Professor Spike Lee Premieres Highest 2 Lowest at Cannes

Friday, May 23, 2025

The Artistic Director of Tisch's Graduate Film Department, Professor Spike Lee, premiered his latest film Highest 2 Lowest at the Cannes Film Festival on May 19th, and brought some of his former students attending the festival to see the film.

Highest 2 Lowest: When a titan music mogul (Denzel Washington), widely known as having the “best ears in the business”, is targeted with a ransom plot, he is jammed up in a life-or-death moral dilemma. Brothers Denzel Washington and Spike Lee reunite for the 5th in their long working relationship for a reinterpretation of the great filmmaker Akira Kurosawa’s crime thriller High and Low, now played out on the mean streets of modern day New York City.

Celebrating alongside Professor Lee:

Belu Poncio '25 (MFA, Grad Film) – Producer (Talk Me)
Joecar Hanna ’25 (MFA, Grad Film) – Writer/Director/Actor (Talk Me)
Melanie Smith – Actor (Talk Me)
Satchell Lee ’17 (BFA, Kanbar Institute, Film & TV)
Anooya Swamy (MFA, Grad Film Candidate)
Sam Motamedi '23 (MFA, Grad Film) – Cinematographer (Talk Me)

Joecar Hanna’s thesis film Talk Me premiered at La Cinef on May 22nd.