Spike Lee crafts complex, monumental look at Katrina

Barry Garron yahoo news

LOS ANGELES (Hollywood Reporter) - Spike Lee calls his four-hour documentary on Hurricane Katrina a requiem, which it is, but that only begins to describe it.

The film, broken into four parts, is much more than a memorial chant to those who died in a natural disaster that went largely unmitigated by manmade relief. It also is a comprehensive look at what the storm did to the lives of the people who survived it.

The docu doesn't shrink from any part of the story. It includes the vast landscape of devastation, which is indisputable, as well as the assignment of blame for the tragic and inadequate response, some of which remains debatable. Lee's work is big enough to allow for conflicting opinions, though in most cases, it isn't hard to discern where the filmmaker stands.

There are powerful images and words during both nights, but if you must choose only one to watch, pick the first. Acts I and II deal with the predictions of the hurricane, the terrible storm and the immediate aftermath. The faces of Katrina's victims, as they describe their life-or-death ordeals, are flat-out unforgettable. Individual accounts put larger stories -- everything from the horrors at the Superdome to the extent of looting -- into greater perspective

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