Spike Lee 'When the Levees Broke'

This is Our Story: 'When the Levees Broke'

First and foremost, thank you Mr. Spike Lee for your (dare I say it?) masterpiece: "When The Levees Broke: A Requiem in Four Acts" (airing on HBO on Monday, Aug. 21 9PM EST and Aug. 22 9PM EST). This is our story, this is our song: I don't think anyone could have told it better. There is great significance in documentation. Like the 'Eyes on the Prize' series, Keith Beauchamp's 'The Untold Story of Emmett Till' or Lee's '4 Little Girls,' this is one for the whole family to see. Like 'Star Wars,' words flood the screen first: "This film document is in remembrance…"

Surprisingly, 'Levees' was not heavy handed at all -- dare I say it was journalism? And fair journalism at that? 'Levees' had a voice, it had a perspective, it had FACTS. Moreover, the people told the story. Old people, young, rich, poor, noted, unknown, local heroes and people at the wrong place at the wrong time -- musicians, law students, actors, politicians, doctors, black and white -- it truly presented a balanced picture, though it was never a pretty picture.

Katrina was a storm that washed up racism, cronyism, history, politics, poverty, how business trumps life, disdain for the poor, incompetence and all sorts of other national sludge. Another surprise was that Lee was noticeably absent from the screen. Known for his shameless self-promotion, Lee is mute here, saying about 10 words in four hours -- and never on camera (and you know he can't even stay off camera in his features).

The only thing that was signature Lee was the music -- which to me has always been a bit cloying and sometimes even misplaced, but here it was significant, nonetheless, because Terence Blanchard who works with Lee on most of his work is a native of New Orleans; and music plays such a big part in the culture of New Orleans and of black culture in general.   

The fours acts were an emotional ride. The first two acts took you through the storm and the Superdome fiasco (a human toilet bowl of death). Acts Three and Four were sobering, because they showed the aftermath: how people had to pick up their lives afterwards. How mothers had to mourn for their dead children, how people who worked hard their whole lives got $1000 for their destroyed homes, how families who used to live down the street fromeach other are now states and states away. How it will happen again…There was hysteria, chaos and understandable anger.

'Levees' also showed humanity. It showed everyone's strengths and flaws -- from the emotional black police chief who lied about the extent of the looting ("they're raping babies") to Blanco and Nagin who at times acted very much like politicians. From Al Sharpton and Kanye West (all hail Kanye) who tell it like it T-I-S to the Mississippi doctor who told Vice President Cheyney to go "f*ck himself," it was about the voice of the folk. 

The facts of it were the most disheartening: the FACT that the government knew for years that the levees couldn't hold water (literally), the FACT that over 127,000 had NO WAY to evacuate because they had no access to motor vehicles, the FACT that after it went down, it just wasn't a priority and that people suffered and DIED.

My favorite moments included black Lt. General Honore "The Black John Wayne" who came through in the aftermath armed with old school competence, journalist Soledad O'Brien, whose astute analysis of the government's incompetence was way on point (who knew she was black?), Wynton Marsalis singing "St. James Infirmary," Michael Eric Dyson's always colorful comebacks, and native spitfire Phyllis Montana-Leblanc who will cuss you out (and be right).

To see it, and to have it documented is to believe it. To know it. Spike did his thing on this one. Where do we go from here?

Posted by abronner4