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This film is recommended.

Flowers and candles, hand-printed messages written on notebook paper tacked to makeshift shrines, all decorated with photographs of young victims. This touching memorials litter the blood-spattered streets of Chicago and are the remains of the day in The Interrupters, a powerful and disturbing documentary by the talented Steve James ( Hoop Dreams ).

His film takes the moviegoer directly into the crime-ridden neighborhoods as we meet a group of peacemakers trying to restore sanity and preaching their anti-violence message to the choir. The group is called CeaseFire and it is made up of ex-gang leaders and former convicts whose motto is Stop the Violence - Save a Life.

James directed and photographed his documentary and focuses on three interrupter and their "scared straight" strategies of tough love and reality checks. We met Cobe Williams, a former gang member and family man now whose father was killed during a street fight, Eddie Bocanegra, a young man easily impressed by the gang's image of fast cars, money, and girls who served 14 years for murder and now uses art as a method of expression and conflict mediation, and the primary spokesperson, Ameena Matthews, the daughter of a gang leader who was physically, emotionally, and sexually abused at an early age and has since let faith and family lead her away from that life-style and keep her grounded.

We also met some of those troubled teens: Caprysha, a defeated Precious type, living in a halfway house, dreaming of a better life while constantly lying and breaking her parole; Lil Mikey, released from prison and wanting to be a better role model for his siblings; and Flamo, a young man enraged with his mother and brother's arrest and wanting his own form of justice. It is impossible not to care about their people and their lives.

The film consists of interviews with gang members, families of their victims, and scenes of escalating violence. At times, The Interrupters becomes slightly repetitive in its interventions and lock-step mindset of anger and frustration. More judicious editing could have made the film even more forceful. But the passion for its compelling subject and James' craft as a filmmaker make up for those minor complaints.

The documentary gives us no easy answers as drugs, unemployment, alcohol, poverty,and guns still are a major reason for the neighborhood's ills. Politicians come and go with each election, giving lip service and promises. Yet these people and their difficult lives become the on-going problem in search of a solution, and groups like CeaseFire seem to be their only course of positive action. The Interrupters allows us to see a world that we can never fathom and acknowledge the spirit of a group of strong-willed survivors, trying to make a difference and save a life or two throughout a normal day. GRADE: B

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"The Interrupters" is sad, upsetting, and hopeful. It's a year in Chicago with two different groups: CeaseFire Interrupters and Violence Interrupters. Both groups are dedicated to quelling, if not eliminating, the violence in the streets of Chicago. We were taken through Englewood, the "Ville," the "Gardens," and perhaps other neighborhoods in Chicago. The Interrupters were dedicated individuals from those streets who were committed to saving lives. They were once in the streets themselves, and who better to warn from the perils of street life than someone who survived it?

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Steve James is a remarkable documentary filmmaker who has given us a series of amazing films starting with Hoop Dreams that explore some of the more difficult issues in our society including race, poverty, crime, and violence. His film on the Trial of Allen Iverson revealed the complex racial discourse at work beneath his hometown of Hampton, VA. His most recent film, The Interrupters, screened today at Austin's SXSW Film Festival. It is a powerful film that captures the plague of urban violence that plagues are cities – in this case Chicago – and goes beyond documenting to show a group of activists (many with troubled pasts) working for a group called Ceasefire.

Ceasefire seeks to engage troubled young people and interrupt their dysfunctional behavior patterns of anger, crime, drug use, irresponsibility and violence. The Interrupters are acting heroically to try to save their imploding self-destructive communities. While the footage and the story are compelling, it could still use some editing since at over 2.5 hours it is a little too long. The length is understandable since James filmed over 300 hours, but it still needs to be paired down further to capture a manageable story.

The other problem with the film is more complex. The Interrupters are fighting on the front lines in their efforts to save their communities. But the fight that they are engaged in is almost impossible, because their personal and human efforts to save individuals are divorced from a larger political reality. The film is a deeply personal and human, but it fails to address the deeper social problems in education, unemployment that have created the epidemic of violence. They are treating the symptoms of those who are already infected without searching out the causes of the disease.

