BEFORE: After that whole film on the "Rumble in the Jungle", I'm doing a deep dive into the whole career of Muhammad Ali who carries over (along with MANY others) via the magic of archive footage. Technically, this is a "miniseries" and not a movie, because HBO is airing it in two parts, but I've made exceptions for this sort of thing before, like HBO's other documentaries on Elvis Presley and the Michael Jackson scandal. I get it, with a run time of nearly three hours, this probably needed to be cut into two parts for airing - some people won't invest three hours in watching a movie but they'll binge-watch a 10 part series if the episodes are 30 minutes each. Weird, right?
THE PLOT: One of the most iconic figures in athletic history, Muhammad Ali's incredible story from world champion boxer to aspiring social activist is explored through his own voice and never-before-seen archival material.
AFTER: If you just go by the numbers, which this documentary tends to do, Ali was one of the most successful boxers in history, starting with a gold medal at the 1960 Olympics for boxing in the light heavyweight division, then four years later beating Sonny Liston to win the world heavyweight championship, and so on. The film keeps a visual tally on the screen of Ali's fight record, which I think gets up to 56 wins and only 2 losses at one point. You might think that's so much winning that you, as a viewer, might get tired of winning, and you'd be right to think that. How many times can we see the pattern repeat itself - Ali has a match, Ali wins the match, Ali's record increases by one. Repeat as necessary. One notable reviewer said this film "never bogs down in repetitiveness" however I disagree, it's repetitive as hell.
But it's the 2 losses that then become the most interesting, because they stand out. And the timing of the losses in the documentary means that Episode 1 is able to show the time that Ali stripped of his title after refusing to register for the draft, and his attempt to bow out of possible military service in Vietnam. Of course this allows inclusion of Ali's plans for a potential comeback, and he opens his own training facility in rural Pennsylvania, which includes a sparring ring inside some kind of log cabin. But even after getting his boxing license reinstated by the Atlanta Athletic Commission, and then a federal court case that forced the New York State Boxing Commission to do the same, Ali still had to contend with Joe Frazier, who became the heavyweight champion during Ali's absence from the sport. The first title match between Ali & Frazier (there would be at least two more, down the road) was called "The Fight of the Century", and was held in Madison Square Garden in March of 1971, and (spoiler alert) Frazier won. It turned out the nascent "rope-a-dope" strategy was no match for a powerful left hook.
So in Episode 2 we get to see Ali battling his way back, through Jerry Quarry, Floyd Patterson and Bob Foster, and getting his jaw broken by Ken Norton in the second loss of his career. Despite considering retirement (again), Ali beat Norton in their second match, setting up the rematch with Joe Frazier, who had recently lost his title to George Foreman. And you guessed it, I've circled back to the "Rumble in the Jungle", as detailed in yesterday's film. I suppose it's logical that if Ali had lost to Frazier, and Frazier had lost to Foreman, logically everyone was expecting Ali to lose to Foreman - but boxing is not a logical sport, I guess. But that's why Ali came in as an underdog, and winning the Rumble was considered an upset. And 1 BILLION people watched it happen.
After that, Ali fought Chuck Wepner, Ron Lyle and Joe Bugner, so it's back to the prepared sequence of win after win, then Ali vs. Frazier 3, which was the "Thrilla in Manila". But then Ali started struggling in fights in 1976, Cosell noted that he's never seen Ali so off in his timing, and talk of Ali's retirement began again. Ali was notably out of shape when it came time to fight the up-and-coming Leon Spinks in 1978 (I didn't follow boxing back then, I was busy being 10 years old) and Ali lost to Spinks but won the rematch 7 months later, making Ali the first heavyweight boxer to win the championship belt three times - what is this, wrestling?
Ali, once again, announced his retirement in 1979, but came back yet again to face his old sparring partner, Larry Holmes, to try to become a four-time champion. But by this time Ali was struggling with trembling hands and stuttering - the Mayo Clinic declared him fit to fight, but clearly this was the beginning of the end. Holmes easily dominated Ali, Ali started racking up more losses, and his last fight was in the Bahamas in December of 1981.
