Newsweek writes of ‘Spike’s Katrina’

Spike Lee has teamed up with HBO for the third time and creates a documentary following the fall out of hurricane Katrina. In the four part doc "When the Levees Broke: A Requiem in Four Acts", Lee interviews people directly effected by the catastrophe and several icons from the media coverage, including Sean Penn, Ray Nagin and the guy who told Dick Cheney to ‘go fuck yourself’. Additionally interviews include my fav CNN American Morning Host Soledad O’brien and Kanye West. The structure of the Doc is as 4 x 1 hour pieces. “Act I covers the storm's arrival; Act II chronicles the failure of the emergency response; Act III follows an abandoned community coming to grips with all that it lost, and Act IV addresses the halting, haphazard effort to begin again.”

This is HBO’s longest Doc ever and with a $2m budget it isn’t modest for the subject matter. "We've never had a four-hour documentary," says Sheila Nevins, HBO's president of documentaries and family programming. "But we could tell early on that the story needed more time."

Socially, Lee appears to be as critical as ever, taking this as an opportunity to address issues he takes with the American administration. Al Sharpton is quoted as saying; "I knew that what I had to say about this administration would see the light of day with Spike. Many times the mainstream news will cut you off when you have something negative to say about the White House. This documentary will make up for all those times."  However, I question lee’s ability to be colour blind. The Newsweek Piece claims Lee has not made a “racial polemic”, stating; “Some viewers will be surprised to find that Lee views the tragedy as a national betrayal rooted in class, not skin color.” Personally I think Lee has so strongly portrayed the psyche of  black Americans in films like Bamboozled, Malcom X, Jungle Fever and Inside Man. Inside Man is particularly emblematic of Lee’s ability to create strong black characters, but lacks a voice to share with white ones. That being said, Lee’s ability to devise strong black male leads has succeeded where many have failed. I hope this doc will find its way onto Channel 4 this year and am eager to see what will at least be engrossing in its criticism of a dismal effort on the part of the government.