Trouble the Water, a documentary film co-directed and co-produced by OSI fellow Tia Lessin, has been shortlisted for the Academy Award for Best Feature Documentary.

Fourteen other films also made the shortlist in the Documentary Feature category, out of a record 94 qualifying films. Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences Documentary Branch members will select the five nominees from among the 15 titles. The Oscar nominations will be announced on January 22, 2009.

The Academy announcement and list of all 15 shortlisted films can be seen at www.oscars.org/press/pressreleases/2008/08.11.17a.html.

Lessin was one of six filmmakers who received an OSI Katrina Media Fellowship in 2006, enabling her to complete and distribute Trouble the Water.

Trouble the Water is a feature-length documentary that follows the journey of Kim and Scott Medina, a young African-American couple from New Orleans's Ninth Ward who survived Hurricane Katrina and brought dozens of friends and neighbors to safety. The film offers a window into how the hurricane impacted society’s most vulnerable—the elderly, the poor, the hospitalized, and the incarcerated—and examines the new underclass of “Katrina homeless.”

Trouble the Water has been shown in the 170 cities so far. The film continues to open in theaters throughout the country; click here to see the list sorted by state.

View a trailer for Trouble the Water.