The Interrupters

The stubborn, persistence of violence in our urban centers is both troubling and perplexing.  And Chicago has been at the epicenter, particularly with the recent brutal beating of a Chicago Public School student caught on videotape. As Tio Hardiman of the group CeaseFire asks: "Why the madness?"

THE INTERRUPTERS tells the story of a group of men and women in Chicago – most of whom are in their 40s and 50s, most of them former gang leaders who have been privy to, if not participants in the brutality of the streets. They now work for CeaseFire, and they have a singular mission: to interrupt the flow of violence. The program is the brainchild of epidemiologist Gary Slutkin, who for ten years battled infectious diseases in Africa.   Slutkin believes that the spread of violence mimics that of infectious diseases like tuberculosis and AIDS.  Therefore the treatment should be similar: go after the most infected, and stop the infection at its source.  He’s recognized that most street violence is caused by tit-for-tat retaliation or retribution for personal slights. 

The Interrupters, whose reputations command respect in their neighborhoods (in public health terms they’re thought of as “credible messengers”), intervene in disputes before they turn violent.  The film follows them on the streets as they deal with potentially explosive situations – everything from a stolen watch that threatens to become a shooting to a funeral where young men in bulletproof vests prepare to defend against a retaliation to the beating death of Derrion Albert.  The Interrupters go about their work with a combination of bravado, humility and even humor. Their work is fraught with moral quandaries, as they walk a precipitous line: stepping between adversaries (sometimes people they know) to make peace, keeping the police at arms length and resisting the lure of the streets which gave them their reputations. 

From acclaimed director Steve James (Hoop Dreams, Stevie) and bestselling author Alex Kotlowitz (There Are No Children Here, The Other Side of the River) in partnership with ITVS, Frontline, and Rise Films, THE INTERRUPTERS is an unusually intimate and provocative journey into the debilitating effects of the thousands of shootings each year in our urban centers. This is a film that goes to the center of “the madness,” in an attempt to grapple with the causes of the violence, and more importantly with how we might best defuse it.