Grant Hill's response to Jalen Rose (Fab 5 documentary)

[Dave Gray]

College kids say and do dumb things.  Rose is just being honest about his feelings at the time.  He wasn't right to think that way, but he did, and this is supposed to be a tell-all documentary, that reflects reality.

Rose can't edit the film, so if he explains himself now, I don't think we should hold it against him.

[Pappy13]

Rose can't edit the film, so if he explains himself now, I don't think we should hold it against him.

He didn't have to edit the film, all he had to do was edit himself.  If he would have prefaced his comments in the film with "What I thought then was...but now I realize how foolish I was", then it would have been completely different.  He didn't say that.  He didn't say that until after he started taking heat for his comments and then he backed off what he said. More is being made of his comments than really deserves to be made, but Jalen should have known how it was going to sound as well. If he did say it that way and they took his comments out of context than he should have come out and said that and been enraged over the fact that they made him look bad on film. He didn't do that.

I'm more than willing to cut him a little slack, but you're cutting him too much slack.

That's just my opinion, I could be wrong.

[MikeO]

Rose can't edit the film, so if he explains himself now, I don't think we should hold it against him.

Jalen Rose's production company MADE THE FILM!! So yeah, he could edit the film

[Dave Gray]

I don't think he has to edit the film anyway.  I think he was just being honest about how he felt at the time.

I am not really giving Rose a break.  I don't even know anything about the guy.  I just think that we hold these guys to too high a standard.  He is probably an idiot who doesn't have a lot of training in having to speak intelligently about racial relations.  He didn't know that what he was saying was going to cause a stir.  But I don't think it makes him a bad guy, either.

[Spider-Dan]

Jalen Rose's production company MADE THE FILM!! So yeah, he could edit the film

Jalen Rose did not direct the film.  He could not have edited it.

[Phishfan]

Jalen Rose did not direct the film.  He could not have edited it.

Not that I really have a dog in this fight, but you say that as if it was set in stone.

[Pappy13]

Jalen Rose did not direct the film.  He could not have edited it.

I hate to belabour the point, but I think it's rather naive to think that Jalen Rose wouldn't have had any say in what was in a film that he was producing about his own life and actually contained footage of interviews with him in it. C'mon man. He knew exactly what was in the film and I'd be willing to bet he was asked if everything in the movie was agreeable to him. If he wanted something changed, I'm sure it would have been, he wouldn't have actually had to do it himself. He produced the film. He was interviewed for the film. The film was about him. This was not just some random movie that he helped produce. Hell he even apologized to Grant Hill before it was released so he knew darn well what was in the film and that Grant might be a bit displeased with him. Let's get real here for a moment, shall we?

[Sunstroke]

Another thing to consider... If this 30 for 30 piece "didn't" have Jalen Rose breaking out the Uncle Tom label for Duke, then the entire movie would have generated about as much buzz as a laxative commercial.

[Spider-Dan]

I hate to belabour the point, but I think it's rather naive to think that Jalen Rose wouldn't have had any say in what was in a film that he was producing about his own life and actually contained footage of interviews with him in it. C'mon man. He knew exactly what was in the film and I'd be willing to bet he was asked if everything in the movie was agreeable to him.

This is an interesting view on the way documentaries work.  You've seen other entries from ESPN Films' 30-for-30 series, right?  I emphasize ESPN Films because they are the company whose name is actually on the film.

What kind of director do you think allows his subject to dictate to him what will and will not be in the documentary?  The fact that Rose apologized to Hill before the movie was released effectively proves that he didn't have control; if it was something he felt sorry about, by your logic, he could have simply had it removed!  And again, based on the way Rose has handled further interviews, he has consistently maintained that he was only expressing his feelings as a teenager at the time (something that was not sufficiently conveyed in the film).

To me, it all seems to fit together: he didn't have creative control, the editing was done to emphasize his negative statements (for shock value) while minimizing the context, and because he didn't have creative control, he didn't see the film until it was finished, at which point he apologized to Hill because of the way his statements were portrayed.

None of this is necessary in a scenario where Rose has creative control and can simply add video of himself saying "But this is only how I felt as a teenager" at any time.  Why would he release an apology before the movie came out for content that he purportedly had full control over?  That makes no sense.

[MikeO]

^^^little naive aren't we

[Spider-Dan]

Yeah, you're right.  Let's try the old Occam's Razor:

a) The director (i.e. not Jalen Rose) had editorial control of his own movie, and put in the parts he thought would be most entertaining

or

b) Rose had editorial control of the movie, and chose to put in that part, then apologize for it before anyone had seen it, then defend his statements with reasoning that he also could have included in the movie (because he had editorial control)

But yeah, maybe the heads of Disney planned this all from the start so as to get maximum exposure!  I mean, since you've got your hand in the conspiracy cookie jar, why not grab a handful?

[Pappy13]

This is an interesting view on the way documentaries work.

I'll admit that I don't know a thing how documentaries work, what I know is how business works. It's not what you know it's who you know. If you are the producer of a film, you know the director. Probably even talked to him once or twice, possibly even about what should be in the film and what shouldn't.

You're assuming that because he apologized to Grant Hill that he didn't want it in the film. My whole point is that he did want it in the film, exactly the way it was and he knew that Grant wouldn't like it. He apologized to Grant, but only to Grant, he wanted the rest of us to know how he felt. I get that.

Let's just agree to disagree.