Sadly, the problems of the poor have disappeared from our political discourse since the collapse of the "War on Poverty." The current administration – led by our first urban President in decades - has failed to offer any sort of serious urban or anti-poverty agenda. Our political discourse focuses on the "middle class" and pretends as if poverty doesn't exist. Poverty has ceased to exist on American TV and in most of our news media coverage. Middle Class America has stopped seeing poverty which is quietly hidden away outside of our consciousness. The social contract that binds our society together is broken. We need far more films like the Interrupters to confront the American public with the realities of poverty and violence that are eating away at the soul of our society.

Hopefully, many people will watch a film like The Interrupters and ask themselves two questions: What can I do as an individual to help groups like this make a difference in my community? What can I do as a citizen to get my government to act to make the structural changes that are needed to transform these communities?

Chicago, Baltimore, Oakland, Detroit – synonyms for American crime, places where young men kill one another in the streets. Bleak background noise in the national news, with dim flares of outrage at especially gruesome killings.

On the subject of solutions, our imaginations are dismally poor and usually limited to applying money or violence in some form. More police, more arrests, longer sentences, talk of the National Guard on the streets.

The Interrupters seem to have a better gimmick. The violence prevention group CeaseFire recruited a group of tattooed ex-gang-members in Chicago, most of whom turned away from crime after cooling off in hospitals or prisons. They know the locals, and they have credibility where cops, teachers and politicians don't.

The film follows several of them: a tough gang heiress turned devout Muslim, an imposing man with several prison terms for drugs and violence, and a soft-spoken Latino out after serving 14 years for murder. Interrupters are, in effect, roaming street counselors; unlike the armchair type, they usually find themselves between two or more people who are about to begin stabbing one another. They are to ordinary counselors what BASE jumpers are to people who feel proud of taking stairs.

The rare and valuable insight of the film is how, over the course of a year, the counselors manage to talk down people who're about to do horrible things, and how these people arrive at such a place to begin with. None of them are remorseless sociopaths, and none of them appear to want or relish violence. They want the best for themselves, they value their families, and yet some have come to the verge of actual fratricide. Why? Hopelessness, poor impulse control, lack of role models, a gang tribalism that feeds on vacuum and anarchy.

It's amazing how many fights and murders aren't motivated by gain. They're essentially the result of undereducated boys applying the Cheney Doctrine every day on street level – "get them before they get you." On these streets, nobody trusts each other, everybody is armed and nobody is willing to back down from a fight. Tempers can flare instantly, and the killers are often as baffled by their own crimes as anybody else.

Somehow, the Interrupters pull young people out of this mindset. It takes a heroic amount of trust and patience. It doesn't work all the time. But it works way more often than one imagines it should.

There is a large and influential contingent in our country which holds that the only solution to inner-city violence is to tighten the screws even further. To their Klingon eyes, the CeaseFire approach probably looks like so much liberal mollycoddling of people who just ought to have their heads busted on the pavement more often. One of the thicker ironies of "The Interrupters" is that this Old Testament law enforcement mentality comes from precisely the same place as the bloody retaliations and preemptive violence by South Side gang-bangers.

I listened to the young ruffians, and heard the words of steely-eyed Giulianis: not backing down, not showing weakness, getting tough, getting serious, showing them who's boss. Once you realize that "tough on crime" politicians count on the same tactics to intimidate gangs that gangs use to intimidate one another, you may recognize the same lustful rage in yourself as well, and subside to embarrassed head-scratching.

The Interrupters talk about the legal trickery of being involved in potential crimes, and sometimes the organization has no choice but to get law enforcement on the case. However, their strength is not in meting out punishment, but understanding – and it's astonishing to see violent young toughs respond and open up. Even with all the money, cops and technology that America can scratch together, maybe the best way to solve social problems is still through one person talking to another.

Only 9 reviews?!! This movie needs to be seen!

I live in Chicago, and every morning the Chicago Tribune has a headline tallying the overnight wounded and dead. It's not at all unlike the beginning days of the Gulf War, where every news hour would begin with the number of soldiers killed that day. The difference being that those stories gradually subsided as the numbers dwindled, and they were based on deaths in an actual military conflict. There are neighborhoods in Chicago that are as much like war zones as any area of Afghanistan, but no one is paying attention.

