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" 'Strong Island' is slang for Long Island, New York. And it really grew out of - what may surprise people, it really grew out of the very vibrant hip-hop scene that, you know, is located and still generates artists out of Long Island. "

Yance Ford

New York

Long

Surprise

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" I remind audiences that I'm in the fortunate position to make a film about my family. "

" Black lives are too easy to take in America because we don't want to question why people are so afraid of black and brown people to begin with. And that's what I want 'Strong Island' to do. "

" Most black families went from the South to the city. My family went from the South to the city to the suburbs because they wanted their children to have the realization of the suburban lifestyle. What does it mean that that doesn't actually protect you? "

" It's important that people understand that 'Strong Island' is just as much about this claim of reasonable fear and our need to interrogate reasonable fear as it is about my family's grief. "

" What 'Strong Island' does is bring a historical perspective and help people understand that what we're treating as a modern-day phenomenon is actually not modern. It's actually quite old. "

" When I use the word 'buzz' in successive sentences, it's clearly time for me to stop writing. "

" I have a lot of surrogate parents, but there's no one like your mother. "

" The justice system isn't meant to work for people of color in this country. "

" I love marching bands. "

" I would hate for people to think that 'Strong Island' is just about a family's grief. It is about a family's grief, yes, but it is also an interrogation of our criminal justice system. "

" Violence against the other, and the way we otherize people out of fear, has to be examined across the board. "

" If my making history makes it easier for a trans kid at home somewhere to feel more at home in their skin, then I'm so excited about that. "

Yance Ford

History

Skin

" Everyone in the street where I grew up was given the same message: You can be anything; you can do anything. That wasn't extraordinary; that was ordinary for us. My folks didn't believe in black exceptionalism. There's nothing exceptional about 'You can have that, too' - except when it comes to justice. You can't have that. "

" Grief is a very complicated monster. There's no real exorcising of it. It has a different form every day. "

" I think fear has been racialised. When you get someone who says 'I was afraid' of a big black guy, that's enough to say, 'Okay, not guilty,' or, 'No indictment.' It's persisted over generations, and it needs to stop. "

" I don't think I present as gender-conforming on screen, but some people need a little extra information. "

" There are people who get to be three-dimensional humans in the United States, and there are people who do not. "

" Being nominated is such a tremendous honor. An Oscar win for me and for the 'Strong Island' team would be the cap to an incredible journey. But it would also mean that my brother will not disappear from history. "

" There is nothing quite as exciting as watching a master at work. "

" 'Strong Island' has been a labor of love and dedication on the part of so many people, that it's just an incredible recognition to be honored. And to be the first trans director - and, I believe, the first African-American trans director - to be nominated for an Academy Award is incredibly, incredibly special to me. "

Yance Ford

Strong

People

" People come up and say, 'Thank you' for showing a black family loving their masculine-presenting child and for undoing the myth of black people as being rabidly homophobic. "

" What little return documentary filmmakers get often comes in the form of recognition by their peers and the critics who influence doc audiences around the country. "

" When I was making 'Strong Island,' it was very clear to me that my brother's death was a point on a line that stretched back into the 1940s and beyond in my family - and in the nation. "

Yance Ford

Back

Family

" It would be easier for people to grasp that gender, sex, and sexual orientation are different things if we had as much imagination in real life as we do when we are making our movies. "

" It would have been tough for anyone to adapt 'Push' - an amazing but wrenching novel by Sapphire - for the screen, and I think director Lee Daniels made interesting choices, particularly with Precious' fantasies. In my view, some of them work and some do not, but they are definitely provocative directorial choices. "

" I hope that audiences understand that there is a precariousness to black lives in this country that we need to address, that there has always been a precariousness to black lives in this country that we need to address. In fact, our country is built on the precariousness of black lives, the disposability of black lives. "

" I'm incredibly proud to be the first trans director to be nominated for an Oscar. "

" Instincts are a really important guide for any artist, but particularly filmmakers because it takes a lot to stay true to your instincts as a storyteller. "

" The quality of festival Q&As is often a matter of chance. Sometimes the lights come up on movies I loved, and not a single meaningful question is asked. Sometimes it's the opposite. "

" When I was young, I didn't see anyone who was trans like me anywhere in the movies. "