User reviews

A worthwhile trip through the disturbing events of Katrina, an honest film, even if on occasion not so subtly directing its viewers towards particular and easily-held opinions.

There are several striking images in the film, including a recording of a 911 call in which an woman requesting help can't get out of her attic which is flooding. The 911 attendant has to inform her that there is no help at this time, and the victim replies, "So I'm going to die?" Silence on the other end of the line.

It seems like the majority of the film is snatched from the video camera of a survivor, as such the footage can be, well, not professional, but in the end it doesn't matter, perhaps even adding to the realism. It turns out that the couple filming is a set of intriguing characters with admirable qualities. They are from the ninth ward, a poor section of New Orleans hit hardest by the storm, yet for those of us without that much contact with society's underbelly or the semi-destitute, they will probably surprise you with their values, intelligence, resolve and resourcefulness.

The strength of the film for me was not in any attempts at blame or inciting anger at a lack of assistance and the seeming complacency of leadership, but in a reflection on the human struggle, manifested through an inspiring family, and in a basic reminder to examine, nourish, and befriend your own community.

A must-see documentary for anyone interested in the suppression of the poor in the United States. What went down in New Orleans was something even the corporate media had a hard time hiding. FOX News was reporting on Hurricane Katrina and saying the place looked like the 3rd world. The images were startling on the US news, but there was still the undertones of profit. "How will this affect gasoline prices?" Julie Chen asks on the CBS morning show after showing footage of all the homeless blacks.

This is the story as told by the people themselves, not by Anderson Cooper or anyone else. This is how the story should be told because these are the people who lived with it. It's not even a story anyone in uniform could tell because they were part of the problem in New Orleans.

One scene of this documentary allows the locals to narrate how they tried to go to a local Navy base in New Orleans which had been evacuated before the storm. It was empty and it had housing for people which wasn't being used. The National Guard who were protecting the building cocked and loaded M-16s and pointed them at the crowd. Nope, these aren't the stories you hear about on CNN.

You won't hear the story about a man in prison for a misdemeanour before the storm hit either. The television was taken away by the guards before footage of the storm was on the air, when the prisoners finally heard that there was a hurricane outside, they were denied food and most of the guards left.

This is a very good documentary, and an important one because it shows the failings of government. The government doesn't fail everyone, it takes very good care of the rich and businesses, which recovered quicker than anyone else in New Orleans. The government failures are biased towards the poor and visual minorities and this doc. pretty much confirms that thesis.

Four years on and not much has changed in the 9th ward, but the casino is open and the tourism department is showing a flashy video urging people to come to New Orleans. The poor black people aren't around any more, except when they're working for minimum wage. The rest have been displaced from the city where they lived but no longer trust to live in anymore.

Katrina is just one of the legacies of the Bush administration and perhaps a strong indication that the US is a country whose power is in decline. What can you possibly say about a country which won't even help its weakest and most destitute citizen? It sucks.

The story of the U.S. government's response to hurricane Katrina remains shocking at many levels: the poor quality of the flood defences, the complete inadequacy of plans for evacuation, recovery and regeneration; and above all else, the overwhelming sense that at heart, no-one cared because most of those affected were poor and black. The ground has been covered extensively by Spike Lee in his magisterial film 'When the Levees Broke'; 'Trouble the Water' is a more personal account, a video diary shot by a resident during and after the storm. But it still contains plenty of gruesome insights: the failure to evacuate the hospitals and prisons, and the protection of higher ground from homeless citizens by the armed forces of the U.S. navy, are the most terrible details. The film also depicts the huge burden of trying to rebuild a life that has been completely swept away. As a piece of pure cinema, it's limited; but it's a story that needs to be told and re-told until something is eventually done. Nothing we see gives us confidence that next time, it really will be different, and the citizens of New Orleans will get the first-world treatment that America could surely afford to give them, if only it cared.

It begins as a lark. A video camera is switched on to record an approaching storm. We get to meet the smiling faces of videographers as they laugh and cajole. We on the other hand know what's about to confront them. Or at least we think we do.

This is a magnificent use of home video built in to a rage against poverty and illiteracy and racism. You can blame the victims here all you want, but image after image, scene after scene the plight of being an African American in this country is shoved in their faces...and in ours.

The lives of this family in the Lower 9th Ward are vividly drawn by themselves. When they confront what is outside, i.e., the post-segregation South, we are startled at the condescension, scorn and devaluation of human lives...if your skin is the wrong color.

The people here have no apologies for their lives. They lay it out and I suspect many will resist what struggles they face. But scene after scene, you can't walk away from this film without a better understanding of racism in America.

