CultureCritic interviews The Interrupters director Steve James...

American documentary filmmaker Steve James is perhaps best known for his 1994 epic Hoop Dreams, following two Chicago-based teenage NBA hopefuls in their attempts to leave their behind underprivileged upbringings and make it big. For his new documentary The Interrupters James returns to his native Chicago, teaming up with writer Alex Kotlowitz to document the workings of Ceasefire, a remarkable organization of ‘vigilante' crime-stoppers dedicated to preventing violence in the city. We spoke to him about earning trust, what he chose to show and Chicago 30 years on..

How did this project come about?

My partner on the film, producer Alex Kotlowitz, wrote an article about Ceasefire that focused on some of the interrupters. I called him and said, "This would make a great documentary". Urban violence has been this persistent issue in Chicago, and many American cities, for so long, it felt like it had been pushed to the backburner in the public consciousness. We both felt it was a good time to put it back on the agenda.

Do you think the national media are guilty of ignoring this issue?

I don't think the media are guilty of ignoring it; they're often guilty of focusing on the wrong aspects of it. There's a lot of hand-wringing and moralising but few deep attempts to understand.

Was gaining trust hard when entering this community, one that you didn't belong to?

I'm always amazed at how open people in different communities are. The fact that we were with interrupters who had that trust already, and because they trusted us, spoke well of us and seemed at ease with us, that made a big difference. People also want to have their stories told. If they understand you're there, not just to titillate an audience with how awful things look, but to truly try and understand something, they're more inclined to cooperate.

How did you deal with possibility that you might film something incriminating (the scene in which we meet Flamo for instance)?

The interrupters had to clear the filming in advance with the people concerned. We even said that, if afterwards, anyone decided they didn't want us to use it, that would be ok, which gave them a sense of control, and made them more inclined to go along with it.

In the case of Flamo, Cobe told him about us in advance, but then about 20 seconds into the filming he looked at me and say "who the fuck are you?" - he'd been drinking and forgot. But we vetted the film editorially with lawyers; we weren't worried that we were going to get subpoenaed. If Flamo had gone off and killed somebody, that would have different. Thank God he didn't.

You filmed for 14 months and amassed 300 hours of footage. How did you go about editing the film? I always torture myself over that; we had a lot of great material. At one point we thought it would make a great mini-series, but there is something great about plunging you into this in a single sitting.

Is it tempting to impose some sort of narrative or conclusion?

There is a temptation to make it more analytical. Even some of the great reviews are saying "I wish they did more socio-political analysis." We talked about it, but ultimately decided we wanted you as a viewer to wrestle with some of this more - we didn't want to have things laid out. Frankly, it's always been an approach of mine. I rarely, if ever, put experts in films. I'm much more interested in the people who are living in the situation, and their analysis.

There's a powerful moment in which Lil' Mickey returns to a barbershop that he had held up years before. You also attend a funeral. Were you ever conscious of invading with a film crew on people's grief?

I felt it more in the funeral scene, that was very uncomfortable to film. I tried to be as unobtrusive as possible.  The Lil' Mickey scene almost didn't happen. The barbershop were skeptical, especially when they found out there was filming involved. What convinced the owner was me saying, "this kid has wanted to do this ever since he went off to prison. If we are the problem, then we won't film, but you should let him do this."

It's interesting when you think about documentary films in those kinds of moments. How would that have happened if we hadn't been there? I suspect that the mother [in the barbershop] would have said all that she said in some fashion, but that we were there could have meant she felt ‘I'm not just speaking to this kid, I'm speaking to a lot of other people'. That can be a good thing.

Why did you choose to focus on Ameena, Cobe and Eddie? Was it a conscious choice?

We knew from the get-go that Ameena was someone we wanted to follow - she's one of the few women that do this work and her father was this infamous gang leader. It took a while to win her trust enough though. We weren't thinking of Cobe at all, but at the weekly film meetings, the programme creator Tio Hardiman woud say, ‘these guys are looking for mediations, we're cooperating with them, I want you guys to help them'. And Cobe took him at his word; he started calling us.

We tried following one other interrupter and shot quite a bit of his backstory and family, but we kept waiting for him to get us into a mediation, and it never happened.

Obviously, the stories for the people in your films don't end when the credits roll. Do you keep in contact with those you meet and document?

Absolutely. We wanted the viewer to have the sense that life's going on, and we  didn't want to tie things up clearly at the end. Flamo still has that job, Capricia did get her High School diploma, in prison, then came out, then got in some more trouble and went back in. Now she's out again. So she's still one step forward, two steps back.

You've said that The Interrupters feels like a homecoming, due to its Chicago setting. Do you see the film as related to Hoop Dreams?

Hoop Dreams was about the same issues in many ways, but was achieved in a different way. Basketball became this fleeting American dream for these kids as a way of escape from what too many families feel locked in to. The same issues of race, class and lack of opportunity are very much alive in The Interrupters. We started filming Hoop Dreams 24 years ago and the reality for a lot of the families in these communities has not changed. There have been improvements, but there are also more boarded-up houses, more vacant lots and more people without jobs than there were in 1987.

What do you think you've learned as a documentary filmmaker since then?

A lot, I hope. I'm sure Hoop Dreams will be the film that gets mentioned in my obituary. I hope they mention a few others. But I feel I've grown as a filmmaker and I'm proud of this film. Making this was just as moving and eye-opening.

The Interrupters is out now, read the latest reviews here.

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