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Project: Trouble the Water
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Tia Lessin directed and produced Trouble the Water, a feature-length documentary that tells the story of an aspiring rap artist and her streetwise husband, trapped in New Orleans by deadly floodwaters, who survive the storm and then seize a chance for a new beginning.
 
Tia Lessin
 

Trouble the Water is a redemptive tale of self-described street hustlers who become heroes. The film takes you inside Hurricane Katrina in a way never before seen on screen. It's a tale of talented and deeply sympathetic people who are surviving not only deadly floodwaters, armed soldiers, and bungling bureaucrats, but also their own past.

Trouble the Water won the 2008 Grand Jury Prize for Documentary Film at the Sundance Film Festival.

Directed and produced by Tia Lessin and Carl Deal and executive produced by Danny Glover, Joslyn Barnes, Todd Olson, and David Alcaro; cinematography by PJ Raval and Kimberly Rivers Roberts; edited and co-produced by T. Woody Richman; additional editing by Mary Lampson.

Trouble the Water features an original score by Neil Davidge and Robert Del Naja of Massive Attack, and the music of Dr. John, Mary Mary, Citizen Cope, John Lee Hooker, and the Free Agents Brass Band and introducing Black Kold Madina.