Asian Journal- The Filipino-American Community Newspaper

THERE are some films that make us feel like we are there, sharing and experiencing the same emotions and feelings of the characters on the screen.

For FilAm Cinematographer Paul James (PJ) Raval, whose job is to see what the audience sees, he not only experienced those feelings but also filmed it in a new highly acclaimed documentary about the Hurricane Katrina catastrophe and controversial aftermath.

“It was an incredible experience,” said Raval to the Asian Journal. “It’s moments like that and films like these is why we make films. It might actually change how people think.”

The documentary by the producers of Fahrenheit 911 and Bowling for Columbine, Trouble the Water follows the life of two New Orleans residents’ days after the hurricane tore through the city. It has received critical acclaim from critics nationwide and already won the Grand Jury Prize at the 2008 Sundance Film Festival.

The film opened on August 22.

The main characters of Kimberly and Scott Roberts were some of the unfortunate victims who did not have the wherewithal to flee New Orleans as the hurricane approached. Armed with a video camera with limited battery time, Kimberly, carrying a no fear attitude, filmed her families harrowing experience being inside the hurricane from her startling interviews with neighbors not wanting to leave before the storm to the thundering, torrential rains pounding the streets and into the homes causing mass flooding leaving the family to flee to higher ground. Kim, while inside their homes cramped attic, kept the camera rolling and showed that even in the worst of times there is good in human nature.

It was days later inside one of the local Red Cross shelters when Kimberly and Scott approached Raval and the rest of the film crew. The film crew was in New Orleans to capture the reaction of the local army soldiers who had just finished their tours in the Middle East only to come to home to a wrecked city. When the Army declined the film crew access to the soldiers, the film crew was left without a story that is until Kimberly and Scott told them about their experience.

“It was just a spur of the moment,” said Raval. “When people ask me and the rest of the crew how we found Kim and Scott we always say the same thing, ‘we didn’t find them, they found us.’”

Thus began almost a year in a half into the life of Kim and Scott Robert’s after one of the most terrifying natural disasters in US history. Their life was in a sense a microcosm of the plight of many New Orleans residents.