12,000 watch debut of Katrina documentary...

Six days after Hurricane Katrina hit New Orleans in September 2005, people waiting to be evacuated from the Superdome took cover after the National Guard reported shots being fired outside the arena.

Wednesday night, as many as 12,000 people, many of them Hurricane Katrina survivors, jammed the New Orleans Arena for the world premiere of filmmaker Spike Lee's four-hour documentary about the deadly storm.

While most critics heaped praise on Lee's documentary the main criticism is that it primarily focused on the African-American victims of Katrina and did not do justice to the suffering of predominately white victims in neighborhoods such as Lakeview.

(Photo: Nicholas Kamm / AFP)