From the Eye of the Storm

Feb. 1, 2008— -- For Americans tuning in to see Louisiana's levees break, Hurricane Katrina may not have seemed real. But as New Orleans natives Kimberly and Scott Roberts watched the waters rushing into their home in the Lower Ninth Ward, it was all too real.

Kimberly and Scott could not possibly know then that Hurricane Katrina would crush their city, leaving almost 2,000 people dead and millions displaced, but they knew they had to capture what they were seeing.

Kimberly grabbed her Sony Hi-8 camcorder, the camera that she had bought on the street for $20 the week before the storm. That snap decision resulted in the documentary "Trouble the Water," the winner of the 2008 Sundance Film Festival's Grand Jury Prize for a Documentary.

Peter Travers caught up with the couple for an interview for ABC News Now's "Popcorn."

Kimberly's decision to film the storm came more as an impulse than a calculated idea: She says, "I grabbed my camera and I was like, 'I've got to film this!'"

She laughs now, saying, "I had to be inspired by God or something. Because I look at it now and I'm like, 'Dang I didn't cut the camera off?' I felt like it was seeing history being made."

The couple remembers being unsure of whether or not they would survive. But if they did, they wanted the world to witness what they had seen.

"I didn't think anybody was going to believe me -- so I just kept filming," Kimberly says.

Even from this earliest moment, she knew her story would affect others.

"I tried to get as much as I can on tape to really prove to my family, 'Hey, if we made it through this, man, you can make it through a lot of things,'" she says.

"Trouble the Water" takes viewers through the hours preceding the storm and the following days as a community struggles to rebuild itself after total destruction. The couple managed to save more than 25 people in their community, prompting many to label them heroes. But the couple explains that the video simply portrays them doing "what good Samaritans are supposed to do."

And while there was much to lament in the aftermath of the storm, Kimberly draws a positive message from those moments.

"Things happen," she says, "but we were strong through it. But above all, it is about our love for people and our love for life."

To craft the documentary, Kimberly and Scott teamed up with directors Tia Lessin and Carl Deal. Their collaboration was born out of a coincidental run-in at a Red Cross shelter.

"We met them at a shelter in Alexandria and at the time we were just interested in getting our story told," Kimberly says.

Kimberly explains that the footage on television did not look like the nightmare she was living through.

"The TV was telling a whole other story," she says. "We had the real story on tape."

Kimberly's footage is raw and real, and watching it brings back the emotion. Kimberly finds that the moments of human connectivity solicit the strongest response for her.

She becomes emotional when she "hears all those people being so grateful," explaining, "I love people and I'm glad that they made it. I'm glad that I was an inspiration to them to help them make it."

The message, chronicling the indelible strength of the individual when faced with adversity, struck a chord with participants at Sundance, known for its celebration of intrepid spirits. But with the acclaim they have received, Kimberly and Scott remain humble.

Scott explains, "I don't consider us heroes; I look at it as neighbors."

On Jan. 20, Kimberly and Scott saw their dreams realized when they attended the premiere of "Trouble the Water" at the Sundance Film Festival. Kimberly, who stayed strong throughout the greatest natural disaster of American history, got choked up when she saw her film for the first time on a movie screen for the first time.

"I cried when I saw it on the big screen," she says. "To see people's reaction, people came up to me with tears in their eyes, hugging me and letting me know how much they appreciate us putting our story out."

She expresses disbelief at being able to move so many.

"I was excited that little old us could do something so big," she says, "touch so many different people."

The premiere was so filled with emotion that Kimberly and Scott failed to notice that nature was once again preparing to interfere in their lives.

Kimberly, more than nine months pregnant, did not notice that her water had broken. The couple rushed through yet another storm and made it to the hospital to deliver their first child, daughter Skyy Roberts.

As they face new beginnings in all areas of their lives, Kimberly and Scott look ahead. With her unwavering optimism, Kimberly looks to her struggling community and sees the good in human nature. She reflects on the thousands who still live without homes, noting that "Katrina is active right now as we speak in our city. But the good part about it is, good things happen too."

To the delight of her loving community, Kimberly says that the family has no plans to leave New Orleans.

"It's home," she says. "That's our community, that's our problems, that's our people."