Shot over a year during the time Chicago became a national symbol of urban violence, The Interrupters is shot from the point of view of three "Interrupters" who work with the organization Cease Fire to stop the cycle of violent culture in the city.
I will try to stay un-biased in this review as my love for Steve James is no secret. I saw Hoop Dreams three times in the theater (at 3 hours long, I deserve to brag) , I've watched Stevie multiple times on DVD and couldn't wait to check out The Interrupters after seeing the trailer. While I feel that The Interrupters is his third best film (Reel Paradise comes in last) that makes it no less worth seeing as they're all amazing documentaries. The Interrupters feels to me like James had a little less invested personally, but his at arms length documentarian style is a perfect fit for this material.
Anyone from a big city knows when the most violence occurs; Summertime. Something about the heat makes people go crazy. The Interrupters is broken up into four segments by season and drops us right into the thick of things during a hot Summer day argument. It is interesting to watch because while it is a documentary the film still follows the formula of any well paced film; start off strong and get people hooked, lay out the story structure, dig deeper into the characters while letting the story unfold and finish as strong as you started (this can be either a positive or negative outcome). First we are introduced to Ameena Matthews as she attempts to mediate the above mentioned argument. While it ended with some bruises and missing teeth, it could have ended in death if she wasn't there. She's the daughter of Jeff Fort who is one of Chicago's most notorious gangsters. He is currently serving a life sentence for conspiring with Libya to commit domestic acts of terrorism. She wasn't always the woman we're introduced to either. Through interviews with other employees and founders of Cease Fire we are then brought up to speed with their goal; to stop the spread of violence through interrupting it. Of course they go into more theory then that, but I don't want to spoil everything for you. Then we meet Cobe Williams and Eddie Bocanegra who are the two other interrupters whom the film focuses on. Both have spent time in jail and are dealing with their own demons. The film jumps back and forth between these three subjects. In addition to their normal everyday mediations each has their own special case. Sometimes it isn't enough to just intervene; you have to help a person grow to keep them from succumbing to the virus that is taking over their neighborhood.
What makes The Interrupters so powerful is how close the filmmakers are able to get to their subjects. These people are in areas of Chicago where I, as a Chicagoan by proximity and association, would never set foot in voluntarily. They get footage that is everything the cliche quotations from the trailers suggest; gut wrenching and raw. We are exposed to situations, conversations and locations that without this film many of us would never be able to experience. With that sentence the beauty of the documentary is explained. We are given a window into the subjects' world and the subjects are given a voice they didn't previously have. It's documentary filmmaking 101 really. They chose a great subject, got great footage of amazing people and edited it together to tell their story well. What sets James and his films apart from the material of documentarians such as Morgan Spurlock and Michael Moore is that James' only desire is to tell someone else's story and not his own. That's a beautiful thing and something Michael Moore should think about. James finds beauty and knowledge in the world around him and wants to share that with you. Im so happy he does as his small canon of work is something to behold.
You may wonder why I ranked The Interrupters third amongst James' films and not higher. Well for me it was the smaller amount of footage. Hoop dreams and Stevie were both shot over much longer periods of time and had longer running times. They just felt more dense. I felt like we could have been given more with The Interrupters. By choosing to shoot for only a year we don't get the character growth we get in his other films. Considering the power of the footage they do have, it really is a small complaint. There is plenty of conversation to be had over what we are given and there is no question it is good enough to earn four stars.
Go see The Interrupters as soon as you can. Then, if you haven't yet, watch Hoop Dreams and Stevie. If things get a little heavy feel free to slip Reel Paradise in there to take a break from the weight of the other three.
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