"The Interrupters" doesn't really try to address why no one is paying attention. It doesn't need to, because everyone pretty much knows the answer even if they're not willing to admit it to themselves. These aren't rural white kids getting killed for their country; these are poor, disenfranchised black kids who most people don't care about. Instead, this documentary follows a few members of CeaseFire, a nonprofit group comprised of past gang members, street criminals, etc. who are now using a tactic of intervention to stop chains of violence before they spiral out of control. These people are deeply admirable. They're not trying to break up gangs, they're not police informers. They're simply trying to make one person understand how pointless it is to shoot another person, no matter what grievances are at play.

This film is by Steve James, the same director who did the tremendous "Hoop Dreams," and if it doesn't have that film's epic scope, it has a more immediate sense of urgency.

After watching "The Interrupters" my wife and I were instantly online looking into ways to support CeaseFire. I hope others do the same.

Grade: A+

I really feel that movies like this are worth it - to see and educate oneself. One of the problems in America today are that the downtrodden and invisible people have no voice or medium through which to tell their stories. Movies like this show us ... how powerful these stories truly are.

The Interrupters themselves were my favorite characters. I wish I could see more and more movies on people who have truly transformed their lives from hopeless to meaningful. There are many out there - fighting the good fight, against all odds. And the best outcome of a movie like this - is to feel transformed yourself, inadvertently, because you've become inspired to take back your power and use it to be the best person you can be, in whatever your situation is.

Steve James' documentary The Interrupters opens with audio taken from several different Chicago news sources, reporting "x" number of people murdered in the city, and how an outbreak of gun violence has ripped apart the area as a whole. We then cut to a volunteer organization that takes the courageous act of stepping in at the sight of conflict amongst gang-members, and works to try and prevent yet another death in a city so consumed by heinous crimes. This group is called "the Interrupters," and for the next two hours we witness their invaluable actions.

The Interrupters work for an organization called "CeaseFire," and its members are comprised of former gang-members; a positive, being that since they are still young, they can speak the language of the gangs and recall the motives of an underprivileged teenager. While they work entirely for the area of Chicago, much of their time is devoted to bettering Englewood, one of the most broken cities in the entire nation. 98% of Englewood residents are black, with the main age demographic being people under the thirty. With a 25.8% unemployment rate (which has now risen to 44%, roughly two years after the release of this film), the townspeople look towards a life of gangs as a way to earn respect, money, territory, and get a quick-fix for violence and danger. This makes the area especially dangerous, not just for the gang-members of opposing territories, but the residents who want no part in the crime world. Whether you're a gang-member on the front lines of violence, a passive resident, a bystander, or even a young child you're a potential victim to a senseless problem.

One of the leading violence interrupters is a bright, young woman named Ameena Mathews. Once an active gang-member, she has since married, converted to being a Muslim, and works to travel around the community promoting a truce and a compromise between opposing forces. When she bravely lectures in the middle of thirty or so gang-members about how there's no reason at all to be dealing or discussing potential crimes when children are arriving home from school, the petite woman herself is open to almost anything. Steve James and his camera crew are as well. Yet Mathews boldly preaches her gospel before traveling on to continue doing more work.

Frequently, CeaseFire will hold fiery roundtable meetings, where group members will discuss what fight/argument they've broken up since the last meeting and what leads do they have on any further gang activity. During these meetings, despite several dozens of Interrupters being on the job and prepared for just about anything, it's when we see how grossly outnumbered they are. Keep in mind, Chicago isn't just Englewood, and with a population of over 3,000,000 citizens, the per-capita rate of the CeaseFire members is and will always remain outnumbered. This doesn't make their efforts any less commendable, but with over 500 homicides taken place in a city so torn in 2012, there needs to be more recruiting and soon. How much longer can a city be referred to as names like "Chiraq," and boast a statistic that states it is more violent than Iraq and Afghanistan? Aesthetically, The Interrupters is extraordinary, with several long-shots of the crisp, yet crumbling Chicagoland area. Scarcely has a documentary about going into a real issue been so engrossing visually. Yet what truly makes The Interrupters the captivating, multi-layered documentary that it is is the way it conducts its subjects. Too often do I see documentaries take the path of a scare-tactic gift-wrapped as a formal piece of information. Here, we are presented with nothing but the true homelives of these troubled teenagers and adults, who are not only bearing hard circumstances on their shoulders, but misguided direction, societal neglect, negative perceptions, and shallow stereotypes. Think about the way white people are often associated with being wealthy, pure, and successful, while black people often associated with being deviant, rude, and obnoxious. Are these stereotypes shaping us or are we shaping our stereotypes? This is a bolder question from a documentary, asked naturally, that for once doesn't come from a glaring, empty statistic.

