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Description:

Hoop Dreams filmmaker Steve James delivers a moving and surprising story of three individuals who try to protect their Chicago communities from the violence they once employed. Filming over the course of a year, he follows Ameena, Cobe and Eddie as they undergo journeys of hope and redemption during a period marked by high-profile incidents including the brutal beating of high schooler Derrion Albert, whose death was caught on videotape.

The Interrupters documents the year that Chicago emerged as a national symbol for the violence in American cities. It takes viewers into a myriad of troubled communities on Chicago’s South Side described as the “Black Belt,” where gangs like the Gangster Disciples and the Black P Stones reign supreme. There, members of an innovative organization called CeaseFire, an initiative of the Chicago Project for Violence Prevention, treat the spread of violence like scientists treat the spread of infectious diseases: They go after the most infected, and strive to stop the infection at its source.

The Interrupters premiered at the 2011 Sundance Film Festival and has won numerous awards, including “Best Documentary” at the 2012 Independent Spirit Awards. As Boston Globe film critic Wesley Morris noted, “The immediacy and caprice of violence in The Interrupters are just as strong as in nearly every documentary I’ve seen about the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan.”

 Director: Steve James | USA | 2011 | 125 minutes

Free.

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Facing History and Ourselves is proud to partner with the Memphis Brooks Museum of Art in presenting the Upstander Film Series in January 2017. Every Wednesday night, the museum will show a film that celebrates stories of individuals that have embraced the challenge to speak out, stand up for others, and make decisions that help create positive change in our world. Following each screening, Facing History and Ourselves will facilitate a discussion with the audience and the creative minds behind the films.