Notably, this film doesn't get into Muhammad Ali's personal life, and it turns out there's a reason for that - he was married four times and had nine children, most of whom you haven't heard about. Laila Ali, of course, but her mother was Ali's third wife. And he kind of married one other woman in an Islamic ceremony that wasn't officially recognized. So, umm, are we counting that marriage, or not? The man also had a large number of affairs, and I suppose all this goes counter to the squeaky-clean, religious image that he projected to the public. There were other people along the way claiming to be Ali's children, plus there were palimony suits and sexual assault suits.
This omitted information, though, might help to explain why Ali started talking about retirement when he was 25, and then didn't get around to it until he was nearly 40. Kids, wives, girlfriends and lawsuits are expensive, or maybe he just got used to a lavish lifestyle, despite the appearance of living in a remote Pennsylvania cabin. Ali claimed to be "broke" shortly after winning at the Olympics, but then once he started boxing professionally the paydays kept getting bigger and bigger, with a $10 million purse for the Rumble in the Jungle. Sure, Ali did a lot of charity work, and reportedly gave housing money to homeless people, but, umm, where did all the rest of the money go? And why couldn't he, just, you know, STOP before his financial troubles got out of hand? Maybe he had to tithe some money to the Nation of Islam.
And then there's that montage at the end, which shows the older Muhammad Ali traveling the world and meeting with Pope John Paul II, Nelson Mandela, Fidel Castro and Saddam Hussein. Umm, there are some mixed messages there, don't cha think? I get that he was trying to negotiate the release of American hostages, but being photographed with Saddam just isn't a good look.
"What's My Name" was released in 2019, and then Ken Burns released a longer, four-part docuseries "Muhammad Ali" on PBS in 2021. But Burns started working on his project back in 2016, so I'm guessing he was pissed when Antoine Fuqua finished "What's My Name" two years before his doc was ready. For me, this is six documentaries down, and I think 19 to go.
Also starring Drew Bundini Brown, Odessa Clay, Howard Cosell, Angelo Dundee, George Foreman, Joe Frazier, Larry Holmes, Don King, Sonny Liston, Ken Norton (all carrying over from "When We Were Kings"), Kareem Abdul-Jabbar (last seen in "Glass Onion"), Steve Allen (last seen in "The Super Bob Einstein Movie"), Count Basie, Oscar Bonavena, Ed Bradley (last seen in "The One and Only Dick Gregory"), Jim Brown (last seen in "100 Rifles"), Joe Bugner, Jimmy Carter (last seen in "The Automat"), Fidel Castro (last seen in "Becoming Cousteau"), Dick Cavett (last seen in "Street Gang: How We Got to Sesame Street"), Jack Paar (ditto), Bill Clinton (last seen in "Venus and Serena"), Martin Luther King (ditto), Malcolm X (ditto), Sam Cooke, Bill Cosby (last seen in "Sammy Davis Jr.: I've Gotta Be Me"), Rocky Marciano (ditto), Ossie Davis (last seen in "Malcolm X"), Joe Louis (ditto), Sammy Davis Jr., (last seen in "Listening to Kenny G"), Merv Griffin (ditto), Arsenio Hall (ditto), Yank Durham, Aretha Franklin (last seen in "Dean Martin: King of Cool"), Sugar Ray Robinson (ditto), Nikki Giovanni, Jackie Gleason (last seen in "Mr. Warmth - The Don Rickles Project"), Pope John Paul II (ditto), Berry Gordy (last seen in "Summer of Soul"), Dinah Shore (ditto), Gorgeous George, Dustin Hoffman (last seen in "Mr. Saturday Night"), Saddam Hussein (last seen in "Equilibrium"), Lyndon Johnson (last seen in "Breslin and Hamill: Deadline Artists"), Robert F. Kennedy (ditto), Richard Nixon (ditto), Jackie Robinson (ditto), Sugar Ray Leonard, Nelson Mandela (last seen in "Mandela: Long Walk to Freedom"), Joe E. Martin, Elijah Muhammad, Tip O'Neill, Floyd Patterson, Tony Perez, Jerry Quarry, Ronald Reagan (last seen in "Weird: The Al Yankovic Story"), Diana Ross (last seen in "Under the Volcano"), Bill Russell, Earnie Shavers, Leon Spinks, Ernie Terrell, Mike Tyson (last seen in "Let's Go to Prison"), Jersey Joe Walcott, Chuck Wepner,
RATING: 5 out of 10 unanimous decisions
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