Steve James

Known for DirectingBorn 1958-03-08 (age 68)Hampton, Virginia, USA

Steve James is an American film producer and director of several documentaries, including the award-winning Hoop Dreams and Stevie. He is also the director of the 1997 feature film Prefontaine. His newest film, The Interrupters, a portrayal of a year inside the lives of former gang members in Chicago who now intervene in violent conflicts, will be released in 2011 after premiering at the Sundance Film Festival. The film is his sixth feature length collaboration with his long-time filmmaking home, the non-profit Chicago production studio Kartemquin Films, and is also his fifth feature to be accepted into the Sundance Film Festival. He is a graduate of Southern Illinois University Carbondale, studying with Charles Harpole. His work, he tells journalist Robert K. Elder in an interview for The Film That Changed My Life, was strongly influenced by the film Harlan County, USA. There’ve been many documentaries over the years that have powerfully impacted me. I think this one came along at the time when I was more interested in being a feature filmmaker than a documentary filmmaker. So it came along at the beginning of a process of moving from an interest in feature film to documentaries, and that’s where my career has taken me. It came along at the right time for me. It helped me see, “Ah, this is more what I want to do.” Steve James also pulls influence from the original definition of the term cinema verite as it applies to the Rouch/Morin method of filmmaking. Just as with Rouch and Morin, the “people on camera and we in the audience are continually reminded that a film is being made, that we are watching a film.” We are reminded of this through James’ presence on screen as well as his cinematic editing techniques, in order to obtain, what he believes is a more accurate depiction of truth.Read more

Movies & web series

Grassroots Chicago

America to Me

Let the Little Light Shine

In the Family

City So Real

Minding the Gap

Life Itself

30 for 30

Storyville

Hoop Dreams

These Amazing Shadows

Edith+Eddie

Reel Paradise

Heartbeats

We the Economy: 20 Short Films You Can't Afford to Miss

No Crossover: The Trial of Allen Iverson

Stevie

Head Games

The Interrupters

Abacus: Small Enough to Jail

The Rescue List

Prefontaine

A Compassionate Spy

Life After Hoop Dreams

Passing Glory

At the Death House Door

The Featherweight

Joe and Max

The Luckiest Guy in the World

Messwood

Focus Forward: Short Films, Big Ideas

The New Americans

Higher Goals

The Tenant

The Value of Work