Spike Lee called an ‘Uncle Tom,’ ‘thug’ for his criticism of ‘Django Unchained’

theGRIO REPORT - The outspoken figure is facing a backlash of his own, as a growing chorus of black entertainers have called him out for his criticism of the Academy Award nominated movie...

Luther Vandross was outed as gay after his death.

Director Spike Lee came out early to condemn Quentin Tarantino’s hit slavery-themed film Django Unchained, admittedly without having even seen it.

Now the outspoken figure is facing a backlash of his own, as a growing chorus of black entertainers have called him out for his criticism of the Academy-Award-nominated movie.

“Screw Spike Lee,” writes former 2 Live Crew frontman Luther Campbell in a new op-ed entitled “Spike Lee is no Quentin Tarantino” for the Miami New Times.

“Quentin Tarantino’s Django Unchained is a brilliant flick that more accurately depicts the African-American experience than any of the 15 movies about black culture Lee’s directed in his lifetime,” he added

theGrio slideshow: Who else could have played Django?

He closes his piece by comparing Lee to the villainous house slave portrayed by Samuel L. Jackson in the film.

“Spike is upset because Samuel L. Jackson’s character in the movie is just like him: a conniving and scheming Uncle Tom,” writes Campbell.

Dick Gregory, the legendary activist and comedian has also lashed out at Lee, referring to the Do the Right Thing filmmaker as a “thug” and a “punk.”

“I’ve seen Django Unchained 12 times. Never in the history of Hollywood, have they ever made anything that freed the inside of me. The inside of me. I’m 80 years old, I saw cowboy movies, wasn’t no black folks in cowboy movies. I’m looking at a Western, plus a love story. To those of you all that see it, you’ll never see a love story about a black man and a black woman where it wasn’t some foul sex and foul language, huh. And Spike Lee can’t appreciate that. The little thug ain’t even seen the movie; he’s acting like he white,” said Gregory in a YouTube interview.

Gregory also directly addressed Lee’s claims that the movie is “disrespectful” to his ancestors.

“[Talking about] ‘it offended my ancestors,’ but when you did She’s Got To Have It and some of those other thug movies you did…you took Malcolm X and put a Zoot suit on him…did that offend your ancestors, punk?” added Gregory.

After his initial remarks about Tarantino’s movie, Lee has largely remained quiet about the film.

It has since become Tarantino’s most financially successful film to date and was nominated for five Academy Awards last week, including best picture.

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