A deeply affecting film about a remarkable Houstonian who's also a proud New Orleanian

My student has become my teacher. Darius Clark Monroe, the young filmmaker I first met when he was enrolled in my class at University of Houston, and who went on to study with Spike Lee at NYU, demonstrated great promise with his acclaimed autobiographical documentary Evolution of a Criminal. Now he has taken the first step toward fulfilling that promise with this deeply affecting 13-minute portrait of Dr. Mtangulizi Sanyika, a remarkable Houstonian who also happens to be a proud New Orleanian. Titled Two Cities, it's part of a six-part Time Inc. documentary series -- New Orleans, Here & Now -- that celebrates different facets of my hometown 10 years after the devastation of Hurricane Katrina. After seeing Monroe's contribution, I'm eager to view the entire omnibus -- and, yes, maybe take another look at another amazing film directed by one of Monroe's other proud teachers.

Why I am always willing to cut Kanye West an inordinate amount of slack

Being a proud New Orleans native, I felt compelled to watch NBC's A Concert for Hurricane Relief when it aired in the wake of Hurricane Katrina nearly a decade ago. And I must admit, I was absolutely gobsmacked when, without warning, Kanye West dropped his infamous 20-megaton dis on George W. Bush. Don't misunderstand: I didn't really question West's claim that Dubya "doesn't care about black people." But I was shocked by the angry intensity-- and, yes, the utter fearlessness -- of his off-the-cuff comment. 

And I was convinced -- absolutely convinced -- that West would immediately be targeted for a boycott by outraged right-wingers. There would be pressure brought to bear on advertisers, who would in turn pressure radio and TV outlets to ban West's music and music videos. And, of course, major retail chains would be pressured to stop selling West's CDs.

So even before the TV special ended, I got up from my couch, ran out to my car, drove over to the nearest Best Buy store -- and bought a copy of every Kanye West CD I could find. In the interest of full disclosure: I think, at that point in his career, West had only released two studio albums, so we're not talking about a huge cash outlay on my part. But, hey -- it was the principle of the thing.

At the checkout counter, the polite young African-American cashier had a hard time hiding his amusement as this gray-haired white dude placed the CDs onto the counter. But his smile faded when I told him what I had just witnessed on NBC. He, too, thought Kanye West was going to suffer mightily -- professionally, and maybe even personally -- for his outburst.

Of course, when I got home, I started playing the CDs in my office. And right around the time I had "Gold Digger" (West's bodacious duet with Jamie Foxx) blaring from my speakers, my son George walked through the front door with a few of his college buddies. They had to file past my office door to get back to George's room, for a long evening of video-gamesmanship. And it was my turn to be amused as I noted the amazed looks on their faces. Fortuitously, I turned down the sound just in time to hear one of my son's friends tell him: "Damn, George! Your dad is fuckin' cool!" George, it should be noted, didn't indicate disagreement with that appraisal.

And that's why, even when Kanye West misbehaves at The Grammys, I can't get too upset at him.   

Talking with Paul Walker about Hours

Chalk it up as a tragic irony of an untimely demise: At the time he was killed Saturday in a Los Angeles auto mishap at the ridiculously young age of 40, Paul Walker was less than two weeks away from seeing how movie audiences and VOD viewers would respond to what arguably was the finest performance of his career up to that point, as a desperate father who triumphs over death.

In Hours, writer-director Eric Heisserer’s suspenseful indie drama, Walker plays Nolan Hayes, a loving husband who rushes his pregnant wife to a New Orleans hospital just before sunrise on Aug. 29, 2005 – just as Hurricane Katrina begins its brutal assault on the Crescent City. Unfortunately, Nolan’s wife dies during childbirth. Even more unfortunately, his prematurely born daughter must remain inside a ventilator for at least 48 hours.

The New Orleans levees break, the city streets are flooded, the hospital is evacuated – but Nolan must remain behind, alone with his infant offspring, because the ventilator cannot be moved. And when the power goes out, the increasingly anxious father must maintain constant vigilance – because the hand-cranked back-up battery for the ventilator works for, at best, three minutes between crankings.

As I wrote in Variety after the drama’s SXSW Film Festival premiere last March: “Hours is practically a one-man show, with Walker alone on camera for lengthy stretches as Nolan passes time talking to his baby, or himself, and dashing hither and yon between battery-cranks while on beat-the-clock explorations and supply runs.” Walker “capably and compellingly rises to the demands of the role,” and “gracefully balances the drama on his shoulders.”
   

Please don’t misunderstand: I’m not one of those snobs who dismiss the guilty-pleasure appeal of Walker’s full-throttle action-heroics in the Fast & Furious franchise. (Although I must admit: I enjoyed his work just as much, if not more, in a genre movie of a scarier kind, John Dahl’s Joy Ride.) It’s just that, in Hours, I saw him doing things -- and expressing emotions – that indicated he also was fully capable of more challenging roles in more complex movies.

