Stranger Than Fiction: Steve, how did you first come to this subject, and for Ameena and Cobe, what was the first meeting with Steve like. Had you been familiar with his films at all?

Steve James: The film was inspired by my partner on the film, Alex Kotlowitz, a great author who worked as a producer on the film and has been a great friend of mine for many years. He wrote a piece in the New York Times Magazine, a cover story on this organization CeaseFire. Alex and I had been looking for something to do together and this seemed like the perfect project to do. In a deeper sense, for both of us, we both had people that we’d come to know quite well from our other work, with me from Hoop Dreams, who had been lost to the streets. For those of you who’ve seen that film, Arthur Agee’s father, Bo, was murdered some years ago, as was William Gates’s older brother Curtis. To see the devastating effect that those losses had on the families—and they were both very senseless situations—sticks with you. It just seemed like it was a good time to refocus a film on this issue of urban violence. We have a sense that everything’s been done that can be done. New York’s been much more successful at this than Chicago, although Chicago has made great strides. The murder rate in Chicago, I think, is four times that in New York per capita.

STF: What was it like to meet Steve for the first time?

James: Do you even remember?

Ameena Matthews: I do remember. I ran from him, I did. In working with the project and dealing with the serious issues we have going on on our streets, and our high-risk youth—but knowing Alex and seeing the piece that he did, that was pretty cool. But then, when they were talking about bringing cameras and following us for hours at a time—me dealing with media prior to the idea that Steve and Alex had, I was like, this is just going to be another sad, fucked up story about inner city youth. Another black kid dead, nothing’s happening behind it. I didn’t want to have any part of that. I didn’t want to do anything to jeopardize my effectiveness out in the community, with the cameras and white boys and Alex’s police shoes. I ran from them, because the stigma of camera and white man in Englewood, in our ghettos, is that they’re either the police, the Feds, DCFS [Illinois Department of Children and Family Services]—something is about to happen and it’s not going to be good. It took a little while, maybe a couple of days?

James: A couple of days?

Matthews: He says two months, it didn’t seem that long. After just getting to know Steve and Alex personally and meeting their families—well, we didn’t meet their families until later on, but they talked about their families. If I give you something and you give me something back that is impactful emotionally, spiritually, then we can jam. They would talk about their families, and I would talk about mine, and the things they were talking about were very personal. So I decided to move forward, also with some positive reinforcement from my supervisor down at the program telling me to let them in. I did and I’m very pleased and happy that I did, because looking at the documentary from the standpoint of an audience, not as me being an employee, it’s already been so impactful. People want to get involved, not to be a violence interrupter like Cobe and I, but to get involved. And I’m starting to see that. It’s not as big, but we have to start somewhere so I’m grateful for that.

Cobe Williams: [CeaseFire] Director Tio Hardman keep telling us at our meetings every week that they were doing a documentary on CeaseFire. He keep stressing this every week, so I just kept calling them, and they was Johnny on the spot. We sat down first and talked about it so they had an understanding that if they come out to the community and somebody doesn’t want to get filmed then they got to leave, and we’ll stay and do our job to mediate the conflict. I kept calling them everytime somebody called me with a problem or mediation. I walked into a lot of situations where I said, I want to let you all know that if you call me I got my film crew with me. So I kept telling people that over and over. So once Steve and Alex started hanging with me in the community a lot, I said, man, you don’t know who that is? That’s Steve James, he’s the one who did Hoop Dreams. That’s how it opened up. It started working out, and they kept coming, like I said, always on the spot, they were doing some good filming.

STF: Steve, this film is two hours long, and you have a lot of characters that you’re following. It’s a pretty remarkable feat of editing that you’re able to follow as many narrative arcs as you do. Can you talk about how you crafted the narrative, and were there any subjects that you loved, but couldn’t include in the film?