One of the smaller, yet more relevant details the film goes into is the significance of rival-gangs and how integrating them in hopes of a "melting pot"-like effect is purely hopeless on all accounts. This is shown when Carver High School, a populated urban school, was rebranded as a military academy, it forced many kids to move to a nearby neighborhood and attend Fenger High School. Carver and Fenger have a notorious gang rivalry occurring, and not long after the schools were integrated, a teenager named Derrion Albert was brutally beaten to death and the beating was captured on a cell phone to be viewed on Youtube.

James, who made Hoop Dreams, which is often hailed as one of the best pieces of documentary filmmaking ever, lived a full year in Chicago, and witnessed unforeseeable acts of not just despair and ugliness, but also true bravery. Being in the line of gunfire and danger numerous times, and filming highly-graphic footage with true documentarian impunity shows not only devotion but true commitment to a job. The Interrupters was also co-produced by sociologist Alex Kotlowitz, who wrote the popular novel "There Are No Children Here: The Story of Two Boys Growing Up in the Other America," a profoundly eye-opening book on the lives of inner-city children who live in public housing projects.

This is a powerhouse documentary in every sense of the word, emotional, exhilarating, heart-wrenching, and often, very melancholic. It shows that while there's a silver lining of hope reaching the Chicagoland area in terms of a method to eliminate seemingly endless gun violence, it may be too facile to call it a formal "solution" just yet.

NOTE: This review was read before my English class, Junior year in high school, in March 2013.

Very interesting topic and well executed but way too long. I am sure they recorded many more stories as interesting as these that are included but the filmmaker did not include them because the film should not be too long. In my view editing should go further and cut more scenes to make it 80-90 min movie. It would make this film much stronger keeping the essence and prevent viewers from checking their watches. What we get is diluted story and sometimes boring as some scenes are redundant in their message or information. Better editing making this film much shorter would make it much more interesting without scarifying the importance of the story. Overall it is important and interesting documentary.

The problem with gang violence in Chicago hasn't changed much (for better or worse) in decades. In that light, "The Interrupters" can't be considered timely, and it certainly doesn't expose a new and growing problem. But in focusing on a group of dedicated violence interrupters, writer Alex Kotlowitz and documentary filmmaker Steve James ("Hoop Dreams"), stepping away from his usual sports focus, capture the cycle of violence in such a complete way that you can finally start to see how it could in fact end.

CeaseFire is a violence prevention group that largely consists of former convicts and people who have spent time in prison. They dedicate a large portion of their time to being present in the communities where violence strikes and stopping conflicts before they escalate into violence. They also make themselves available as resources and confidants to individuals in need of a calming influence.

Essentially, these interrupters do what the police can't, even though none of the subjects come out and say it directly, nor does James imply it in a heavy-handed fashion. The people in these neighborhoods don't trust the police and fear the police, whereas these interrupters are adult role models who they can relate to/who can relate to them, people they respect.

James chronicles a year from summer through spring, or the most violent time of year to a time of year when hope grows anew. He focuses on the efforts of three violence interrupters and a few of the young people they each reach out to during the course of this year.

The first is Ameena Matthews, daughter of notorious Chicago gang leader Jeff Fort, who at one point became involved in a drug ring. She's easily the most magnetic figure in the film and given that families of violence victims seek her comfort specifically, it says a lot about her strength as a community leader. Throughout the film she delivers powerful and moving speeches suggestive of her strength, but as she works with a loving but emotionally troubled teenager named Caprysha, we learn even she has moments of doubt.

Next is Cobe Williams, more soft spoken, but whose prison time give him a street cred that finds him able to talk to and work with some hostile individuals. His work with a gangbanger named Flamo, who he comes into contact with at a serious boiling point, is one of the more powerful arcs in the film.

Lastly there's Eddie Bocanegra, who does art work with students but spent half his life in prison for murder. His redemption story proves more than any that there's hope for those who make these fatal mistakes.

