I think all movies are political. The ones that are not political intentionally are the worst, and have the worst politics, I think.

Obviously, I can't tell the story of what it is to be a black girl, but maybe I can tell something else. Girlhood is not about what it's like to be a black girl, it's about what it's like to be a girl.

I like to work around identification for the audience, and when there's a grown-up or a moral figure or something like that, people tend to go there.

I mean, putting women in the center of a movie and not talking about men, that's already political, right? And you know, political doesn't mean that it sends this message or that is has a statement. It's also political in its aesthetic project.

I was a lot younger - when I wrote Water Lilies. I was like 26. It felt so natural to write about adolescence.

Being in a group is a way to actually to speak up, and define yourself in the comfort, and the complexity of the group.

People keep telling me, "You don't like boys!" And I'm saying, "Wow, no, it's just that you're not used to them being objectified in movies, but women are so often objectified in movies and we don't care."