. It was a communal experience,
and we'd share a box of popcorn and
have a great time. But School Daze
changed all of that, on several levels.
First, if you were a young Black
person growing up in Louisville and
hadn't seen School Daze, then you had
[missed] an authentic Black experience. You needed to go to a theater
because this young Black filmmaker
named Spike Lee made this for you.
That was the first time that I
experienced film as a movement. I
wasn't aware of that [idea] then, but I
was aware that everyone was talking
about this film. I went with my mom,
and my sisters who were a little older
than me, and I saw my friends in the
theater. It was the first time I went to
the movies and saw only Black families all in one place watching something specifically made for a Black
audience. I'd gone to the movies 100
times and never seen [that happen]
before. Not for The Goonies, not for
Return of the Jedi - none of that. But
for School Daze, everybody was there,
and I remember that resonating with
me because I felt like I was sharing

Another inspiration for Young was cinematographer Malik Sayeed, shown here during the production of
his first feature, the crime film Clockers (1995), working with director Spike Lee (with viewfinder) and
actor Mekhi Phifer.

something with them. And then the
film came on.
Now, my grandparents were
relatively affluent, and they stressed
to us that culture was important. So I
www.ascmag.com

met artists at their house, I went to
art-gallery openings, I went to the
opera and saw Porgy and Bess. That
was part of our rearing, and it seemed
natural. So as a young person, I had
May 2020

23



http://www.ascmag.com

American Cinematographer - May 2020

Table of Contents for the Digital Edition of American Cinematographer - May 2020

Contents
American Cinematographer - May 2020 - Intro
American Cinematographer - May 2020 - Cover1
American Cinematographer - May 2020 - Cover2
American Cinematographer - May 2020 - 1
American Cinematographer - May 2020 - Contents
American Cinematographer - May 2020 - 3
American Cinematographer - May 2020 - 4
American Cinematographer - May 2020 - 5
American Cinematographer - May 2020 - 6
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American Cinematographer - May 2020 - 8
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