Original subtitles

By creating a film of this type...

it's my personal...

and virtually undocumentable feeling

that this is only going to, again, cause people to say,

"Well, gee, look at that design.

I can do better than that."

And they're going to try.

And that's what we don't want.

Case: That's why I'm letting you know now,

I'm feeling the vibes.

I know how this shit is, with the program--

it don't pressure me.

This shit is all over with, to me.

I don't want it to seem like in the show

like I still do it or none of that.

It's just I was one of the olden brothers from way back,

maybe years-- and knowing what was up with it.

That way I would keep my reprancy or discrepancy process real righteously right.

Case: I don't even think about this no more, man.

'Cause you see how it look now anyway, right?

That's what I'm saying, you know?

Just don't let nobody know it, till they see it for they self.

That's what I'm saying. When they see ours--

our whole car's always crushing, you know?

We is the monsters, know what I'm saying?

- Always the kings of this line. - Stuff like this here.

We would have no problem. You know.

- Burning that up. - Word, man.

They always came to me with paint, whatever,

and say, "Yo, Case, man, hook me up this and that.

Hook me up with style." I did it, I'd get 'em style.

I had so much style, from having so much spark and charisma,

wisdom and knowledge plus understanding behind it, you know?

They came to me for "Style Wise"

and I didn't mind generating my generosity, you know, so I did it.

I felt as though if I did this it's like doing a good thing

in favoritism to myself as far as good luck-wise or whatever,

you know? So I done it.

See how I'm always doing my computers, right? Like connectors.

See how I got the smoothness camouflaged like?

See how that "A" look like camouflage,

real neat and dipping through there with the "S" and things?

You know that shows you the odd-even thing.

- It balances out. - Yeah.

There go the Fonz. Look at the Fonz.

- Word. There you go. - It's the Fonz.

Look at that nigger. That nigger loves the movie.

Hey, you know it's us, The Cold Crush.

You said something right there, that's right.

Tony: That's the main thing? Breaking, too?

Yeah, B-Boying, you know?

That's what I'm saying, the Rock Steady Crew.

Yeah it come out like, from the streets, you know?

People hanging out, they ain't got nothing to do.

I remember, like, before that...

hip-hop stuff started out, nigger's banging on the mailbox.

You know, like Hard-Hands Barretto.

You know Hard-Hands Barretto?

He's a Latin star now. He started out in the ghetto too,

playing on garbage cans. Well, we used to bang on the mailbox,

boom, bang, bang, you know, and start rhyming.

And that's how Flash and all these niggers--

they come out to the park with a little DJ set,

and now they're on the radio and stuff like that.

And that's why, you know, us graffiti artists,

now we're trying to get up there, you know?

Still, we ain't getting nowhere, but we're getting a little recognition now.

Case: 'Cause we stopped writing, that's why.

It's like, you know, we know our potential.

We done got fame, you know, kick the game and all type things.

It wasn't no thing, we just did it and got it over with,

you know? That's all there was to it.

Now it be about women, cash, money and all type things, you know.

Oh, styles? I just-- I write the way I write.

I got my own style, that's all.

- Henry: Where'd you get it? - I made it up.

But it looks something like other graffiti styles.

- No, it looks like my style. - I know it looks like your style, but--

Cameraman: Hold it, hold it. Cut, cut.

- Cameraman: Turning? - Sound man: Yeah. Go.

Henry: John, where did you get your style?

I developed it, you know? I didn't get it from nobody.

Didn't you look at other graffiti?

Yeah, but just to read it, not to copy their style.

And these ridiculous fights that they have about

somebody crossing them out, which is absolutely ridiculous.

Yeah. If you mess with us, yeah, of course.

Nobody walks around with machine-guns in their pockets.

If you mess with us, just like regular people, we're gonna defend ourselves.

And if you mess with us real, we know we're gonna come looking for you,

and we're gonna get you too. We're gonna get you.

( sighs )

You want to film this fist-fight we're getting ready to have?

Is that what it is?

I guess it's pretty much like

anything I would do on a train, I would do on canvas,

or whatever I choose to paint on.

