Groundbreaking and influential filmmaker Melvin Van Peebles died Tuesday night at the age of 89. According to a statement from the Criterion Collection, he died at home surrounded by family.
Van Peebles was most known for producing Sweet Sweetback’s Baadasssss Song, Watermelon Man, The Story of a Three-Day Pass, and Don’t Play Us Cheap.
The New York Film Festival is scheduled to air a 50th-anniversary screening of the 1971 classic Sweet Sweetback’s Baadasssss Song this weekend. The film is regarded as one of several films that gave birth to the Blaxploitation genre.
A revival of Van Peeble’s play Ain’t Supposed to Die A Natural Death will make its return to Broadway next year.
“Dad knew that Black images matter. If a picture is worth a thousand words, what was a movie worth?” his son and frequent collaborator, Mario Van Peebles, wrote in a 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.”
Van Peebles was born in Chicago, Illinois. He attended West Virginia State College and then Ohio Wesleyan University, earning a bachelor’s in literature. Van Peebles served as a navigator-bombardier in Air Force for three years.
He is survived by sons Mario and Max, a daughter, Marguerite, and his grandchildren. He was pre-deceased by his daughter Megan.