James: Just to answer that one first, there’s this great story on the DVD with Cobe and this kid named Stephan, who was living down the street from Cobe’s grandma in an abandoned home. Cobe tried to reach out to this kid and help him. At one point in time when we were editing it was strung through the film like the other stories. Eventually, with great reluctance, we took it out to shorten the movie and focus it more. We understand it’s a lot to ask of an audience to track three interrupters plus the stories of the people they’re dealing with. For me, we knew early on that it wasn’t going to be the traditional arc of a narrative. It’s always wonderful when you have that strong narrative to hang your film on, it’s a gift to have that. I’ve been fortunate to have that in the past with films. But I think one of the things that’s exciting about this film, creatively for me as a filmmaker and editor, is not having it. And trying to capture organically and preserve organically the nature of what we witnessed in that year on the streets, and find a way to pull you through the film hopefully, that is compelling and interesting. Even though it’s not that strong narrative, it’s a lot of mini-narratives. As filmmakers, the more films you make, you kind of look forward to situations where you might not have everything that you want, and how can you solve it? The solving of those kinds of things, creatively, makes a film more distinctive, more original. You have to find a way. I didn’t feel it was hard in this case because we had such great subjects, such great people and stories. But it was still a creative challenge and a lot of fun.

Audience: Has the film played in Englewood, and how was it received in the community in the Chicago area if so?

Williams: We don’t have a theater in Englewood, but up the street about ten blocks there’s a theater where it stayed about 11 weeks. It played on the West Side where we’ve got a CeaseFire office for 13 weeks. It played downtown at the Gene Siskel for two weeks straight, then it came back a month later for two more weeks. It’s been playing great in Chicago, it’s been playing in a lot of schools in Englewood—high schools, colleges. A lot of people have been responding to it, they’ve been talking about it a lot. And we’ve got a lot of bootlegs in the community. A lot. Five dollars. But the DVD is coming out February 15, and it’s got a lot of extras.

James: In fact, the version that played at Sundance a year ago was 40 minutes longer than this version. You may count yourself as blessed that you didn’t have to sit through that, but there were some great scenes in that version that went away that are in the DVD.

Audience: There were a few spots where you were able to pull people out of their world, allow them to make a change. Do you think they had something in common?

Williams: First of all, we spend a lot of time with these guys, we spend a lot of time with them. You’ve got to spend time if you want to make them change. With Flamo, he reached out to me and said he had a problem. So any time he called me, that meant I got his attention right there. He called me and said he got a situation, and I told him I got the film crew with me. So when I got over there he flipped—who is these white guys right here? I said, I just told you they’re coming with me. He was on 10 really, so charged. I really was like, I ain’t gonna waste my time with him. Sometimes in this job, you want to give up on somebody, but it reminds me not to give up. Steady working with Flamo, it took about five to six months to visit him, take him out of the neighborhood. To really get him thinking about his sisters, his brothers, his kids. Doing this type of work you need to be thinking on your feet all the time. With Lil Mikey the difference was that he had just came home. He had gotten rejected 12 times trying to find a job, he was determined. But he kept saying all the time he was locked up that he wanted to apologize to the people at the barbershop he robbed. That was something he wanted to do. We went to the barbershop about four times to talk to the people, they refused, they didn’t want nothing to do with him. I was ready to give up on it. But Steve and Alex went in without me and said, we’ll leave the cameras out of here, but this is what this young man wants to do. And once Steve and him talked to them, they let him apologize. A lot of these guys want to make a change in their lives, they just need some guidance and some help to get to that next level. It reminds us over and over not to give up on them. Me and Ameena and the whole CeaseFire staff, we don’t judge nobody. We meet them where they’re at and try to take them to the next level.

Matthews: With each conflict or crisis, there’s always a principle. What a principle is, is maybe one or two is the aggressor, that’s the one that stands out to us. We’re gonna grab them by the back of the shirt and say, come here. You just saw Mikey and Flamo, but it’s 150 of Mikeys, Flamos, Capryshas, Stephans that we deal with on a regular basis. They did get lucky to be followed in the documentary, but at the same time, Steve didn’t want to lose you guys with all of the different people. Before they’re ready to go to the outreach workers we need to work with them to change their minds, to really chill on that crisis or conflict. I’m ready to get back to Chicago because I have so much work to do. We deal with so many high-risk youth and their families. Once we deal with the principles, we have to deal with their moms, aunts, uncles—just different things that are going on. Violence is the result of a whole bunch of symptoms going on in their lives. Sometimes they’re not as open to say, ok, I’m open to listening. They may listen and go back and do some dumb shit. As long as they’re calling and answering the phones, and the police haven’t really gotten in—because once the police get in we have to back out. We deal with a whole bunch of youth in which we get to impact how they think about violence, how they react. CeaseFire is, “Stop the Shootings and Killings.” My parents used to tell me, if someone hits you, you hit them back. That’s a form of defense. Now, I have to tell our young youth, if someone hits you, you don’t have to shoot to kill them. They don’t have to die because they hit you. These guys are starting to shoot because someone looked at them the wrong way, put something on Facebook, put something on YouTube.

