Quartile rating: 7.5/10 · 1 rating
It's 1974. Muhammad Ali is 32 and thought by many to be past his prime. George Foreman is ten years younger and the heavyweight champion of the world. Promoter Don King wants to make a name for himself and offers both fighters five million dollars apiece to fight one another, and when they accept, King has only to come up with the money. He finds a willing backer in Mobutu Sese Suko, the dictator of Zaire, and the "Rumble in the Jungle" is set, including a musical festival featuring some of America's top black performers, like James Brown and B.B. King.
When We Were Kings is a landmark sports documentary capturing the mythic 'Rumble in the Jungle' fight between Muhammad Ali and George Foreman in Zaire, 1974. The 'plot' — really the unfolding of real events — is extraordinary: Ali's rope-a-dope strategy, the political backdrop of Mobutu's Zaire, the accompanying music festival, and the underdog narrative all converge brilliantly. The film features remarkable archival footage and interviews with Norman Mailer and George Plimpton adding literary texture, functioning as 'acting' in the documentary sense — Ali himself is a magnetic, charismatic presence unlike anyone else captured on film. Cinematography is solid but constrained by the limitations of 1974 documentary filmmaking, with some uneven archival footage quality. Novelty is exceptionally high — the film is utterly singular in its subject, its cultural moment, and its layered examination of race, sport, African identity, and political power; there is truly nothing quite like it. The ending, culminating in Ali's stunning eighth-round knockout of Foreman, delivers one of cinema's great climactic payoffs, made all the more powerful because it's real.