The Interrupters: Stopping street violence, one incident at a time.

In the year 2009, the city of Chicago was in the national focus due to the acts of violence which were happening on the streets.  42 children were killed due to senseless violence during this period and most notably was that of Darrion Albert.  I distinctly remember this very summer as nearly every weekend I was seeing a story about another youth which was killed in the streets due to violent actions.

That summer, film maker Steve James (Hoop Dreams, At the Death House Door) was in Chicago following the organization Cease Fire's violence interrupters as they worked on the streets of Chicago.  Following Armeena Mathews, Cobe Williams, and Eddie Bocanegra, James paints a picture of a city gripped by violence with people fighting back against the violence through education and understanding.

Recently aired on the PBS program Frontline, "The Interrupters" has opened the nation's eyes once again to violent crime, while showing a revolutionary way in dealing with violence in the streets.  That very summer, Mayor Richard Daley began toying with the option of seeing if the National Guard could help curb the violence which was taking place in the street.  Had our cities' streets become war-zones in need of citizen soldiers patrolling neighborhoods?  CeaseFire's direct approach to violence intervention was able to show a dying art in the world of policing where getting to know and understand the people of a beat helps reduce violent crime because there is a sense of community between law enforcement and citizens which has been lost in recent years.

As we go through the weeks, we meet various people who have been affected by violent crime.  We visit a family who lost a son through gun violence and the grief which it caused, but finding hope in the boy's sister to takes to her brother joy of painting as a way to deal with the pain.  We see the family of Darrion Albert being consoled by members of CeaseFire, helping them cope with the tragic loss of their son.  We also get a chance to sit in on a boy returning from jail, apologizing to the people in which he held up in a local barber shop and the forgiveness which he hopes for his foolish actions.

While we witness the pain and suffering of a city, we also see hope through the very people which walk its streets every day making a difference in the lives of people they interact with.  As someone who hopes to be teaching within Chicago schools in the very near future, I could not have felt more proud of the city, and the people which inhabit the numerous neighborhoods of the city.  While being intense at times due to the films subject matter, "The Interrupters" sends a message that things can get better if we search for the root causes of violence which plague many of our cities.  Force is met with force, while for most people, a true friend and someone who will listen to their problems can help mediate many of these violent events before they occur.

[from ChicagoMag.com]

So many kids today, growing up in these neighborhoods, have very few heroes and role models to look up to.  The music stars and athletes have come to preaching tales about being violent is the only way to be a true man, or the only way to survive in these areas, creating a vicious cycle of violence which is so hard to break.  While we cannot deny that the root of these problems goes back for generations, and more recently economics have made the situation worse, we can find hope and inspiration in these people working to make their neighborhoods better places to live.

If you are looking for a true to life tale of the state of the urban world in America, look no further than "The Interrupters".  I could barely think of a moment while watching this documentary I would either be in tears of pain for the lives lost, screaming in rage at what choices some people were making, or in tears again in knowing that things will get better with more people like Armeena, Cobe, and Eddie being role models for children searching for a better life.

My grade = A

Watch the trailer: