Spike Lee put his all into this documentary about Hurricane Katrina and the government's slow response. This disaster will always be remembered by everyone no matter what race, sex, or economic group. I could not believe the job that the Army Corp of Engineers did on the levees over the course of 40 years. Even after Hurricane Betsy, they never finished that job and the residents paid the ultimate price for their negligence. The people did not deserve to be run out of their homes. A lot of them had nowhere to go. I have relatives that were displaced by Katrina. Lee gives an insight on how this has affected there lives during and after the storm hit. Also shown is the economic and social status of New Orleans. Due to this,education and health care are decreasing to the point that residents have relocated to other states for a better chance. Crime was already a big problem there and it seems that it is increasing as everyday goes by. No matter what, New Orleans will remain a top-notch city.

This documentary is intensely powerful, all 4 parts of it - easily over 4 or 5 hours in total (I watched it all from beginning to end in one sitting and lost track of time). The purity of the depiction is very refreshing, free of the overbearingly pompous moral platitudes of someone like Michael Moore. No voice-over, just the just the voices of people involved in the disaster. Yes, it is clear what side the filmmaker is on. However, the way the film is produced is balanced, thought-provoking and insightful in such a way that one simply cannot argue with what it is saying. It is incredibly poignant, but there is no sentimentality here - there 's simply no need for it, because the tragedy is so stark and numbing in its extremity. The scale of the tragedy is too huge for any lens to capture, but this is probably the closest most outsiders could ever get to feeling the pain of the New Orleans people. It is clear this was an unprecedented event, and it really does require the depth and scope that a 4 or 5 hour examination makes possible. It is always compulsive viewing, and while the subject matter is impossibly dark, it does show some wonderful flashes of human strength and positivity that provide some hope. In short, it is a masterpiece of documentary film-making, and a very courageous project.** spoilers and discussion below **The first 2 parts cover the buildup to and immediate aftermath of Hurricane Katrina. It is harrowing and painful. It is incredible to see 'third-world' scenes of utter devastation and people so viciously stripped of their humanity and dignity on American soil. You will see dead bodies hideously swollen and decomposed, shell-shocked children whose last memory of their home is watching their parents die. Words honestly fail me when trying to convey the horrors depicted here. It is not easy viewing, but in a way it is our duty to watch it.Nothing can prepare you for acts 3 and 4 that cover the longer-term aftermath. This is a mind-boggling story of an entire people, community and culture sold out and literally left to rot. Families are separated and dispersed around the country, left to fend for themselves. Work on clearing up the city doesn't even start for 6+ months after the event. On top of everything else, property developers are trying to steal citizens' bare land with the government's help (it's very profitable you see). It is a shameful indictment of the corrupt and subhuman way that the US is run. To any sane person watching, there is absolutely no doubt that the government of the US does not care about its people. For this reason alone this is probably the most important film that Spike Lee will ever make.I am saddened by the criticism of this film in some of the reviews here. The film is clearly not only about black people, even though when a city has such a large black majority it is inevitable that race will become an issue. Wake up America, the only place in the world with such segregated communities was South Africa during apartheid. There are a lot of clearly shocked white people here, quite obviously feeling absolutely betrayed by the government and system they formerly believed in. It seems almost like the negative reviewers are hired ghouls of the government out to discredit this film and its maker. The more cynical would say "well, what right do these people have to receive anything for free?" - I would implore these people to watch act 4. Lawful citizens who have paid years of tax and insurance, building a livelihood out of nothing with their bare hands, are told they will get nothing - theft and fraud on a grand scale. How does this fit into the American dream? How do you know that it won't happen to you tomorrow?The most incredible thing you realise after watching this film is that somewhere along the line, life and humanity became expendable and cheaper than the paper we worship. The only thing that means anything anymore is money and power, and the only way to grow is to acquire more of it. This documentary shows how empty and destructive this philosophy actually is. I'm happy that Spike Lee still has the balls to make films like this.The other thing you're left wondering at the end is: what more does it actually take for people to wake up and realise what is happening? What is this 'freedom' that is being sold to the world with a gun to its head?By the way if you think I'm a typical internet anarcho-commie rebel, you could not be further from the truth. I work, pay taxes, bills, all the rest of it, just like any honest citizen. Read my other reviews, I'm not some kind of reactionary Infowars sheep. However I refuse to bury my head in the sand, and after watching this film you will also find it hard to do so. The truth is here, more vivid, brutal and real than CNN could ever be. You owe it to yourself to watch it.

