When Spike Lee’s rousing documentary When the Levees Broke: A Requiem in Four Acts faced criticism for its political angles—before anyone saw the final product—Lee did the right thing. Sticking to his guns, he insisted that the anger stemming from a massive chorus of interviewees who had suffered the wrath of Hurricane Katrina was justified by the negligent American government. At the 2006 Toronto International Film Festival, he boldly announced that the president was “the worst in the history of the United States,” and reasonably so: Lee’s four-hour-long finished product, which aired on HBO and will receive broader recognition now on DVD, provides a missive to the masses whose only encounter with the tragedy was Kanye West’s declaration that George Bush doesn’t like black people.
Naysayers were swept away by the movie’s startling immediacy in its depiction of the devastating event, particularly through the dozens of wrenching anecdotes from survivors whose help arrived much too late. Lee took a brazen step with the decision to include harrowing footage of bodies floating off while FEMA failed to mobilize, and combine the imagery with the soothing lyrical vibe of New Orleans jazz. The technique works startlingly well. Not since George Stevens’ Nazi Concentration Camps helped send fascist killers to the gallows at Nuremburg has cinema carried such power as an indictment. (The only real conspiracy theory that could be contested is the suggestion that the government intentionally demolished the levees, and the discussion lasts about two minutes onscreen; fortunately, Bill O’Reilly was out the night FOX News covered the film, and the relatively more subdued John Kasich wasted a scant few minutes babbling about the issue.)
For all the nifty ethnic idiosyncrasies that made this year’s top notch heist drama Inside Man such an escapist delight, documentary provides the form that unleashes Lee’s strongest creative proclivities. 4 Little Girls shows the director’s versatility on a small scale, but Levees demonstrates unprecedented ability to unite activism and art. The DVD contains a fifth act oddly titled “Next Movement.” While more heavily politicized, it’s basically 105 minutes of outtakes. Still, the stories need to be told, and Lee knows how to extract them. When one white resident recalls packing heat for protection as the water drained, the director can’t restrain himself from behind the camera. “Who were you looking for?” he asks. “Bin Laden?” Oh yeah, that guy.