The stubborn will ask "Why didn't they leave when they were supposed to?" And this film records "How were they supposed to?" and "Where were they going to go?" In the face of it all, those who survive manage here to triumph. While the footage of the disaster is why most people will buy the ticket to see this, it's the struggle to survive, not only Katrina, that will last in the viewer's mind.

Hurricane Katrina 2005. The ravage of New Orleans. The flooding of the ninth ward. A couple who did not evacuate tells a story of survival and the consequences.

The couple in question is the subject of this documentary. It blends newsreels and footage taken by the couple and the directors. It's not polished, but it's real.

We see amateur shots of the period immediately preceding the arrival of the hurricane, the storm itself, the rising water, the flood aftermath. The couple moves out of New Orleans not intent in coming back. Eventually they do come back and rebuild.

The problem with this documentary is that the exciting part comes at the start. As it gathers distance from the tragic events, it loses steam and eventually becomes borderline boring.

The most pointed line, said by a mother to her son as regard the occupation of Iraq: "You're not going to fight for a country that does not give a damn about you."

There's quite of bit of rap composed by the wife. If you like rap, it's pretty good.

Back in 2005, when Kimberly Roberts,a up & coming rapper from the 9th Ward in New Orleans first heard of what was going to be a major hurricane in her neck of the woods,she got her hands on a used video camera from a street hustler,looking to make a quick buck & started to record anything & everything she saw (with the assistance of her husband,Scott). Four days later,her world,as she knew it,drowned in the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina. Documentary film makers Carl Deal & Tia Lessin (who had worked on 'Fahrenheit 9/11',etc.)were in New Orleans,filming all of the mass mayhem & became acquainted with the Roberts' & offered to use their crude,clumsy,kitchen sink video footage as part of their documentary film project. The results of this collaboration is 'Trouble The Water' (the title of a Gospel song that is heard on the soundtrack). This powerful film is cinema verite at it's best. It easily takes it's place among recently released documentaries on Katrina ('Camp Katrina',etc.). This documentary is produced by HBO,which means that it will probably turn up there some time later for those who missed the opportunity to see it in cinemas. No rating,but contains vulgar language & some disturbing sights & sounds.

Wow. This is absolutely the best documentary I've seen in years, and hands-down most engaging and relevant piece I have seen on the Hurricane Katrina catastrophe. It is outstanding: funny, tragic, sharp and smart. Kim simply steals the show, even she's videotaping and you can't even see her, you can only hear her voice from behind the camera. The film is centered around Kim's footage of the hurricane and her life. She is a gifted storyteller and also quite a good rapper. When I saw the film, the theater burst out into spontaneous applause after she performed one of her songs in its entirety on film; in the Q&A, the directors' said that had happened every single time it's been screened.

Everyone saw footage of Hurricane Katrina on the news. Spike Lee's documentary "When the Levees Broke: A Requiem in Four Acts" dealt extensively with the storm and the lack of response. "Trouble the Water" consists mostly of camcorder footage shot by New Orleans resident Kimberly Roberts before during and after the storm. Partly about the hurricane, the documentary also poses the question of what America is supposed to be all about if it lets this happen to thousands of people, most of them poor and black.

Hurricane Katrina, like the September 11 attacks (whose tenth anniversary is in a few days), is something that should always be remembered, maybe more so. It showed how detached the government had become from its most vulnerable citizens. The collapse of the levees and subsequent flooding of the Lower Ninth Ward became an excuse to dismantle New Orleans's public school system and replace it with vouchers. The documentary is even more relevant now, after Louisiana got a second strike in the form of the Deepwater Horizon spill.

How much are you willing to pay to see some amazing footage shot in the Ninth Ward during the storm? That's what it really comes down to, because there's no other reason to see this "documentary" ... and I use that word loosely. If you've been paying attention during the last few years (I have), you will learn NOTHING NEW about the storm, the aftermath, or how it affected the poor residents of the city. You will learn a lot about Kim Rivers, who seems to have a rather high opinion of herself. Here's a question for Ms. Rivers: Your uncle died in the storm. Before the storm, he was lying on YOUR porch, drunk or stoned or both. You knew the storm was coming; you knew he couldn't take care of himself; and you let him wander away, barely able to walk. So who's fault is it that he's dead? I'll give you a clue: it ain't the police, or the Bush administration, or the Army Corps of Engineers, or the city of New Orleans. Sit with that for a while, and get back to us if you think of something.

Trouble the Water: 8 out of 10: Kimberly Roberts is a 24-year-old rap hopeful who took some incredible footage just before and during hurricane Katrina. Carl Deal and Tia Lessin who came down to Louisiana to film a different project about Katrina and found both her and her footage, they switched gears and this movie was the result.

