A few months ago, my parents went back to New Orleans. They own a condo there, which was remarkably undamaged by Hurricane Katrina. You can read excerpts from my father’s New Orleans diary here: A Katrina moment, Because of all that’s happened, and An equal opportunity destroyer.
I asked my father to take my video camera and shoot some footage of New Orleans as it is today. Other than a few scattered news reports from the Convention Center and Oprah’s trip to the Superdome, I simply didn’t know what New Orleans looked like anymore.
It looks like this: The Rhythm of New Orleans: a tragedy in 3 acts.
Streaming mirrors:
I call the film “The Rhythm of New Orleans” for two reasons. Of course New Orleans has always been known for its rhythm. Rhythm and blues. Jazz. Music always playing somewhere, everywhere. I once walked into a church on St. Charles — no cover charge, just walked in — and sat down and listened to Ellis and Branford Marsalis jam for an hour and a half. Two of the greatest jazz musicians in the world. No big deal. Happens every night of the week.
Happened.
The second reason comes from the film itself. What struck me the hardest — once I got past the images of total annihilation — was the noise in the background. Other than the occasional gust of wind, the only sound you hear is construction. Workers demolishing the remains of a house. Former residents dumping wheelbarrow after wheelbarrow of their life into garbage trucks. Rhythm and blues has been replaced by the rhythm of jackhammers. There is no music left in New Orleans. There is no life. Only the sounds of the afterlife, a city’s afterlife.
I am not a religious man. I am not a spiritual man. I can count on one hand the number of times I’ve quoted the Bible and still have fingers left over. But when Katrina hit, I read Matthew 25 over and over until I could recite it by heart.
The other reality which set in after Katrina was the political reality. Politicians and pundits rushed to turn New Orleans into a prop for their own agendas. I witnessed the destruction of an entire American city, live, in real time. Before it was even finished imploding, before the first survivor was rescued, people were drawing battle lines and issuing talking points. Here’s a tip: God doesn’t care about your talking points. Your brothers were hungry; you either fed them or you didn’t. You can’t talk your way out of it later.
Anyway, this is not a political film. It is not a religious film. It does not try to place blame or put anything in historical context. It is just one man’s personal experience of the afterlife, a city’s afterlife.
The rhythm of New Orleans is construction… and silence.
§
I am no longer accepting public comments on this post, but you can use this form to contact me privately. (Your message will not be published.)
§
firehose ‧ code ‧ music ‧ planet
© 2001–8 Mark Pilgrim