Audience: Do you think there’s been an escalation in the type of violence we’re seeing? People are going around shooting people like it’s nothing. Something’s changed.

James: I just want to point out one statistic which may make you feel better, which is, nationwide, murders are down in America, in virtually every American city, from the height of the crack epidemic. Back in the early 90s, when it was at its peak, there were twice as many murders in Chicago as there are now. The violence statistically in poor neighborhoods in Chicago is very located. Something like 90 percent of the murders take place in 10 or 12 percent of the neighborhoods. There’s a lot of reasons that those murders have come down, certainly the interrupters’ work is part of that. For good reasons as well as loss of population in Chicago. The black population in Chicago has declined by 17 percent in the last decade, 20,000 less residents in Englewood alone. There’s other reasons for the decline as well.

Audience: Do you feel threatened while you were filming?

James: We never really felt any real threat, I think that was entirely due to these guys. We were with them, and that made a huge difference. I’ve had the experience of shooting in neighborhoods where I go to film and I’m not with an interrupter. I’ve done it enough where I think I’m sensitive to those situations to know how to get people’s permission to allow you to film. I know for a fact if I walked into Englewood without them and got the camera out and started filming indiscriminately, it would not go over very well. And I would never ever get close to the situations we were able to film. So it’s really them, and the trust people have in them. Both their former reputations and their reputations for what they do now that makes a difference. When we’re with them, they see there’s a connection between us. They’re not showing up in these neighborhoods and acting all different because of us. That makes a huge difference. Having said that, there were a few situations that were a little dicey, and they were always looking out for us. Ameena mediated a situation with Alex that had nothing to do with what was going on in the moment, it had to do with a guy that had seen Alex give a speech months earlier that he didn’t like. He was kind of a threatening guy and then Alex showed up in the neighborhood when we were filming, and he zeroed in on Alex and Ameena had to deal with him. With Eddie, we did some filming in his neighborhood of Lil Village with some gang members. After this one really great scene, which is not in the movie because of this, the word got passed down from the top of that gang that they didn’t want us over there filming any more with gang members, and so we didn’t.

[Q&A edited for length and clarity]

The other rule that got passed that you read about that was about the New York Times reviews, the Academy has reminded us that this is an award for movies that are released theatrically and not tv documentaries. They have an award system, it’s called the Emmys. It’s a fine award, many of you might have one. So somebody proposed that the New York Times has a policy of reviewing every single film that opens in New York. You wouldn’t be able to sneak a film in for a week, it’s their policy. It’s not up to the reviewers, it’s not up to the critics, it’s their policy. Every film, big or small, fiction or non-fiction, gets a review. So they added that as one of the benchmarks to make sure they’re honoring theatrically released films instead of tv films. But the big news, I think, is that this is now a much more open, transparent, inclusive, accessible process. And the old days of this are gone.

Moore’s remarks came just moments before he handed the CEH’s top award for Outstanding Achievement in Nonfiction Feature Filmmaking to Steve James for his lauded film THE INTERRUPTERS, which was famously ignored for an Oscar nomination this year. James also scored another award for best direction, marking the first time a film had been honored by both awards in the five-year history of CEH. (We’ll have more complete coverage of the awards in the upcoming January 16 edition of the Monday Memo.) James holds the dubious distinction of being the victim of the Academy’s arguably two most famous doc snubs; he was similarly overlooked for his work on the classic HOOP DREAMS (1994).

Much of the initial attention paid to the Oscar doc kerfuffle focused on the new rule requiring that award contenders be reviewed in either the New York Times or the Los Angeles Times. But filmmakers and others over the past few days have also taken a closer look at the changes being made to the nomination and voting rules.