I'm still using spray-paint.

I'm still using the same basic technique

as painting trains-- just about.

I think it's pretty much the same thing,

it's just been scaled down much smaller.

- Dondi: Let's go to work. - Marisol: I hear you.

Marisol: This shit is bad.

And this one's called "Sands of York."

It's...

it's a letter "B."

There's a painting under this

that I went over, that I did in 1980.

I didn't actually like it. It was called "I Love New York."

I decided to paint this over it.

I like it much better now.

I can scale down letters, like pretty easy.

I did pieces probably...

almost this size on a train with Aaron.

We were doing some real small pieces,

looked like they were chiseled into the subways

because of the way I had the 3-Ds going down.

Actually way below the window.

I have really no problem in scaling them down to canvas.

Compared to a piece on a train

this is like-- this is like a miniature dude.

And this one...

me and a fellow named Rammellzee did.

This one is the armored letter "E."

And he sort of has his own beliefs about that...

why he arms letters.

- What, to arm a letter? - Yeah.

Just so it could defend itself, actually.

'Cause he says...

the Christians put a Catholic symbol on a letter

and the only way to destroy a symbol is with a symbol.

So in order to destroy a symbol you have to arm a symbol.

And he thinks by arming letters

this Christian symbol will be destroyed.

I hate getting into Rammellzee's religion and shit.

It's like too deep for me and shit.

Rammellzee would smack me for even saying something like that.

This is an arrow,

which actually fires.

And this is like...

some type of like, maybe machine-gun you would have--

that shoots rays.

And this thing is also like a machine-gun.

And this piece right here,

this is like a gauge or hinge.

And this thing is supposed to actually do

a full 360 so it could even defend itself from behind

or the side, or whatever.

If it was actual, if it was real,

this would be a weapon.

This would be a tank actually,

as he would put it. And this particular letter

would be able to defend itself.

From writing graffiti on trains

and trying to take an art class, you know, it's like--

Well, I just couldn't do it, you know?

I couldn't see myself doing it.

So I never really took an art class.

But then, okay, see like--

then there's like a graffiti--

it's not really a law, but--

if a dude is using your style and you definitely know it,

and everyone else knows it, you know?

But in our class

it seems like that's accepted or something,

to like use other people's ideas.

Most of the other writers who write now,

have been busted once already.

Or twice or what have you, you know.

As before like in old writers, if you got busted you just quit.

You didn't want to be out there getting busted, you know,

that was like, I mean--

that was like-- you didn't know the yard

or you just didn't know what you were doing or something...

if you got busted.

That's how, like, old writers look at it actually.

Well actually, my art teacher started me.

Although she didn't know it.

She asked us to do a project

dealing with graffiti on a train station wall.

Or a truck or whatever.

I gave it my best shot.

Then one day I was writing on the lunchroom table.

A kid comes over to me asking me what it was.

I started bragging about the graffiti I was doing.

He pulled out a Pilot and showed me what real graffiti was all about.

From that point on I was just more intrigued by it,

and didn't know that it was wrong to do, being a kid and all that.

Naturally you're inspired to do something secretive

and against rules and regulations.

There was always that mischievous thing about it.

Knowing that it was against rules and regulations

but still knowing you can get away with it secretly-- secretively,

and still gain recognition on it.

A lot of people didn't care for it

but there was a handful of people that still did,

and those are the people that kept it alive.

People like Cliff and Vinnie,

and like Superstrut, Stem and Tee.

I could go on forever like naming old names.

It's like...

you know, ask Blade. I mean, why does he still write?

I mean he's been writing longer than me, you know?

Crazy Legs: The Bronx.

It started from 183rd Street and Creston.

Then like, you know, it was like...

there for around two years, three years, right.

Then they stopped breakin', right?

So the pres of everybody, his name is Jimmy Dee,

he told me to make a visit to Manhattan,

so then I made one over here.

Like most of the people stopped from the Bronx already,

but some of them are trying to come back now

because they hear that people are making money doing it.

( hip-hop music playing )

I went to the Bronx, to a party.

I met up with him after a long time.

