After making the rounds of the festivals and a brief run in a few theaters this past summer, “Facing Ali,” a different kind of fight biopic, makes it to TV tonight.
And to paraphrase Muhammad Ali himself — “it’s almost the greatest.”
What makes “Facing Ali” different is that it’s told neither from Ali’s nor the filmmaker’s points of view, but from the points of view of the men who faced Ali in the ring — and how facing the self-proclaimed, self-fulfilling-prophesy maker affected their lives.
The boxers interviewed for the film (and in old clips) include legendary opponents Ken Norton, Joe Frazier, Ernie Shavers, Leon Spinks, George Foreman, Sonny Liston, George Chuvalo and Sir Henry Cooper. (Yes, in England, old champs don’t end up in an old age home, they end up — or at least Cooper did — with a knighthood and a grand home!)
The stories they tell are so fascinating and the aging boxers are so articulate that you will be riveted. And the stories ain’t all as pretty as Ali’s face.
Chuvalo, for example, talks openly about his belief that Liston took a dive in a match against Ali. “I think he was afraid of the Black Muslims, and I voiced my opinion about it,” he says.
There is a horrible story about how the manager of one of Ali’s opponents was beaten nearly to death, and ended up so damaged that he died “in the loony bin.”
The fighters talk about the former Cassius Clay’s conversion to Islam with its accompanying name change, as well as his stance against the Vietnam War.
Clips show the gorgeous Ali saying, “Why should I and other Negroes go 10,000 miles away from home here in America to drop bombs on other brown people who’ve never done anything to us?”
In the 1960s, this stance — if you were a black man rather than a white student of privilege — did not go down well, and the boxers talk about what it was like to see Ali go from icon to false idol — and the hatred that ensued.
But this is more than a retelling of the things fans already know, it’s a telling by those who not only took a punch from Ali but tried to give as good as they got — and how their lives were forever altered by their shot at the champ.
If you’re a boxing fan, don’t even think about missing it.