At the Times’ own Carpetbagger blog, Melena Ryzik got fresh reactions to Moore’s speech and the award changes from filmmakers at the CEH afterparty. The blog later noted that the new rules had officially taken effect on January 12, as decreed by the Academy’s Board of Governors.

A few days earlier, the POV blog expressed concerns that the changes would result in a sort of provincialism favoring the opinions held in L.A. and New York City, shutting out films screening in smaller cities and festivals, both in the U.S. and internationally:

There are stunning and meaningful documentaries being produced at an unprecedented rate, which is the most happy outcome of the digital age—amazing work by ‘outsiders’ who lack the speed dial of the L.A. players but who know how to tell a damned good story. They use cheap camcorders and HDSLRs and other DIY tactics to tell sublime and gripping tales. And there have never been so many channels to distribute them, but the Academy has yet to fully support them.

At the Documentary Channel’s Docblog, Christopher Campbell said that opening up voting to the entire Academy could have the effect of allowing populism to run roughshod over the process, and questioned the accepted hegemony of the Academy Awards as the most highly regarded doc award:

Are the new rules bad for truly independent filmmakers in general? Probably, but that’s par with the rest of the Oscars. And regardless of its supposed prestige, which is still only marked by how much attention we all give it, the Academy Awards are not the only nor the most important of film honors for documentary. Those who really enjoy docs should be and for the most part are paying attention to other sources of acclaim and prominence. It’s not the 20th century anymore. We have more media, more outlets, more options.

The International Documentary Association (IDA) on January 10 issued a statement on the changes, seeking to clarify that not all of the films submitted to its DocuWeeks program were guaranteed acceptance to it. The statement also said the changes “will certainly have an impact on IDA’s DocuWeeks program,” and added that they would be “evaluating that impact over the coming weeks and asking for further information and clarification from the Academy as well as the Los Angeles Times and the New York Times editorial staffs.”

The Washington Post‘s Ann Hornaday snagged an interview with Academy Chief Operating Officer Ric Robertson, who said the changes were proposed, in part, to cut down on the number of films submitted to the Academy that were not made with the intent of being released theatrically.

What everyone seems to be able to agree on is that debate over the changes shows no sign of abating. We’ll all just have to wait until the conclusion of the nomination and voting processes for the 2013 awards, when the new rules take effect, to see how everything shakes out.

As always, anyone with tips or other ideas can send them to .(JavaScript must be enabled to view this email address).

In competition for the Outstanding Achievement in Nonfiction Feature Filmmaking are Clio Bernard’s hybird doc THE ARBOR, about playwright Andrea Dunbar; SENNA, Asif Kapadia’s masterfully edited biopic about the Brazilian race car driver; James Marsh’s investigation of the anthropomorphization of a chimpanzee in PROJECT NIM; POSITION AMONG THE STARS, filmmaker Leonard Retel Helmrich’s third and final installment in his trilogy of films about a poor Indonesian family; Patricio Guzman’s exploration of the Chilean desert NOSTALGIA FOR LIGHT; and Steve James’ film THE INTERRUPTERS, about conflict resolvers working in Chicago neighborhoods beset by violence. Also, directors Bruce Sinofsky and Joe Berlinger are set to become the first recipients of the Hell Yeah Prize (best prize name ever), awarded to the pair for their PARADISE LOST trilogy, which aided in the release of three men wrongfully imprisoned on murder charges. Documentary legend Frederick Wiseman will also receive the 2012 Legacy Award for his 1967 film TITICUT FOLLIES, a stark portrayal of a psychiatric institution in Massachusetts. If you haven’t seen the film, you can catch a screening of TITICUT FOLLIES, followed by a Q&A with Wiseman at a special January 17 screening at Stranger Than Fiction. Get more information and buy tickets here.

