A Preview Of Local Filmmaker's Documentary 'Heartbreak And Healing After Sandy'

by Patricia A. Miller

Filmmaker Sandy Levine held off on finishing up her documentary film Heartbreak & Healing After Sandy in time for the first anniversary of the monster storm.

The reason? By Oct. 29, 2013, there was little to celebrate.

Levine held a screening of the film in the Mancini Room of the Ocean County Library on Wednesday night. It was the last screening before the documentary debuts on WHYY at at 1:30 p.m. on Sunday.

“This is a tough time for all of us,” she told the audience at the well-attended event. “Two years after the storm, there are still so many people that still need help.”

A number of storm survivors are featured in the documentary, which Levine filmed primarily in Toms River, Brick, Mantoloking, Seaside Heights, Seaside Park, Ortley Beach, Island Beach and Berkeley Township.

One Ortley Beach resident stood on the property where his house once stood - marked by a wooden cross - and described the scene before he evacuated.

“I said, ‘I‘ll see you tomorrow. And I never saw it again.”

The Gonzalez family of Seaside Heights is shown packing up their belongings in their sodden apartment, then pulling away in a truck piled high with mattresses. They headed toward the mainland, to a new home where they don’t have to worry about storms anymore.

Levine also included a few residents who ignored the warnings to evacuate and stay.

One Seaside Heights man and his family had no choice but to head for their cramped, airless attic. It was the last place to go.

Nearly all of the film focuses on the aftermath, not the steadily advancing superstorm.

But the footage of the devastation are sobering. Camp Osborn in Brick, that burned to the ground. Mile after mile of battered homes and empty lots in Ortley Beach and Mantoloking. The iconic Jetstar in Seaside Heights, sitting forlornly in the ocean.

Levine - whose family moved to Toms River in 1956 - could not make it to her father’s house for three days. Dr. Bernard Levine, a veterinarian in Toms River for decades, had four feet of water in his home.

A lot of the film is devoted to recovery efforts after the storm, including the rapid rebuilding of the Seaside Heights boardwalk, followed by the September 2013 fire that destroyed large sections of the new boardwalk.

Good Luck Point in Berkeley Township was perhaps the unluckiest community of all. Township Council President James J. Byrnes is featured briefly standing in front of a devastated home, describing the storm surge that overtook the waterfront sections of Berkeley.

A number of Brick officials appear on camera, including current Mayor John Ducey and former Mayor Stephen C. Acropolis and Police Chief Nils Berquist.

Five copies of the documentary will be available at the Toms River branch of the library. It will also be available for purchase eventually, Levine said.