Tuesday, June 05, 2007

Spike Lee plans 'Requiem' follow-up

NEW YORK (AP) - Spike Lee plans to return to New Orleans for HBO to follow up the stories told in last year's four-hour documentary about the devastation caused by Hurricane Katrina.

Lee, who accepted a Peabody Award yesterday for directing "When the Levees Broke: A Requiem in Four Acts," said he's still not sure when that will be. He says now is too soon.

Lee says the story is not over and it's something that's evolving.

His film was able to tell stories not often seen on television news because of the time he had to work with, and the ability to show things others couldn't. Some of his interview subjects asked if he minded if they cursed; he said it proved essential to conveying the anger of the event.

He collected footage of bloated bodies floating in the floodwaters near New Orleans, much of it taken by the BBC. He said American news networks could show little of it.

Lee and his team were one of 35 winners of the 66th Annual Peabody Awards, given for excellence in electronic media. They included cable and network entertainment shows, as well as local
and network news programs.

1 comment:

Reel Fanatic said...

I was so happy when I first heard about this today ... Although it's certainly hard to find anything good that came out of Katrina, Spike's alternately heartbraking and heartwarming documentary was certainly one of them ... As a former Peabody judge (when I was a UGA student), it also makes me proud that they keep honoring such great work