The decision by the Academy to stress the importance of newspaper criticism was strangely timely, given that it came on the heels of news that J. Hoberman, longtime critic for the Village Voice, had been laid off on January 4, continuing a wider trend of cutbacks in criticism by newspapers. Mark Asch of The L Magazine has a nice look back at Hoberman’s time at the Voice, as well as a round-up of tributes from various Hoberman fans. Homages were also paid by Jessica Winter of Time.com, and David Carr of the New York Times. Fellow Times writer A.O. Scott also delivered the Voice a smackdown with what we consider to be the tweet of the week: “the Village Voice has been mostly irrelevant for years, EXCEPT for J. Hoberman and a few others. now worth less than its cover price.” (In case you don’t get the joke, the Voice is free. Burn.)

In other awards news, the British Academy of Film and Television Arts (BAFTA) January 6 released the “longlists” (the BAFTA equivalent of an Oscar shortlist) for its awards, including for its newly created documentary award category. Making the cut was SENNA; PROJECT NIM; Wim Wender’s PINA, an homage to dancer choreographer Pina Baush; GEORGE HARRISON: LIVING IN THE MATERIAL WORLD, director Martin Scorsese’s profile of the late Beatle; and Kevin Macdonald’s crowdsourced film LIFE IN A DAY. The longlist is to be winnowed to three nominees on January 17. SENNA also managed to get longlisted in five other categories, including best film; it’ll be interesting to see how it fares against its fictional narrative rivals.

POV has provided a thoughtful list of the 12 small-town documentary film festivals to look forward to in 2012, finally giving us a reason to visit Muskogee, Oklahoma (pop. 38,310). And Jennifer Merin, who covers documentaries at About.com, has posted a useful calendar highlighting some documentary film festivals in the upcoming year. On the immediate horizon is DocPoint - The Helsinki Documentary Festival, which is set to begin January 24 in Finland.

Over at The Atlantic, associate editor Jared Keller profiles 99%: THE OCCUPY WALL STREET COLLABORATIVE FILM, a crowdsourced filmmaking effort being headed by Audrey Ewell and Aaron Aites. Technology has finally made a crowdsourced production feasible, as evidenced by Macdonald’s LIFE IN A DAY. But it remains to be seen if the complications arising from such a model will lead to any kind of widespread adoption by documentary filmmakers in the coming years.

If you’re in New York City, it’s not too late to catch a special U.S. screening of some international shorts programmed by the folks at DOKUFEST, the largest film festival held in Kosavo. The screening is being held TODAY (Monday, January 9) at the Producers Club at 358 West 44th Street, starting at 6 p.m. Best of all, it’s free!

Deadheads rejoiced at news that late Grateful Dead guitarist Jerry Garcia was getting a feature-length doc produced about him, to be helmed by filmmakers Malcolm Leo and John Hartmann. Leo will be building the film around a three-hour interview conducted with Garcia back in 1987. Please continue to stay away from the brown acid.

Now for the shameless plugs. Spring for an STF Winter Season Pass for only $100 ($80 for IFC members), which will get you into nine films (including Wiseman’s TITICUT FOLLIES), a free DVD from Docurama, and free popcorn at screenings. Info and tickets can be found here.

In gustatory news, STF Artistic Director Thom Powers has compiled for the peckish two lists of places to eat convenient to IFC Center, depending on your budget:

For Cheap Eats, check here.

For a Splurge, check here.

As always, anyone with tips or recommendations for the Monday Memo can send them to .(JavaScript must be enabled to view this email address). Have a great week!

Funding will certainly continue to be a challenge in the new year, as the budgets of grantmaking institutions continue to shrink and competition for the available pool of funds ramps up, leaving more filmmakers in search of alternative sources of money. In October of last year, the folks at The D-Word hosted an insightful online conversation (registration required) with filmmaker Jennifer Fox and producer Katherine Nolfi on crowdfunding, detailing techniques they used to raise over $150,000 for a project. Here at Stranger Than Fiction we too have jumped on the crowd-funding bandwagon, and have established a Kickstarter page to draw attention to deserving projects attempting to raise money.

In the waning hours of 2011, the POV staff gave us a rundown of the top documentary stories of the year. In the pole position was the release of the West Memphis Three, a direct result of the efforts of filmmakers Joe Berlinger and Bruce Sinofsky and their PARADISE LOST trilogy about three boys wrongfully convicted of murder.