As a resident of south Mississippi, I am incredibly frustrated by media that reports "Hurricane Katrina Struck New Orleans." In truth, Hurricane Katrina struck the Mississippi gulf coast and south Louisiana, visiting upon those areas a thirty foot wall of water. New Orleans, on the edge of the weaker northwest quadrant of the storm, was merely brushed.It is a point which WHEN THE LEVEES BROKE brings out early: New Orleans received at best a glancing blow and it should have survived. The great disaster which befell the city was not so much natural as man-made. And throughout the documentary's four hour run time, director Spike Lee not only presents a kaleidescope of interviews with survivors, he repeatedly returns to the inevitable question: how did it happen? Much of the answer to that question depends on who you ask. New Orleans has a history of blowing levees, and early in the film several people state flatly that the levees were deliberately blown in an effort to protect the city's wealthier districts at the expense of poorer areas. But although director Lee gives the idea play, it soon becomes clear that no such effort was required: it was in fact a mixture of bad design; neglect; an unwillingness by city, state, and federal officials to spend the money; and, most simply, indifference toward the people of New Orleans and indeed Louisiana in general.WHEN THE LEVEES BROKE is truly devastating in its portrait of a great American city's collapse. Interviews with survivors, archival footage, and news reports paint a damning portrait of failure at almost every possible level. Most damning is the picture of federal inaction. While people drowned in their attics, President Bush was on vacation. While people collapsed from heat prostration and dehydration Condoleeza Rice bought shoes at an upscale store. The minutes became hours, the hours became days, and the cavalry simply did not arrive.Spike Lee is a somewhat problematic director, an artist who has the very distinct tendency to interject race issues into scenarios whether such is warranted or not. In this particular instance, however, I believe Lee is on target when the attributes federal inaction in large part to the fact that New Orleans is predominately poor and black. Had he gone further to note the obvious fact that the city is also of the deep South--a region that has typically been ignored by Washington--he would have struck a bull's eye; it is worth pointing out that south Mississippi, which is predominately white, experienced the same federal foot dragging and ridiculous mismanagement.When all is said and done, WHEN THE LEVEES broke is a stunning but flawed portrait of a horrific disaster that befell a great American city--a city which, as of this date, has yet to begin a significant recovery and which will very likely never again be the New Orleans of legend and song. It's great strength is that it allows the victims to speak for themselves; it's great failure is a tendency to posit race plain and simple as the cause of federal indifference. It was a mighty factor, to be sure, but nothing is ever quite as simple as all that.The DVD release includes three disks. The film itself offers a commentary by Lee; the third disk consists of bonus material that further elaborates what is indeed an American tragedy. In spite of occasional flaws, I recommend it very strongly.GFT, Amazon Reviewer

I was with my host family in St. Petersburg, Russia, when Hurricane Katrina hit New Orleans. As we watched it on the news, I was absolutely ashamed. Even if I couldn't understand every word, I could see what it looked like, and I didn't know how to explain to my host family the fact that my government abandoned the people of New Orleans.Well, even just seeing it on TV and reading about it through e-mails and over the Internet didn't prepare me for what I saw in Spike Lee's documentary "When the Levees Broke: A Requiem in Four Acts". When I saw just what everything looked like, I was horrified. Aside from the fact that the Crescent City will probably never be the same, the documentary makes clear that this was another example of those in charge screwing the people (certainly that looked like the case during the 1927 flood).Any logical-minded person would have to agree that George W. Bush playing the guitar while New Orleans drowned was the same sort of thing as Nero playing his fiddle while Rome burned, or Marie Antoinette saying "Let them eat cake.": it was the ultimate display of not caring. But the New Orleanians interviewed weren't neutral: that one boy was very clear about what the city needed.I liked how Spike Lee interviewed various figures (Ray Nagin, Kathleen Blanco, etc.) to get their opinions on what what went wrong, even if they sometimes blamed each other. Of course, the biggest blame lies with the Bush administration for its racism, inaction, and starving of government programs (never mind that he'd sent the National Guard to Iraq to fight his vile war). As Rev. Al Sharpton put it, we're supposed to be spreading democracy to Iraq while the people here got nothing.All in all, this just might be Spike Lee's best work ever. It just goes to show what the US government had degenerated into. For the record, Harry Belafonte mentioned how Venezuela's Hugo Chavez had offered New Orleans help; I remember while I was in St. Petersburg reading on the Internet that Cuba's government also offered help (the Bush administration didn't respond, natch). Also while I was in St. Petersburg, I read about Bob Denver's death on 2 September 2005; it turned out that that was the same day that Bush commended FEMA head Michael Brown for "doing a heckuva job". So the last thing that Bob Denver got to see before dying was Bush praising incompetence (even if it wasn't specifically Brown's fault).All in all, a great documentary. And I laud Kanye West for reminding everyone that George W. Bush doesn't care about black people.