Misstropolis

Monday, March 26, 2007

Spike Lee’s Requiem Quietly Begs Us to Care

by Rebecca Dorr

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No matter how you spin it, “requiem” is a word born out of sorrow.

It is a mass for the dead, a dirge, a piece of music that honors those who have passed and crystallizes their suffering. Spike Lee’s When the Levees Broke: A Requiem in Four Acts isn’t a happy film. It isn’t short either. Four hours in length, its sorrows begin with the inept preparations for Hurricane Katrina and, I would argue, never really end.

Lee forces introspection that can’t just fade when the credits roll. Why wasn’t more done to protect New Orleans’ residents when it was obvious that the levees weren’t up to par? Why did it take so long for the federal government to respond after the flood waters rose while people city-wide drowned? Why didn’t we care more?

A year and a half after Katrina, Lee’s film is a glimpse into the kind of drama that would seem absurd in the 21st century, in one of the richest countries in the world—if it hadn’t actually happened. In the wake of the catastrophe, Lee’s quiet direction (he never explicitly appears on camera, and he doesn’t narrate) speaks volumes. He lets Katrina victims speak for themselves, and in their voices finds deep emotion: fear, pain, love, confusion, blame, guilt, anger, hate, and hope. More than once, Lee holds on a New Orleans resident who chokes back tears, unable to verbalize his anguish. Lee’s empathy for his subjects is salient in moments like these; their heartache lingers with me more than anything else in the film.

I felt like an outsider looking in when I began watching Lee’s documentary. I’ve never visited New Orleans, and what I know of the city is what I’ve read. But it doesn’t take long for that unfamiliarity to become irrelevant to the film’s power. These people braved death, lost loved ones, watched their homes wash away, lost everything. Everything. Lee pummels us with jaw-dropping pictures of houses underwater and whole neighborhoods turned to rubble. We saw these images on the evening news after Katrina hit, but to see them one after another, for four straight hours - does something else to you.

The film’s 4 “acts” are loosely structured around the chronology of the storm itself: pre-storm planning (or lack thereof), immediate response after the levees broke (or lack thereof), the emotional impact on New Orleans residents, and what the future holds. Lee interweaves storm footage with studio interviews, done with a wide range of close to 100 people. He talks to regular citizens of all colors and backgrounds. He talks to politicians, actors, musicians, activists, scholars, and engineers. Many of them are New Orleans natives, a smattering from all the different neighborhoods; many of them witnessed the storm first-hand.

Lee has long addressed racial and political tensions in his feature (Jungle Fever) and documentary (Get on the Bus) work. Levees is no exception. We hear of rumors, never substantiated, that the government deliberately broke levees in poor, black neighborhoods in order to save richer, whiter ones; and disgust from black residents who are sure the federal government ignored them because of their skin color. I can’t begin to tackle these issues here. Lee lets you come to your own conclusions, though the voices he highlights are decidedly anti-Bush. Most damning, I think, is the simple fact that the feds took almost a week to launch a full-scale response while citizens lay dying in the streets of New Orleans.

Lee doesn’t shy away from death. There’s a montage of dead bodies in Act II, accompanied by a sad, slow refrain from a score composed by New Orleans native Terence Blanchard. There are dead bodies floating upside-down in 15-foot water, dead bodies in front yards, on street corners, at the Convention Center, on Interstate 10. Some of them are covered with sheets or blankets, makeshift respect for the deceased; some left by families who had to flee and leave their deceased behind. These images are not easy to watch, but that’s no reason to turn away.

I believe this is a film that everyone should see.  “I think this is a great moment in American history,” says trumpeter Wynton Marsalis at the end of Act IV. “Because I feel that in this moment you see a lot of what’s wrong with us.” He compares it to looking in the mirror and not liking what you see. Implicit in the message is that if we face that reflection head on, we can move people to action. We can look ourselves square in the eye, look at our country, at our fellow citizens, and say, ‘We messed up. This isn’t where we want to be. Let’s make a change.’

When the Levees Broke screens at the Harvard Film Archive in its entirety on April 7th. It will show in two parts, separated by a one-hour intermission.

Photos: Forty Acres and a Mule Filmworks. Title photo: Harvard Film Archive.