Ali Bumiaye!! (Ali (DVD))

Member Name: MurphEE

Product:	Ali (DVD)
Date:	26/02/02 (208 review reads)
Rating:

Advantages: Will Smith.

Disadvantages: Overlong fight scenes.

If you like this review?
He’ll go down in two.
This is the movie to see.
Will Smith is Mohammad Ali.


I have been looking forward to this movie since I first heard of it. I was too young to appreciate the phenomenon that was and is Ali. I remember my father talking about the rumble in the jungle and the fact that the split glove saved Ali from what seemed like a certain beating. I knew that Ali was a boxer and that his catchphrase was “I am the greatest”. As kids, we would chant this to our vanquished opponents after a playground scuffle.


But like so many people of my generation I was not aware of much more of the facts of Ali’s life. I had seen him on chat shows and knew that whenever adults talked about boxing comparisons would be made with Ali. When I heard that Will Smith was going to make a movie about Ali my first thought was that he was way too small to make a convincing boxer. How wrong can you be? Physical stature aside, who else could convincingly play Ali? Smith is funny and has a remarkable vocabulary, which he can use to ad lib forever. A friend of mine was staying next door to Smith in Miami a couple of years ago and they regularly played basketball in the evenings. He said that Smith was a riot; he talked incessantly and had perfected an Irish accent within hours. When you think of both men you can see the similarity, both are “in your face” kind of guys. So with the hard decision made how do you go about telling a story that is fast becoming a legend?


The movie covers the ten years in Ali’s life between his first world title and his regaining of that crown in Zaire. The first thing that you will note is how much Will Smith looks like Ali. Looking at the screen you know that it is Smith but at times he is Ali. It is uncanny and should earn Smith a much-deserved Oscar. They have taken this section of Ali’s life because it will be the part that relates w
ell to an American audience but something that they have not captured in the movie is the fact that Ali was a global superstar. Heavyweight boxing at this time was the pinnacle of a sport that enjoyed global popularity. It was far removed from the comic caricature that it has become today.


The director is Michael Mann and the movie looks great and flows with a certain style. The fight scenes are slick and use a combination of third and first person shots that not only puts you in the ring but actually in the line of fire! While the fights are accurate they do tend to go on too long and this takes away from the movie. I know that it is about a boxer but believe me there is a little too much boxing in here. They could have shown us more of the training and back ground to the fights and cut a little of the actual fisticuffs without damaging the end product.


Throughout the telling of the Ali story the big events of black history are woven. We see Malcolm X and Martin Luther King assassinated. We are given an insight into Ali’s connections with the Nation of Islam and his family’s reaction to that connection. His father describes the Nation as “bowtie wearing, Arab talking niggers”. (Note: this is an actual quote and not a word that I would normally use. It is used here to emphasis the fact that Ali was not born a Muslim and that his father in particular had strong feelings on the subject) There is also tension between his second wife Belinda and the Nation even though she is a Muslim. She rightly suspects the Nation of only wanting Ali for his fame and money.


Ali is portrayed as the man that he was. While they stop short of his wilder excesses, his brother once stated that for Ali to stay at a hotel it had to have hot and cold running hookers, we are shown that he was far from the model Muslim. His weakness for women being the most prominent here. It is on record that he beat his first wife but this is no
t shown. He also had little business sense allowing others to control his finances, a decision that cost him countless thousands of dollars.


His fight against the US government is well covered and shows a man who stood up for his ideals. It is here that we see the true Ali. He rightly stated that he had no quarrel with the Viet Cong. This is especially poignant at the moment when the motto in the US is United We Stand (sometimes). Many black people watching this movie will understand that not much has changed since Ali took his stand. A black child has a much higher chance of being born into poverty than a white child in the world’s most powerful nation. Ali believed in the ideals of the Nation, that black people needed to live their own lives and that they had the right to do so. They should be free to do this without intervention from whites or those who would seek to promote only Christianity as a way of life. You have to understand that these ideals split black society at this time. Christians were suspicious of the Nation and some would argue that the reason for this was the underlying belief in a strong black brotherhood that supported each other without the need for charity or help from whites.


Above all he was a brilliant boxer and this shines through in the fight scenes. There is none of the Rocky style stuff here but actual round by round recreation of what actually happened. Smith looks and carries himself like a professional boxer and there is never a moment when you disbelieve that he might be what he is portraying. My dad actually got to meet Ali at a sparring session in the US later in his career. Afterwards, the audience were allowed to ask questions. My dad asked who had hit Ali the hardest, expecting the famous quote about Cooper shaking his ancestors back in Africa. Ali replied that his first wife had hurt him most.


The performances are what make this movie. You can argue that Mann was not the corre
ct choice for a biographical piece and I would agree, but you cannot argue with Will Smith. He should surely take the Oscar for this performance; he not only looks and sounds like Ali but he even has the mannerisms. A truly epic performance from an actor who was, until now, best known for wise cracking action/comedy roles.


Jon Voight is Howard Cosell, the ABC TV sports anchor man. Not that you would know who it was by looking at the screen. They have made him look exactly like the man he portrays and both actors superbly play the relationship between the two men. Cosell liked and admired Ali off camera while keeping up a running battle of words with him while the camera was rolling.


Jamie Foxx plays Bundini Brown the inspiration in the Ali corner. Brown was supposedly sent by God to provide inspiration for Ali. He ended up selling his title belt for $500 to feed his booze habit during the lean years when Ali was not fighting due to the draft affair. Foxx is a stand up comic and shows here that acting is another of his strengths.


Look out for the young Don King, before he went grey. A real treat for those of us who thought that Don had only just arrived on the scene. Belinda neatly sums up his contribution to the rumble in the jungle when she states that King talks black, dresses white and thinks green!


The movie is a little long and it does wander off course at times but Will Smith is excellent as Ali. You will be enthralled. It is a pity that the direction was not a little tighter; at times it gets a little flabby (like some of the opponents that are rolled out to fight Audley Harrison). There is a message in Ali’s life and times and it is one that resonates with people now as much as it did then. Go see this movie, and try to take away a little of the message. Ali Bumiaye!

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