I asked him if I could use the name "Rock Steady" and he said, "Yeah."

But now I don't know where he's at.

He disappeared. So for now, he left me in charge.

And I started going all around getting different people,

and like certain people who have been working with me,

you know, keeping things organized.

( hip-hop music playing )

Master Float.

Flow Master-- they call him Master Float, though.

He taught me how to float.

He taught me pop, pop, lock it.

Pop and move like a robot, you know?

I like, just learned it about two weeks ago.

I'm getting gooder by the minute.

Tony: Where did it come from originally?

California.

Like LA. LA.

LA.

Is it hard breaking?

Nah, it's like-- it's called electrical boogie.

It's like the robot. And it's pop locking.

You do a move and you like hold it.

Then you move back and then you start floating.

Then you come back.

Then you stop, do the lean or something.

Then you just float, stop and then you pop.

When you pop, you lock it. You hold it there...

like that.

- Where'd you learn to do it? - I learned from him.

We had another guy in our crew that used to do it

but he's no longer with us so I just learned from him.

Once you get to know it, it's easy.

- Who is he? - This guy is called Mr. Freeze.

- Where's he from? - He's from Paris.

Everything pretty is getting dogged. Have you seen that?

Cap: You're proving that at Graphiti Productions--

that going over people is not the only way to get fame.

So you have your side, too. I'm just doing my own thing.

But who's gonna tell these little toy writers that that's--

that this is one way to get fame?

The other way they see to get fame is to go over people.

Yeah, but I go over them, too.

What do you plan to do in the future?

You going to keep, like, going over the people

you've been going over, or you gonna make peace with some people?

Well, I don't know.

People start with me or they start with my crew,

I start going over everything they have.

I'm not like people-- you go over one of mine, I go over one of yours.

You go over one of mine, I go over everything you're gonna do, ever.

Anywhere I can find it. And when I catch you, I'll just beat the shit out of you.

We always outran the cops and scaled them fences.

But we can't-- but we can't outrun each other.

We can't play with each other's heads anymore.

We'll be the end of our own graffiti.

At one time we had information that these kids,

about four or five kids, were going to go

to a layup area and do some painting.

So we went there. It was night time, it's dark, there's no moon out,

in dead of winter and we're waiting and waiting.

Finally we hear a little noise coming up through the bushes

and here come the kids. There are about 20 kids there.

If you can visualize it,

we're stuck inside the train, the doors are closed,

the kids are on the outside and they're painting away.

And the fumes from the aerosol cans are coming up,

seeping under the door getting into our nostrils. We're getting dizzy.

We're ready to pass out and we're saying to ourselves, "We better do something now

or it's gonna be too late. We'll have to go to a hospital."

We open the doors, jump down. We grab two or three kids.

We let it be known to them at the time

that we want the rest of the people to give us a call.

And we gave them our number.

The next day, the phone was constantly ringing off the hook,

just waiting to just about surrender.

I know where you live, I'm gonna pick you up sooner or later,

might as well give yourself up. They're well known for that.

What gives you away is ink in your hands,

if you're doing insides, right?

So you would try to-- like you would try to talk it out.

"No, like I dropped something in the track,

and I went down there to get it," and all that.

You're trying to keep your hands in your pocket,

not show your hands. Then he'll tell you, "Let me see your hands."

When you show your hands, if they're inked up

they got an arrest right there for graffiti.

It's up to him. He can comply,

or he doesn't have to comply.

He can come with me, or he doesn't have to come with me.

One way or another, he's going to come, with me.

I have a job to do. He has fun to do...

doing his trains. I have a job to do.

Unfortunately, I don't think

they have anything to fear from the courts.

They have to fear the system itself.

The train system. It's dangerous, very dangerous out there.

The courts are backlogged

with such numbers of violent crime.

Graffiti, itself, is not a violent crime.

It's not a crime against a person. It's against property.

And it has to take-- it has to sit on the back burner.

They know the yards, and the layups.

They know the system.

( trains rolling )

Usually I do my pieces in between the lanes, if anything.

You only got a four-foot distance in-between.

You gotta stand on one foot on one train, one leg on the other train.

