oscar jubis
10-20-2008, 08:51 AM
Spike Lee's When the Levees Broke topped my list of Favorite Documentaries in 2006. It's a sprawling film that combines archival footage and studio-set interviews, one of the more conventional and effective approaches to documentary subject matter. When the Levees Broke is the definitive film about the effect of hurricane Katrina on the people of New Orleans and the gulf region, and about the tragic failure of government to assist its victims. It aims to answer every important question one might have about what happened and why and who's to blame.
Its perfect companion piece has emerged two years later. Trouble the Water doesn't compete with When the Levees Broke. It provides an alternative. Whereas Lee's film takes a macro approach, focusing on the "the big picture", Trouble the Water furrows in a personal story of struggle, survival and rebirth. Its methods are congruent with the "cinema verite" or direct cinema that emerged during the 1960s as an attempt to get closer to a representation of reality.
The official directors of Trouble the Water are Carl Deal and Tia Lessin, who apprenticed under Michael Moore. Yet, to be fair one would need to give equal authorial credit to 24 year-old, 9th ward resident Kimberly Roberts. She had made a $20 payment towards purchase of a video camera days before Katrina arrived and proceeded to document the approaching storm and the thoughts and actions of relatives and neighbors. Deal and Lessin met her days later at a shelter and decided her footage would be the centerpiece of the Katrina film they were planning to make. Roberts continued to shoot her own film and provide her own voice-over while the professional filmmakers were filming her and her husband Scott as they struggled to regain a semblance of normality in their lives. Gradually we gain a sense of who Kimberly and Roberts were before the storm and who they aspire to be. They drive a truck full of survivors to Memphis and make efforts to rebuild their lives there with the help of a relative. Eventually they decide to return to New Orleans and retrace their journey from their flooded home to the shelter. The viewer becomes more invested in the material because we come to know Kimberly and Scott enough to really care about them. The young woman is also an aspiring hip-hop artist (under the name Black Kold Madina) with a terrific sense of "flow" and an ability to write compelling lyrics. Three of her songs grace the soundtrack, one performed on camera with unmitigated verve and power. The whole film is infused with her winning spirit and force of personality.
Trouble the Water won the Grand Jury Prize at Sundance 2008, and won Best Film at the Full Frame Film Festival, perhaps the most prestigious documentary film festival in the USA.
Its perfect companion piece has emerged two years later. Trouble the Water doesn't compete with When the Levees Broke. It provides an alternative. Whereas Lee's film takes a macro approach, focusing on the "the big picture", Trouble the Water furrows in a personal story of struggle, survival and rebirth. Its methods are congruent with the "cinema verite" or direct cinema that emerged during the 1960s as an attempt to get closer to a representation of reality.
The official directors of Trouble the Water are Carl Deal and Tia Lessin, who apprenticed under Michael Moore. Yet, to be fair one would need to give equal authorial credit to 24 year-old, 9th ward resident Kimberly Roberts. She had made a $20 payment towards purchase of a video camera days before Katrina arrived and proceeded to document the approaching storm and the thoughts and actions of relatives and neighbors. Deal and Lessin met her days later at a shelter and decided her footage would be the centerpiece of the Katrina film they were planning to make. Roberts continued to shoot her own film and provide her own voice-over while the professional filmmakers were filming her and her husband Scott as they struggled to regain a semblance of normality in their lives. Gradually we gain a sense of who Kimberly and Roberts were before the storm and who they aspire to be. They drive a truck full of survivors to Memphis and make efforts to rebuild their lives there with the help of a relative. Eventually they decide to return to New Orleans and retrace their journey from their flooded home to the shelter. The viewer becomes more invested in the material because we come to know Kimberly and Scott enough to really care about them. The young woman is also an aspiring hip-hop artist (under the name Black Kold Madina) with a terrific sense of "flow" and an ability to write compelling lyrics. Three of her songs grace the soundtrack, one performed on camera with unmitigated verve and power. The whole film is infused with her winning spirit and force of personality.
Trouble the Water won the Grand Jury Prize at Sundance 2008, and won Best Film at the Full Frame Film Festival, perhaps the most prestigious documentary film festival in the USA.