Also, the Library of Congress in December named 25 films to the National Film Registry. Included on the list was the Drew Associates classic CRISIS (1963), an early example of the direct cinema movement that captured the efforts of President John F. Kennedy and his brother, Attorney General Robert F. Kennedy, to integrate the University of Alabama over the objections of segregationist Governor George Wallace. Also making the cut was Frank Capra’s THE NEGRO SOLDIER (1944), a film intended to encourage blacks to enlist during World War II often grouped with Capra’s “Why We Fight” propaganda films of the same era.

The end of 2011 brought with it a multitude of Year’s Best lists, and the documentary world is no exception. The staff over at POV made an incredibly comprehensive rundown of the year’s top 67 (!) documentaries, drawn from a combination of critic’s lists, festival programming, industry groups and online voting. The number one spot, with a 99% rating on Rotten Tomatoes, went to the universally loved—and confusingly Oscar snubbed—Steve James film THE INTERRUPTERS, about a group of activists dedicated to conflict resolution on the streets of Chicago. (One of these days someone is going to have to explain to me how the Academy comes up with its shortlist.) You can check out POV’s full chart below.

The Best Documentaries of 2011 from POV.

Chicago Sun-Times film critic Roger Ebert also gave THE INTERRUPTERS the number one spot on his year-end list, while the Chicago Tribune paid tribute to one of the film’s subjects, Ameena Matthews, naming her one of the Chicagoans of the Year. Time magazine also credited Matthews with delivering one of the best movie performances of 2011. NPR included THE INTERRUPTERS in its list of the five breakthrough documentaries of the year, where it joined Patricio Guzman’s NOSTALGIA FOR THE LIGHT, Clio Bernard’s hybrid doc THE ARBOR, Asif Kapadia’s biopic SENNA, and Errol Morris’s TABLOID.

If you haven’t gotten a chance to see THE INTERRUPTERS yet, you’re in luck. As a STF pre-Winter Season special, the film is screening Jan. 12 at 8 p.m. at the IFC Center in New York City, to be followed by a Q&A with Steve James. You can buy tickets here.

As another precursor to the Winter Season, STF on Jan. 17 is screening the Frederick Wiseman classic, TITICUT FOLLIES, followed by a Q&A with Wiseman himself. You can get more information on the film and buy tickets here.

On Jan. 31 the STF Winter Season officially kicks off with a screening of GIRL WITH BLACK BALLOONS, a portrait of a reclusive artist living in the storied Chelsea Hotel. Save your hard-earned dollars by purchasing a Winter Season pass, which earns you tickets to ten films, including both pre-season specials, as well as free popcorn and a free DVD from Docurama, all for only $100 ($80 for IFC members).

Following the film, Meehl, producer Julie Goldman, and editor Toby Schimin joined Stranger than Fiction’s Artistic Director Thom Powers for a Q&A.  When asked how she came across Brannaman, Meehl explained, “I went to one of his clinics and I was so amazed that in just a few minutes he could transform an animal.” Meehl, an English rider, laughed as she recalled, “Buck calls himself the lawyer for the horse.”  After attending one of his clinics, she realized there was much more than horse/human relationships being explored. “When I would leave the clinic, there was so much more than just the horse lesson being taught. You start to realize that, once you reflect weeks and months later that he was talking about life and that he was talking about people; your job, your children and I found there was so much to it that America could use meeting this guy, that everyone should meet him.” 

A photographer and fashion designer now happily ensconced in the world of feature film,  Meehl was deliberate in her search to find collaborators once she decided to embark on the project.  “I had a couple of teams that didn’t pan out, they didn’t quite share my vision, I kept searching, knowing what this film should be, how it should look.” Knowing she was a director without a team, a friend set up a lunch where she was introduced to producers Andrea Meditch and Goldman.

“They immediately got it, they loved the project, they got behind it, they just let me go and were extremely supportive, bringing in great people from the cameramen to Toby Schimin, a very brilliant editor. They didn’t think it needed to be a zillion dollars and they saw that it was a feature film,” Meehl said.  Once underway, Brannaman’s gregarious personality and seemingly endless well of aphorisms and horse-sense propels the film easily. “A feel can have one thousand different dimensions” he tells a rapt audience at the round corral, later telling a different audience, “everything you do with a horse is a dance.”