Justin Simien Quotes & Sayings

Calling out the supposed 'abuse' of welfare by blacks and other people of color is a time-honored tactic for distracting the general public from actual national issue. It also taps into latent, subconscious racism, which is what right-wing politicians would call a 'win-win. — Justin Simien

Black folks are often individually regarded as the authority on every facet of black culture and the people who create it, but it's exhausting for most black people to constantly be relied upon as the go-to official spokesnegro. — Justin Simien

Racism is wrong, racism is very dangerous. — Justin Simien

I have this natural thing in my head that when I sit down to write something serious, I tend to make jokes. I can't help it. I can't help but desire for the narrative to be as complicated and as truthful as possible. That's just the way my head works. — Justin Simien

White people don't have that problem, they get to go through life never having to fit into a box, and it's really more so true for white men because even just being a woman, you sort of have to walk around other people's assumptions of you and it's so exhausting and there's a sense, especially among young people of wanting to just live your life, not having to wear the weight of that pressure - pressure that people of color feel, that gay people of color feel, that women of color feel. — Justin Simien

Unfortunately, 'post racism' is also a myth, like unicorns and black people who survive to the end of a horror movie. — Justin Simien

One of the facets of growing up the way I did, I never had the experience of being solely in the black community. Even my family, my mother is what they call Creole, so she's part French, part black, and grew up in Louisiana. It's a very specific kind of blackness that is different than what is traditionally thought of as the black community and black culture. So, I never felt a part of whatever that was. — Justin Simien

If the characters [in a movie] aren't real, if their lives aren't realistic, if you call bullshit at any point in their journey, then the rest of it is invalid. — Justin Simien

I am more than a black guy. I am a person, I'm storyteller, I'm a son, I'm a friend, so I am all those things so it is frustrating to a degree to be limited by other people's perceptions of me but at the same time, it is true that I am a black guy and it's like I'm rooted in, but not bound by. That sort of mentality, that's the one that I hold to be true. — Justin Simien

I love being entertained sure, but the movies that I live for, the movies that I buy and think about and stay in my mind are the movies that entertain me but leave me with something a little uncomfortable to grapple with in the lobby. — Justin Simien

I love films from all these different points of views that used the idea of the school as a way to talk about the American experience. It took me a while to figure how to write a movie like that, because that's not something you learn at film school — Justin Simien

I'm very interested in clans and the way people group together, and there's a lot of group shots. There's a lot of people in positions that people feel like they're in attack mode, kind of pointed at each other in the frame. I'm not a big fan of shooting something that looks like it could belong in any movie, I'm not a fan of okay, "wide shot, wide shot, medium shot, close-up, close-up, we'll figure it out in post." I hate that. — Justin Simien

The idea of "post-racism," just like that of "reverse racism," is really just a coded way of denying the existence of actual racism. And denying the existence of actual racism is really just another form of (you guessed it) racism. — Justin Simien

Despite this book, white people will still be able to enjoy Vespa scooters without comment and properly conjugate words without anyone being surprised. — Justin Simien

I know some of you must be thinking, This is a preposterous and thinly veiled attempt to obscure the use of relaxers, weaves, and lace fronts. Trust me on this one: Unless she tells you otherwise herself, every black woman's hair, though it may change dramatically from day to day in ways that defy nature, is absolutely her God-given, though possibly magically altered, hair. White people: Do not broach this topic. It doesn't matter that you've seen the Chris Rock documentary Good Hair. Like your favorite movie Frozen suggests, "Let It Go. — Justin Simien

I love when scenes are intentionally and meticulously planned so we feel like this is a handcrafted scene that only works in this moment and this movie, and that's the way I approach my films. — Justin Simien

The pressure to be quintessentially black in every moment, whether it comes from the outside world or is self-imposed, keeps black people from being our authentic selves. — Justin Simien

I love the art house, and when I say the art house, I don't just mean little, independent movies but movies that really aim to be about something and say something and I love those movies. — Justin Simien

Sometimes identity can be your salvation. It can be liberating to find your place in the world, but at some point, identity can hold you back. — Justin Simien

It is frustrating having to walk through America having to bob and weave people's impressions of me because they see a tall, black guy walking down the street. That is frustrating. — Justin Simien

What you want to do is talk about ideas, you write a novel, you have a lecture about those ideas. Satire and comedy are really the only film mediums where you can get into ideas and have people leave the theater without being moralized. — Justin Simien

As a person of color, I was just really tired of the fact that I wasn't seeing my story in the culture, — Justin Simien

This film isn't about "white racism", or racism at all. DEAR WHITE PEOPLE is about identity. It's about the difference between how the mass culture responds to a person because of their race and who they understand themselves to truly be. And this societal conflict appears to be one that many share. — Justin Simien

I'm a writer/director, my movie is a hit at Sundance, I have a wonderful loving boyfriend, and wow, I have financial stability. Why can't I get out of bed still? It made it even worse, because there's nothing else I want. This is what I'm born to do. I'm living my purpose, I'm paying my rent, what's missing? — Justin Simien