"The Interrupters" explores the deepest depths and root causes of violence, enough to even the most self-assured pacifist consider reality that is the cycle of violence and that it's not simply a matter of just not letting it be an option. Many of the subjects discuss the role of parents being there or not there and how they are role models whether they want to be or not, as well as how violence has become part of the culture because of the value placed on pride and ego.

Like any great documentary, "The Interrupters" is a conversation starter. Yes, it's edited in a powerful way will elicit emotion, but there are so many discussions worth having based on what the subjects say and do and what we observe. It's really hard to capture the entire spectrum of the conversation on a subject as general as violence, but somehow James manages to do it. And nothing he presents is black and white (not referring to race); if you pay attention through the entire film, you rationally cannot make generalizations about the roots of violence.

There are moments when the film drags a bit as it takes a step back to cover the human interest element of the film, the tragedy of it all. That's important, but its call to action is loud and impossible to ignore, so much so that you want it to continue its search for an answer, or in this case, to see if the work CeaseFire does really makes a difference.

It certainly does. "The Interrupters" proves as much. At the same time, we become so aware of how they can only be in once place at a time. A handful of occasions during the film we hear someone talk about some act of violence unfolding somewhere else right now as the camera is rolling. It's a wake-up call that unless the City of Chicago or the government take an extensive, grass-roots approach to ending violence, there's no way that even these amazing individuals can end it.

~Steven C

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This film takes a year-long look at the work of a group of volunteers trying to reduce murders and violence in inner-city areas of Chicago. They do this by intervening wherever possible, trying to mediate on the streets between those reading to kill over as little as $5 or a perceived slight, cool the anger before it spills over into bloodshed. The majority of the volunteers have a background in the gangs themselves, have served jail time but were able to get out while they still have their lives. The film follows three of the volunteers during a year where the profile of the Chicago murder rate is raised to the national level.

From the director of Hoop Dreams, this film gets right down onto the streets of Chicago and, while the volunteers are dealing with people ready to kill, the camera is right there too – getting good access and surprisingly natural footage from everyone involved. For the most part it is the capturing of this world that makes the film engaging because while many people (particularly on the internet!) would like to pretend they live in tough situations and are ready to turn to violence over nothing, the majority in the western world are not and certainly for me, I appreciated an insight into the world of those who are ready to pick up a knife and stab someone because of a slight on their family. The camera captures a real natural air when situations are at their most flammable and also in the one-on-one chats, but it doesn't quite manage it when there is a group. Sometimes when break-throughs are being made with groups, it does feel a little uncomfortable and I got the sense that the camera was becoming a little bit of an intrusion.

Likewise, although it isn't overdone, the film also uses sentimental music a bit too often over the top of insights or breakthroughs – and it did annoy me a little bit because none of it actually needed this music. None of these things are bad though, just a little negative in terms of impact. This is covered by how good the chosen subjects are – in particular Ameena and Cobe. To my external ears they occasionally sound uncomfortable or odd or even a bit too much like they are saying platitudes and hyperbole, but yet they work and generally their words and attitudes make an impact – even if they don't always make a lasting impact on a person's life (although the goal is always to get through the immediate threat of violence). James makes good use of them and in Ameena he finds someone likable, charming, intelligent and empathetic – she doesn't just "say" what she is doing and feeling, she lives it and it comes out in every word; wisely she is the heart of the film.

Overall The Interrupters is not a perfect film because it does occasionally overdo the sentimentality and gives the subject a sense of worthiness that they may deserve but that the film doesn't benefit from. It also doesn't have much of a sharp investigatory edge, a little of which it could have done with a little bit of, but otherwise the film is engaging and moving thanks to the ground-level access and the force of the personality and bravery of the volunteers focused on.

This is a very important film and a must see for those wanting to affect change, such as grassroots organization, those living in these kinds of neighbours, advocates, gang members, wanna be gang members, kkkops, lawyers, judges, inmates, patrol officers, psychologists, psychiatrists, jail guards, wardens, anyone wanting to understand the roots causes of gang violence, and anyone wanting to live in a better world, etc.