And it's kinda hard to...

envision the whole piece

between four feet, just to stand back.

You gotta get used to it.

Once you're used to it, you're able to proportion your pieces to the right size.

All's I know, it takes anywhere between 15-20 cans

to do a full car.

I like to color mine in solid

so I use approximately 20 cans myself.

In the case of doing it top to bottom,

you can either open a window and hang on the windows.

Open the door-- you can hang out the door and fill in the top.

One time I even used one of those suction cups,

that the glass people who carry-- you know-- to put in windows.

Put it on there and suck it on and you hold onto the window as you paint.

This train I must have painted... two weeks ago.

Brand new, they already painted over it.

One solid silver paint job.

On the other side they already have--

I have another piece on the other side, as a matter of fact.

See, they paint right over your work.

They leave your work in the windows.

I hope they're not buffing no more, they're just repainting.

Man, this guy used to be king of the line.

Two years back. Sly 108, alias known as MC.

I must have been in this yard in about '75.

'75? Yeah, '75 sure.

I met Danko, Danko 1, who was doing the art in here.

At the time, he was trying to take over.

Again, he didn't quite do it but that was the first time,

and I got raided the first time.

Still come back for more, though. It's the excitement in it all.

Tony: What about the art?

I wouldn't say too much for that.

Just a matter of how many pieces I could put up.

I really don't-- I really can't say that it's art.

It's just...

It just keeps me going. I don't know what I'm gonna do

after you're not able to go in the yards anymore.

After they put up the fences and all.

There's an old guy. This guy used to be king of the line,

Puma 107.

Right before-- No, him and Sly 108 were about the same.

Here's another piece.

Two of my buddies. This is a PJ/Sin. It's kind of old.

They cleaned the windows.

Dripping from the acid.

Comet...

painted over PJ.

That's what happens, they don't last more than maybe a week,

if the city doesn't get them.

It would be so cool if you could just...

get a graffiti writer,

or a young graffiti writer, who you think would be into it.

Or you just think...

he'll be writing for a number of years,

and just film him through his stages

of like, you know, step one, and step two,

or whatever stages he goes through.

Dondi: Just him on the way to the yard that night, you know?

Then, like, him looking for that first piece.

To have that kind of documentation

of a graffiti writer.

That would be, like, a real good film, actually.

It starts in darkness.

That's partly romance but it's true.

It starts, it gets made,

the work of art happens in darkness.

Then it bursts into the light.

And then, we see it, right?

Everybody sees it, hates it, loves it.

Is stunned by it in one way or another.

And that's kind of the feeling

I wanted to express at the beginning of the film.

Henry is a very low-key person.

Henry's wife, Kathy, is an actress

and a very dramatic person.

I remember we were having dinner one night.

And we'd been kicking this around.

What would this film be about?

And Henry was saying, "It really is--

there's rap music and there's..."

We kept thinking, "Where are the boundaries?

How do we--

how do we write the proposal to raise the money for this?"

And Kathy...

launched into this incredible,

unbelievable aria.

I still think of it as an aria.

About...

the drama of this.

Going into the tunnels, going into the layups.

Risking your life to paint a whole car in the middle of the night.

And I thought, "Yeah, it's an opera.

That's what it really is."

The music makes it an opera.

And the dance makes it an opera.

This is theater. And it's theater that's happening...

in real life,

in my city.

And then I really felt it as a film.

We all-- we may have forgotten

what terrible condition the subways were in,

along with the rest of the city and its infrastructure.

The subways were a garbage dump, essentially.

It was a vacuum of attention

on the part of the civic authorities of the city.

And you could argue

that what graffiti artists and writers and taggers were doing

was they were filling this vacuum the way they knew how.

And in the course of doing it, discovered a capacity in themselves

to make something that was transcendent.

I didn't only want rap music in the film.

I didn't only want-- I wanted a lot of that,

but I wanted another element

that would make it feel like a movie.

And I had seen "Excalibur," actually--

John Boorman's-- a couple of years before that.

I had loved the way he had used Wagner.

( humming ) It was just-- it was marvelous.

