SYNOPSIS

KATRINA'S CHILDREN is a multi-faceted portrait of nineteen children, ages 5 through 13, from different neighborhoods of New Orleans. Told entirely from the children's point of view, the film captures with vivid poignancy the tragic ramifications of the greatest man made and natural disaster in modern American History.

By focusing exclusively on children's experiences, KATRINA'S CHILDREN humanizes this epic storm and seeks to understand the heartbreaking consequences in a small intimate way. Part oral history, part lyrical meditation on childhood, loss, grief, healing and socio-economic divides, KATRINA'S CHILDREN addresses these grand themes through intimate vignettes that are deceivingly understated.

The film shifts between past and present, weaving the children's thoughts on Katrina with 'verite-style' scenes of their everyday life. We enter the children's world through their stories, play and art and we have animated several of their drawings, magically bringing to life their interior universe.

The children we are profiling come from all walks of life: from the daughter of the queen of Carnival, to underprivileged kids still stuck in Texas. Their common denominator is Katrina - an event that affected them all, to varying degrees. The similarities and differences between these children are at times surprising and reveal patterns and problems that predate Katrina.

Aching with sadness, yet grounded in hope, KATRINA'S CHILDREN is ultimately a celebration of children's extraordinary power of resilience and a tribute to New Orleans' unique and indomitable spirit

SELECT FESTIVALS AND AWARDS

• Official Selection, 2008 Bahamas International Film Festival
• Official Selection, 2008, St. Louis International Film Festival, USA
• Official Selection, 2008 New Orleans Film Festival, USA
• Official Selection, 2008 Atlantic Film Festival, Nova Scotia, Canada
• Official Selection, 2008 Miami International Film Festival, Florida, USA

DIRECTOR'S BIOGRAPHY

When she left her birthplace New Orleans (to move to Switzerland) at the age of six, Laura Belsey, along with her two sisters, sobbed so hard that their father drove 75 miles in the wrong direction. Belsey returned permanently to the United States to attend New York University Film School. She is an award-winning director, whose commercials and short films have won numerous international honors, including a Cannes Gold Lion.

Her "New York, New York" spot for the Coalition for the Homeless, hailed by the New York Times as "one of the most remarked on, and remarkable, examples of thepuissance of public service advertising", is in the permanent collection of the Museum of Modern Art.

Currently Belsey is a partner at Shadow Pictures, a film and commercial production company in New York. She is an adjunct professor at the NYU Tisch School of the Arts Graduate Film Program and serves on the Directors Guild of America’s National Board and Eastern Directors Council.

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SHOWTIMES

TUES. 5/19 at 6:00PM
Stockton Empire Theatre

CAST AND CREW

Production: Shadow Pictures
Writer: Laura Belsey
Producer: Laura Belsey, Babs Johnson
Exec. Producer: Richard C. Colton
Cinematographer: Laura Belsey, Bob Perrin
Editor: Guido Stadelmann
Music: Jay Weigel
Animator: David Sullivan, Courtney Egan
Cast: Amanda, Antoine, Corriana, Dakota, Destiny, Ella, Erica, John & Royce, Joshua, Leander, Lucy, Marlon, Mary, Sam, Simone, Sophie, Tyronieshia, Uacobi

SOURCES

Shadow Pictures
www.KatrinasChildren.com