Melvin Van Peebles Passed Away At Age 89

Actor-writer-director-composer Melvin Van Peebles  who highlighted  Black economic empowerment and  assisted in breaking  in a new era of Black filmmaking with his most famous work, the 1971 film Sweet Sweetback’s Baadasssss Song died Tuesday night at 89.

 His death was confirmed by film distributor Criterion Collection in a statement from the family. No cause of death was given.

His son, noted director and frequent collaborator Mario Van Peebles,  had this to say about his legendary father: “Dad knew that Black images matter. If a picture is worth a thousand words, what was a movie worth?” he said in the statement. “We want to be the success we see, thus we need to see ourselves being free. True liberation did not mean imitating the colonizer’s mentality. It meant appreciating the power, beauty and interconnectivity of all people.”

At the age of 75  Van Peebles spoke about what it was like for an African-American male growing up in the 1940s and ‘50s: “ ‘Boy’ was when you were a kid, and when you got old, ‘uncle.’ They’d never call you a man.” Of his own journey past that in-between period—the threatening “virility stage,” as he put it—he said: “Little old ladies used to pull their purses close to them when you’d walk by,” he said. “Now they smile.

“It’s all how you look at stuff,” he added. “And America gives you a lot of stuff to look at.”