Director of Photography, Cliff Charles re-teams with Director Spike Lee to continue the story of New Orleans and the greater Gulf coast area post Hurricane Katrina. Just as they did on When the Levees Broke, the filmmakers chose several cameras and formats to work with on this film including:
2 – Sony SRW-9000′s outfitted with Zeiss Digi-zooms for portrait interviews and Canon ENG zooms for run and gun
1 – Canon 1D outfitted with Canon primes and zooms
1 – Canon 7D outfitted with Canon primes and zooms
1 – Bolex outfitted with Switar C-mount lenses shooting Super 16 negative and reversal stocks
1 – Beaulieu super 8 camera outfitted with a Schneider zoom lens shooting mostly reversal film
Five years after Hurricane Katrina, director Spike Lee returns to New Orleans to see how the ambitious plans to reinvent the Crescent City are playing out in IF GOD IS WILLING AND DA CREEK DON’T RISE. In an all new, four-hour documentary premiering on HBO, Lee finds a patchwork of hope and heartache in a story bookended by a pair of momentous events — the historic 2010 Super Bowl victory and the disastrous British Petroleum oil spill — that changed the history of America’s most unique city once again.
IF GOD IS WILLING AND DA CREEK DON’T RISE is a continuation of the story of the rebirth of the Big Easy as first recorded in Lee’s epic, Emmy® and Peabody award-winning 2006 documentary, When The Levees Broke: A Requiem In Four Acts. Alongside the city’s storied ability to celebrate life with unmatchable ebullience, Lee documents the successes and failures in the ongoing efforts to restore housing, healthcare, education, economic growth and law and order to a battered but unbowed community. The film will debut on HBO in two parts on MONDAY, AUG. 23 (9:00-11:00 p.m. ET/PT) and TUESDAY, AUG. 24 (9:00-11:00 p.m.).