The most amazing footage is the pre-Katrina scenes. Kimberly knows her neighborhood and is a real person. She asks people what they are going to do about the hurricane her uncle buys another bottle of booze, stumbles home, while a 10-year-old pigtailed niece flashes a gang sign, and declares she is not scared of any water.

While I know that neighborhoods like this exist it is still shocking to see people live like this first hand in America. One of the sad strange truths that ooze out of the film is that Katrina is the best thing that ever happened to Kimberly and her friends. The disaster probably saved her life or at the very least gave her a chance at a new one.

Orphaned at 13 when her mother died of AIDS Kimberly is no shrinking violet and she certainly tells it like it is. While Michael Moore veterans Carl Deal and Tia Lessin add structure and social commentary to the film this is Kimberly’s show. The show is both moving and truly fascinating.

That this could happen in America is a crime of such a magnitude that no words coming from the Bush administration could ever erase the shame. An amateur rented a camera and her video is supplemented by profession work in this Oscar nominated and Sundance award winning film.

The fact that we had rapid response to the storms that hit Texas afterwards does not negate what happened in Louisiana. This short film brings home the crime that was committed upon this city and it's residents.

Navy personnel aiming M-16s at a crowd of survivors just looking for a warm and dry place to sleep is indicative of the lack of care the government displayed in the aftermath of Katrina. "Get off our property or we're gonna start shooting." Excellent film about some people got their lives together on their own.

This is a must see movie by all God's children around the world. It a secret the US Government would like to hide. This movie gives an honest and compiling account on how all of us can prepare and respond to natural disasters. The US Government did and continues to fail the citizens of New Orleans. However, this movie also focuses upon the inner faith and strength the citizens of New Orleans have. I pray this documentary gets maximum exposure. People from around the world need to see a true and accurate account of what occurred before, during and after Hurricane Katrina. It is my hope that people and government's from around the world take note of how to prepare for natural disasters.

While the movie started good it quickly seemed to push its slanted view of the truths surrounding Katrina. The language was very, very offensive and I almost quit viewing because subtitles were needed due to poor sound quality. The movie covered the Navy Base as an outpost intended to keep the natives out. Actually the USS Totuga was there 2 hours after Louisiana Governor Blanco "finally" asked for help about 5 days after Katrina. A lot of the people in the movie seemed to be asking for the government to take care of them although they didn't want to leave New Orleans before the storm. The Navy actually built kennels for hundreds of dogs and housed locals that were homeless and gave them thousands of meals. Coincidently this same ship helped the Japanese after their tsunami. I found it interesting that the subjects spent so much time complaining about the national government and President Bush, but work seemed like an afterthought.

If you are looking for a documentary about a waste of air (former drug dealer, aspiring rap artist - enough said) that you can barely understand due to slurry ghetto speak, then this documentary is for you. This woman had a rough life, blah de blah de blah. She has done nothing to improve on it, which is what this documentary proves. Yet she is all "trust in God," while following none of the basic rules of how to be a good person. It's sickening, and incredibly sad. The pivotal moment, at least for me, is her and her crew returning to their home after Katrina, camera rolling and good teeth flashing, to find their dog has survived the flood. They abandoned their dog, people. And want you to believe there's a respect for life here as she one millionth of a percent worries about her neighbors and where their bodies might be. They then bitch about the National Guard not being there as soldiers walk through their backyard, and point out that only the ASPCA has been there. Maybe because of people like you, sweetheart. Perhaps I think too rationally, but the two things people grab when fleeing from disaster are their pets and their family photographs. She leaves both behind, more focused on that camera rolling on her and her own sweet bum. She barely acknowledges the dog, who is sadly so happy to see his betrayers, and kisses the photographs she left behind that managed to survive, but weren't good enough to take with her. There is no redemption here. There is no love, there is only a want for money and personal gain. Just a bad person who demands that FEMA takes care of her while she can't look out for her own. Skip this waste of film unless you are in the mood to get really, really mad at how disgusting human beings can be, especially in the wake of a tragedy.

Part of the problem was that people seemed to think FEMA was supposed to be activated before the local response. They weren't. They are activated once local government has tried and discovered that their resources are insufficient to the task. THEN FEMA gets called in.

Strange how Florida regularly gets pounded by Hurricanes but doesn't suffer the same consequences. Perhaps the real culprit should be examined: Louisiana's state government is among the most corrupt of all states. Florida's state government isn't.

Example: funds for maintaining the flood defenses in Louisiana were already available, that is, until the local government spent that money on other projects.

Hmmmmm....