SCA Alumni Screening Series Presents: TROUBLE THE WATER

ABOUT TROUBLE THE WATER

This astonishingly powerful documentary tells the story of an aspiring rap artist and her streetwise husband, trapped in New Orleans by deadly floodwaters, who survive the storm and then seize a chance for a new beginning. It’s a redemptive tale of self-described street hustlers who become heroes that takes you inside Hurricane Katrina in a way never before seen on screen.

Trouble the Water opens the day before Katrina makes landfall, just blocks away from the French Quarter but far from the New Orleans that most tourists knew. Kimberly Rivers Roberts is turning her video camera on herself and her 9th Ward neighbors trapped in the city. “It’s going to be a day to remember,” Kim says excitedly into her new camera as the storm is brewing. It’s her first time shooting video and it’s rough and jumpy but dense with reality. Kim’s playful home-grown newscast tone grinds against the audience’s knowledge that hell is just hours away. As the hurricane begins to rage and the floodwaters fill their world and the screen, Kim and her husband Scott continue to film, documenting their harrowing voyage to higher ground and dramatic rescues of friends and neighbors.

Intertwining Kim and Scott’s insider’s view of Katrina with a mix of verite and in-your-face filmmaking, filmmakers Carl Deal and Tia Lessin follow their story through the storm and its aftermath, and into a new life.

Running time: 96 min.

ABOUT THE GUESTS

Tia Lessin (Director/Producer) makes her feature debut with Trouble the Water. She also directed and produced the documentary short Behind the Labels in partnership with Peter Gabriel’s human rights group Witness. She was awarded the Sidney Hillman Prize for Broadcast Journalism for the film, which is about labor trafficking of Chinese and Filipina women garment workers.

Carl Deal (Director/Producer) was the Archival Producer for Michael Moore’s Fahrenheit 9/11 and Bowling for Columbine, and has contributed to many other documentaries, including Sundance Festival favorites Murderball and God Grew Tired of Us, and John Pilger’s recent The War on Democracy. He previously worked as an international news producer and has reported from natural disasters and conflict zones throughout the U.S., Latin America, and in Iraq. Carl graduated from Columbia University’s School of Journalism, which awarded him the Sanders Social Justice Prize. Carl has authored reports for Greenpeace, Amnesty International and Public Citizen. He is a Sundance Institute Fellow and received the 2005 FOCAL International/Associated Press Library Award for best use of footage in a feature film.





To view the full schedule of films during the Alumni Screening Series, click here.