This documentary enables us to understand the problems, conflicts that are a day in day out situation in a neighborhood plagued by violence. Its quite moving to see ex felons and gang leaders working to prevent the youngsters making the same mistakes they did. Violence is like virus and it shows the struggle of few and their persistence to make a difference how ever small it might be. We get to see the trans-formative effect that the group is having on the youth. We get to see and feel the loss experienced by families and friends due to violence. This documentary does not provide answers but sure makes us think deeply about a critical issue. Life is not easy and fair, it teaches us the importance of forgiveness in order to live a peaceful life. An eye for an eye is only going to make the whole world blind.

The Interrupters is frustrating. The three 'violence interrupters' which this film follows must have an endless supply of optimism and an iron will to go out there every day and try and convince people, who mostly are not looking to be convinced, that there are better choices than resorting to violence and revenge. A normal person would give up, probably on the first day, but not the CeaseFire interrupters.

Most of CeaseFire's violence interrupters are ex-cons. This is actually a plus on their job application for a position like this. They know firsthand the consequences and utter futility which comes with choosing the violent option in an argument on the street. Their goal is to intervene in an argument's 'front end' before pistols are drawn from waistbands.

Chicago has drawn national attention for the number of murders which happen on its streets every year, especially involving adolescents. The Interrupters follows a year in the life not just of the CeaseFire organization, but specifically three of their most committed mediators. The most engaging and interesting person by far is Ameena Matthews. She is the daughter of Jeff Fort, one of Chicago's most notorious gangsters, who made mistakes in her youth but is now out in force and ready to get in your face to show you just how wrong a choice violence is. With no fear, Ameena will walk in the middle of a large group of young gangbangers and give them a lecture on just where they are headed. Amazingly, these lectures usually work. You do not want to disappoint Ameena Matthews; she is one of the most persuasive and enigmatic people ever to show up in a documentary.

Her fellow mediators are not as engaging as she is though. Cobe Williams is usually an interesting guy to follow, especially when he is trying to calm down a man known as 'Flamo'. Flamo has a particularly bad day when he first meet him and appears to be 100% ready to charge down the block and start a shooting spree. Cobe listens, nods his head, and then offers to take Flamo out to dinner thereby putting some distance and time between him and his problems. We check in with Flamo every now and then and he provides some segments of comic relief and even some hope.

The third mediator is Eddie Bocanegra. He comes in a distant third on this list of three. Most of the time, he is with the family of a deceased young man who made some poor choices and ended up in a coffin. Eddie strikes up a relationship with the boy's sister and encourages her to draw to deal with her grief. The rest of the time, Eddie leads an art class in a local elementary school to teach the kids who are just a few years away from their prime ages of vulnerability to think through their choices to their logical conclusions. Eddie is never shown actually talking down violent situations like Ameena and Cobe are. He acts as more of a peripheral mediator rather than a down in the mud violence buffer, at least that is how the editing process shows him.

The filmmaker, Steve James (Hoop Dreams), checks in with various at risk youth throughout the year. Some start off in very shaky and turbulent places but steadily pull themselves up and out of the gutter. Others, however, leave you shaking your head at the end acknowledging that there will most likely be many more failures for the mediators than successes. Happy endings really do seem few and far between in the streets of Chicago, even when there are extremely persuasive interrupters who guarantee that if you pull the trigger, you will not win in the end.

I came to see this movie to learn more about the method. Yet one hour in and it's still about the life in a Chicago suburb. Okay. Deceitful advertising. It is not about the method. It is about the neighborhood. I can take that. But beyond exploitation of the pain there is nothing. The only facts come from publicly available video clips. It's about poverty. The government is pouring billions into aid, yet the only ones getting well are the state employees. But the issue of poverty is only blurred in the background. At times the audience catches glimpses of religious leaders leeching on the pain and suffering to scam some more money. They talk the same talk that was heard for two hundred years and more in poor towns. And the violence does not seem to decrease. Yet, the producers don't want to touch that issue either.

Somehow the audience is tricked into believing that the interrupters are picked from the community. But they are all community leaders. People with family and relationships. The upper middle class of the poor side of the city. So again, no help from the outside. Like the producers of this documentary, people come, see and go their own way. And the people stuck in there are left there to deal with the mess.

Bottom line: an amateurish job with fuzzy goals and dubious scene selection.