So Sam Pollard, the editor, and l--

we started putting this opening sequence together.

And didn't know if it was going to work.

Sam had a class and he was teaching them film editing.

So he brought these kids in when I wasn't there,

and when I showed up, he said,

"Tony, I had these kids in here. "

I said, "Yes. " He said, "I showed them what we're doing. "

I said, "What'd they say?"

He said, "One kid looked at it and he said 'Excalibur. "'

( laughing )

Oh yeah, that's the music from "Excalibur."

I though, "Yeah, exactly.

So to them, now it's a movie."

Narrator: In the 1970s, New York graffiti,

rapping and breaking became the prime expression...

Tony: A friend of mine was a documentarian.

He saw the film and he said,

"God, you've done things with music

that nobody's ever done in a documentary before.

It's astounding and amazing.

But that awful narration," he said.

Yeah, you know--

How could you do that?

The other thing about the narration

is that he sounds enough like me, that--

Really?

I keep-- people assume--

lots and lots of people assume that it's me.

I moved to New York in the end of 1972,

I was a sculptor,

and I think I was on the verge of a career change

that I wasn't at all conscious of.

These extraordinary cars are coming through the stations,

and I was commuting every day.

I couldn't wait to get on the train and see what was going on.

I thought, "Wow, this would be great

to try to take pictures of this.

Somebody should be documenting it.

And the pictures that I took

were these segmented pictures

which I then made a composite out of in my studio afterwards,

and I put them in sections.

As a sculptor, one of the things I had to do all the time

was create sites for proposals.

And you make your little model,

and you put it in a diorama,

and you create the environment around it

by going up to the site and taking pictures,

panoramic pictures, and splicing them together.

So, it just came totally natural to me.

Take a picture, jump. Take a picture, jump.

Take a picture, jump. This one I took five.

I would get information.

I would be told the next day,

when somebody did a piece,

I'd get it on my answering machine.

Yo, Henry, this is Lask.

I busted out a rooftop on the 6 line.

- Bright colors... - That's how I would know where to go.

I would get there right away.

It really increased my chances of getting it,

because it's a big system.

If you go up randomly waiting for trains,

you spend all day and you might not get anything.

So if you know where to go and what line it's on, it really helps.

I had taken pictures for about three years,

before I ever met--

consciously met a graffiti writer.

I think it was '79,

another kid was on the platform doing the same thing I was.

He was the one who said,

"Go to the writers bench because all the writers hang out there. "

For months they thought I was a cop.

'Cause who else? Middle-aged white man,

what's he doing...

up on the platforms taking pictures of graffiti?

What's he doing getting to know graffiti writers,

if it wasn't for a major bust?

Intelligence, and then getting everybody together in one spot

and then calling in the troops.

I was doing the fill-in. I was like the toy.

This was the apprenticeship.

You'd go out with an 18-year-old

master of graffiti art.

And that way you would learn to paint.

After photography came along,

and began to be used, especially with my pictures--

I had such a big collection of a lot of the masters' work--

kids would come to my studio, and they would be able to sit and study it.

So it changed the way the whole process took place.

That's why we talk about Case and his camouflaging the letters.

He was determined to make it so complex,

that even if you had a camera--

I don't think you'll even be able to read it.

( laughter )

Koch, Ravitch, and Cap gave us the plot of the film.

It didn't have a plot up to that point.

It was just a survey. I had no idea how it would come together.

That was fresh. It was a brand new burner.

It only ran for two days.

He didn't even give it a chance to run on the line.

Just like, "Pahl"

After one of these interviews with somebody complaining about Cap,

Tony would say, "We can't use this,

unless we have Cap.

This is meaningless, unless we have Cap.

It's just one side of a hand clapping.

We need to have Cap."

And so I'm rolling my eyes I'm going,

"Oh my God. You know what that means?"

Because I know what that means.

That's the last thing-- within the subculture--

you want to do is give him fame.

So, I was against it.

And I was taking the side of the writers,

and not even mentioning it to the writers.

Were you also concerned about the anthropologist

intervening in the activity of the culture?

No, I'm not that pure.

