Movies: Steve James

Two boys escape from slavery, spend a year in a rehabilitation shelter, and eventually reunite with their families. Meanwhile, the man who rescued them launches another mission to liberate more children....

When a thriving, top-ranked African American elementary school is threatened to be replaced by a new high school favoring the community’s wealthier residents, parents, students and educators fight for the elementary school’s survival....

The New Americans follows a diverse group of immigrants and refugees as they leave their home and families behind and learn what it means to be new Americans in the 21st century....

Declining participation leads two Milwaukee area high schools—one black and urban, the other white and suburban—to combine their football programs. Tensions rise as the disparities between the two schools become increasingly apparent over the course ...

Why is minimum wage important? In 2013, Seattle became ground zero for the heated national debate about increasing the minimum wage to $15 per hour. "The Value of Work" gives voice to supporters and the opponents, including the mayor, an activist cit...

In 1995 Director Steve James (Hoop Dreams) returned to rural Southern Illinois to reconnect with Stevie Fielding, a troubled young boy he had been an 'Advocate Big Brother' to ten years earlier....

A documentary about neighborhood people creating change. Produced for the MacArthur Foundation by Kartemquin Films, this piece features six vignettes on community organizing in different Chicago neighborhoods: LeClaire Courts, Marquette Park, Roselan...

This forty-minute program was produced by the Criterion Collection in 2014...

An investigation of the wrongful death of Carlos DeLuna, who was executed in Texas on December 7, 1989, after prosecutors ignored evidence inculpating a man, who bragged to friends about committing the crimes of which DeLuna was convicted....