Back in January, we reported that Spike Lee and his crew were heading back to New Orleans to begin filming a sequel to his massive and celebrated documentary “When The Levees Broke: A Requiem In Four Acts.” The HBO production was a massive opus and a critically-lauded look at the city of New Orleans as it suffered and survived through one of the worst natural disasters to ever land in the United States. The film won three Emmys and ranked in the top five of our list of the best documentaries of the last decade. Well, it looks like the follow up to that documentary is going to be no less epic.
Titled “If God Is Willing And Da Creek Don’t Rise,” Lee’s sequel runs a healthy four hours long and will premiere on HBO in two parts on August 23rd and 24th. The project will find Lee not only returning to the still devastated and rebuilding Gulf coast region, but expanding his focus to include the recent earthquake in Haiti as well BP’s massive oil spill, the latter subject which will take up a quarter of the film’s running time. And don’t expect Lee to hold back on criticism of the oil company’s efforts and PR spin.
“We went back seven times after the BP spill to get more footage,” he said. “It’s really eye-opening the power that BP has. There’s no way it should be dictating what’s going on. But it shows the power of the company.” Lee added, “the connective tissue is greed. I don’t care how many scientists BP buys, that oil is still there. [BP] has been lying from the get-go. You’re telling me we’ve had the biggest oil disaster in the world and it’s all gone now? Where did it go? No damage done to the wetlands? I don’t believe it. As journalists, you need to ask questions and not accept the lies being told.”
As for his regular feature film work, Lee recently signed on direct the thriller “Nagasaki Deadline,” but any further news has been quiet on that front, presumably because the director was putting the finishing touches on his Katrina doc. [Deadline]