And when I spoke to him at SXSW last March, I got the distinct impression that he, too, knew he’d taken full advantage of a showcase for his heretofore underutilized talents.

You can judge for yourself when Hours is available in limited theatrical runs and as VOD fare starting Dec. 13. In the meantime, here is some of what Paul Walker had to say about the movie – and his work in it – during our conversation.
  

How much responsibility did you feel toward the people of New Orleans – the people who had endured the devastation of Hurricane Katrina – while making Hours in their city?

Prior to getting to New Orleans, [Eric Heisserer] told me that our ace in the hole was the fact that a lot of the people on the crew, because we were filming in New Orleans, had a very personal connection to this. So we had built-in accountability – like, the accountability police. There had been some other Katrina projects that had come up. But this one, when they read it, the locals felt a real connection. And when I got there, I saw this consistently. Everybody was there because they really wanted to be there. They felt like they had a connection to the story.

Were you at all intimidated by the challenge of doing a movie in which, for long periods, you’re the only person the audience sees or hears?

Well, I read [the script], and it felt very truthful, very pure to me. And I liked the idea of just telling the truth. But it was intimidating, because I knew that it was completely on me. Because the story itself, it was there. And now it’s my responsibility to show up and deliver every moment of it. I mean, I felt it when I read it. But does that mean that I can actually do it? I’d never really taken on a challenge like that before.

So how did Eric Heisserer convince you that you could trust him – and trust yourself – if you accepted that challenge?

Part of it was – and you’re not going to hear this from Eric – his due diligence. We had our first pow-wow, and then I found out, “OK, cool, he actually wants me to do the film with him.” And I was excited. And then we had meetings at his house once a week, for about four or five weeks there, just to rap and have a better sense about what’s going on. He really wanted to establish a shorthand, seeing as we were up against [an 18-day shooting schedule]. He wanted to know what triggers would work.

And what I realized is that his preparedness… [Laughs] If it’s possible for someone to be over-prepared, Eric was over-prepared on this one. I was like, “Holy shit! Has this guy done his homework, or what?”

But I’ve got to tell you: Going into it, I felt like I had that in my pocket. I was like, “The guy that’s captaining this ship has done his homework. He’s really done his homework.” And that allows you to just step in and say, “OK, I’ve just got to worry about what I do.”

In a way, you caught a break by being able to shoot in an actual New Orleans hospital that had been closed since it was damaged during the Katrina flooding. Not to sound crass, but it’s almost like you got an extra $1 million for your production budget.

Yeah, but we probably had to spend something like a million and a half on the clean-up of the rust and the funk and the mold. On the ground floors, where basically the water sat and stagnated for periods of time – we had crews that had to go in and remove sheetrock, drywall, wood. There was a lot of work, just to make it sanitary. But it definitely played into what we were doing because – I don’t know, it just felt like death there. It really did.

How much did you draw upon your real-life relationship with your own daughter while playing Nolan Hayes? Because speaking as a father myself, I have to say: The plot of this movie is every parent’s worst nightmare.

Well, I grew up in a military background, everyone in my family. My dad’s a solider to the max. And my grandfathers before him, on both sides. So for me, while I was growing up, we were always posing these hypothetical situations. Something like, OK, you’re at an ATM machine late at night, and someone puts a gun to the back of your head. What do you do? Or there’s an earthquake, and you’re trapped inside. That was just the way I grew up.

So it’s fun to go through it hypothetically and process it. You want to believe that you’re man enough, and you’re going to be able to realize whatever needs to be realized in order to save yourself and save the others around you that are near and dear to you.

But the fact that I have a daughter now -- I wouldn’t say that I was pulling from that consciously. But that’s just who I am now. That’s just my reality. It’s there.

And you think that allowed you go deeper inside yourself than maybe you might have before?

I think I’ve always had the capacity to go there. I don’t want to say that I’m a sensitive person. But maybe that’s what it is. And I think here it was amplified by the fact that, yeah, I do have a little girl.

But what I really liked about it, and what I didn’t realize until the end of this movie, what I learned about myself, is that in living every bit of it and being truthful the whole time – in the end, Nolan’s victory was my victory. There’s no separation. That’s what was incredible. When the baby was put in my arms, that’s real emotion I’m showing. It’s like I’ve been through this whole rollercoaster ride. And you know what? I kicked its ass. And I didn’t know it could be like that, to be honest throughout.

Were there ever days when you dreaded going to work? Days when you looked at the call sheet and thought, “Gee, can’t they get a stunt person to do that ?”

Oh, whenever I saw that, I was like, “Oh, cool!” Because the physical challenge is always fun for me. I know I don’t fail there. But what was so intimidating for me, what I was so possessed by, was, like I say, having to tell the truth every day. I was so preoccupied, and thinking: “Oh my God! Just live it! Live it!”