I was intrigued by Cap, too, because I never met Cap.

I knew people who knew him, but I'd never met him.

I gave in, basically.

So, through the grapevine I knew how to get to him,

he had friends who were playing a double game, too.

Pretending not to know him but who knew him

and were actually friends of his.

Friends who shall be nameless.

Friends who shall forever remain nameless.

So through these connections,

I found him,

and he was more than happy to be a part of this.

But he said from the get-go,

he said, "You can't film my face."

I'm telling Tony he's going to wear a ski mask,

and Tony's going, "No, it's not working.

It's not going to work. He can't wear a ski mask."

But we have to do it anyway, because it's better than nothing.

So, on the appointed day,

he comes and... no ski mask.

And when I brought it up, he said "Don't worry about it. "

Cap: People don't know what I look like until now,

till they start going to the movies.

They're gonna see my face. Big deal.

I'm-- I'm glad I got Cap.

I paid a little price, but I'm glad I got Cap.

People still feel betrayed by it.

I get that all the time.

We knew that it was an amazing phenomenon,

and we knew that the film that we were making

was showing the world something,

that the world generally wasn't aware of.

That this would have some kind of impact.

I don't thinks we had the sort of vision

to understand the extent of it, what it would become.

Because of the photographs,

it's been like a visa to another world

that never in a million years would I have gotten into.

Those photographs gave me this incredible access,

to meet the most extraordinary people.

It's a gift to me

that because of Henry, I got to make this film.

There's so many paradoxes associated with graffiti,

about whether it's good or bad for society,

good or bad for kids who do it.

It's a tangle that can never be untangled or reconciled.

And that to me-- finally, those paradoxes

are the most fascinating thing of all about this project--

that finally there is no judgment that can be made.

It just is.

And the "isness" of it is...

its poetry and its beauty.

"Style Wars" had a very strong concept.

There was a little question about how fair it was going to be.

Did you want to present both sides of the issue?

I always remember, very distinctly, Kase.

and I remember the material of Kase walking into the projects.

You know, yelling out to the people,

and then the camera pans up,

and then we're inside looking at him

as he's creating one of his masterworks and stuff.

and for me, growing up in East Harlem, in the projects,

I connected.

Kase and that group, they really stuck out to me.

Kanefsky: That was a great scene. One of the few scenes

that cut very quickly and very easily.

Well... Tony had me rework it a few times.

Tony has everything reworked!

What happened with the guy with his mother

- that we interwove throughout? - Kanefsky: That was incredible.

That's one of the big structural things that we came up with

- which worked beautifully, but it took... - A long time.

Should it be in front of this scene or behind it?

Should it be in front, or behind--?

Mary, who started as an apprentice,

by the time she left the film--

which was approximately one year of working,

roughly from promo on--

was an editor.

I love the Wagner. I love when the trains come out

and the music is oh, so powerful and big

and monstrous.

And then that cut,

that cut to the hip-hop music,

it's fantastic. That's one of the great music cuts I ever did.

It was Tony's idea. It was a great cut.

"Pump, pump, pump it up, pump me up."

After the old gentleman says, "It's in his nom de plume--" "I'm a wanderer. "

We tried so many things in terms of speed and tempo

and changing music

and cutting different phrases out of music and stuff

and bringing them together.

There are no rules that you can follow,

and that's one of the reasons I like the independent documentary film.

We would cut something-- I would cut something--

and Victor would re-cut it, and Mary might re-cut it.

Then it would come back to me and I'd cut it again.

We went to lunch and I said, "What do we do now that the money's run out?"

- Keep going! - Otherwise we didn't have a film.

If you don't have a film, why did we start in the first place?

When you see the result,

when you see the reaction to it,

if you go flash forward 19 years later--

and I have students who I advise come to my class,

and come to me for advisement and they'll say...

"Did you do that film 'Style Wars'?"

I say, "Yeah," and they say, "Wow, that's one of the great documentaries."

Even my sons, who don't usually look at my films,

they like that film.

Tony: What was the biggest struggle that you had?

The biggest struggle was always you, Tony.

( laughing )