"Superfly is timeless. It's the definition of cool," said Director X to open the Superfly portion of Sony's slate presentation at the 8th annual CinemaCon confab. The time for X's iteration of the classic film is different. It's set in 2018 Atlanta unlike the original, which was 1972 Harlem. "One thing has remained," asserted X, "The hustle."

Sony Pictures

Speaking with Deadline before the presentation, X contributed his decision to tackle this film as his first studio feature to its "classic material" which he said he stayed true to. "If you know the original Superfly, you're going to see your favorite characters. They're not going to have the exact same thing happen to them but you can see it's inspired by the original film."

Before this film, X was largely known for his work as a music video director with a distinct colorful and slick visual style, which from the clip that was shown during the presentation, was incorporated into his film. He's worked with high profile artists which include The Wanted, Usher, Kanye West, Jay-Z, David Guetta, Justin Bieber, Drake, Nicki Minaj, One Direction, and Rihanna.

The blaxploitation genre arose in the 1970s and was met with mixed reactions on its stereotypical portrayal of Black culture. That stigma wasn't a crutch for the director. "I come from stigma filmmaking," said X. "I make music videos where it's always lesser. I don't care. I'm not concerned with what people think about what we're doing."

He insisted that the film steered clear of overarching political or social commentary. "This is an action film," he assured. "We're light on moral lessons."

Simply put: "We wanted to make a Black film that's fun… it's an escape with melanin."

Superfly opens in theaters June 15.