But the thing was, once we got rolling, it was good. It wasn’t until I got home at night, and looking at the next day’s work, what was in store for me, that self-doubt would creep in. But once you get there, and you get into it, it was like, “I’m there. This is OK.” Being away from it was tougher than being in it.

An art-house renaissance in The Big Easy?

Take this with a grain or two of salt -- or, more appropriately, a bag of popcorn -- but maybe things really are on the rebound in my hometown of New Orleans four years after Hurricane Katrina. That's the only way I can explain why one local theater-industry veteran thinks it's a financially sound idea to expand, of all things, a Canal Street theater devoted to indie and foreign films.

Invisible Girlfriend should be seen

Glad to see someone else waxing enthusiastic about David Redmon and Ashley Sabin's Invisible Girlfriend. You can buy a copy of the DVD -- and, while you're at it, a copy of Kamp Katrina, a fascinating documentary about post-Katrina New Orleans by the same filmmakers -- here.

Oscar watch: Trouble the Water

Kim Voynar writes of Trouble the Water, the Oscar-nominated documentary about struggles to survive and efforts to thrive in post-Katrina New Orleans:

I first saw the film at Sundance last year, where it won the Grand Jury Prize for documentary, and it was one of my favorite films of that year's fest. As I walked to the shuttle stop after the film, I was behind two obviously well-off, white couples (the women were both wearing ankle-length fur coats and were glittering with diamonds), and overheard a conversation that's stayed with me for over a year.

One woman said to her husband that she didn't like "those black people" the film focused on, and wondered why the filmmakers had chosen to focus on Kimberly Rivers Roberts and her husband, Scott; the husband of the other woman offered that he felt that [Tia] Lessin and [Carl] Deal, who are white, had exploited their black subjects to make a film with a liberal political slant. And I remember thinking to myself, "Wow, is that really all these people got out of the film we just saw?"

You can read more of Voynar's insightful piece -- which includes recent comments by documentarians Carl Deal and Tia Lessin -- here.

Trouble the Water

Talk about being in the wrong place at the right time: Kimberly Rivers Roberts, an aspiring rapper and self-described "street hustler" living in the Lower Ninth Ward of New Orleans, had just recently purchased a Sony camcorder in August 2005 when Hurricane Katrina slammed into her city.

Like too many other residents of their predominantly African-American neighborhood, Kimberly and her husband, Scott Roberts, lacked the wherewithal to evacuate, so they stayed put. At first, Kimberly was happy to play the part of "interviewer," pointing her camcorder at relatives and neighbors while asking how they would ride the storm. But then the rains came. Kimberly and Scott, along with a handful of others, wound up warily watching from their attic while waters from breached levees flooded the streets — to the point of submerging stop signs — outside their home. And throughout it all, Kimberly continued to operate her camcorder, instinctively capturing indelible images that are the heart of a powerful new movie aptly titled Trouble the Water.

You can read my entire Houston Chronicle review here.

Kamp Katrina

A worthy addition to the steadily increasing array of documentaries about life and strife in post-Katrina New Orleans, Kamp Katrina is a frequently affecting but scrupulously nonjudgmental look at a makeshift mini-community of survivors. Filmmakers Ashley Sabin and David Redmon may catch grief in certain PC quarters for focusing almost entirely on working-class and lower-middle-class whites -- specifically, the sort of New Orleaneans often referenced in local slanguage as "yats" (as in, "Where yat, darlin'?"). Oddly enough, however, the movie winds up being all the more fascinating because race isn't an issue as tensions rise among earthy folks in close quarters.

I reviewed Kamp Katrina for Variety after its premiere last spring at SXSW, and I subsequently was honored to introduce the film and the filmmakers at the Nashville Film Festival. And, yes, I am a New Orleans native -- born and raised in the Ninth Ward. (Most of movie was shot just a few blocks away from the Alvar Street Branch of the New Orleans Public Library -- the first of the city library system's storm-damaged branches to reopen its doors after Katrina -- where, as a youngster during the '60s, I first encountered a collection of reviews by Pauline Kael.) So I've taken more than a casual interest in how this insightful film has fared elsewhere. And so far, I'm happy to say, the reponse has been good. GreenCine Daily offers an invaluable update that includes links to Matt Zoller Seitz's favorable appraisal in the New York Times, and the Kamp Katrina website, where you can see whether or not it's coming soon to a theater near you. If it isn't, maybe you should ask the appropriate people in your area to rectify that situation.

Spike and Soledad and Katrina

Spike Lee and CNN's Soledad O'Brien -- who made a memorable appearance as an interviewee in Lee's When the Levees Broke: A Requiem in Four Acts -- have reunited to keep the country's eyes affixed on post-Katrina New Orleans. Good for them.

"When the Levees Broke"

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