When We Were Kings is justly praised. Telling the story of the 1974 heavyweight title fight in Zaire between challenger Muhammad Ali and champion George Foreman, the legendary "Rumble in the Jungle," the film is way beyond the quality and substance of other boxing documentaries. Then again, it is not really about boxing. At its core, it tells one of the oldest stories, that of the power of the mind to work its will upon oneself and upon others, and how to use fear to overcome fear. Along the way, it touches on race, music, capitalism, dictatorship, voodoo and spectacle. It’s a thrilling documentary.

Muhammad Ali is the star of the film, and he carries it like any great Hollywood leading man of old. He dominates every scene he is in, and he hovers over the few scenes in which he does not appear like the answer to an unasked question. Everyone else is secondary, and has to be. The deed the film describes--Ali’s knockout of Foreman to reclaim the heavyweight crown he had won 10 years earlier, against almost everyone’s expectations--will permit no sharing of the stage.

Fight

Ali’s victory stands as the greatest single performance in boxing history, and one of the most enduring underdog tales in sports. He defeated a man seven years his junior, who entered the ring undefeated. Foreman had the greatest knockout percentage among heavyweight champions, and his punches had reduced Ali’s great nemesis, Joe Frazier, to something like a little boy.

Ali won by using a defensive technique he had first learned from Archie Moore called the tortoise shell. While backed against the ropes, the boxer covers his face and uses his arms and elbows to protect his midsection, allowing the opponent to hit him. Done properly, the tortoise shell provides a breather while wearing down the opponent, who expends precious energy trying to penetrate it. Ali employed the technique to perfection against the thunderous punches of Foreman until the younger man was following him around the ring like a ghost. His punches had lost their power. Finally, just when an exhausted Foreman was starting to follow after him lazily, Ali moved off the ropes and threw a lightning combination that dropped the big man to the canvas for the full count. Ali re-christened the tortoise shell the "Rope-a-Dope," and another page of his legend was written. To willingly take shots from a fighter like Foreman, and then dismantle him, all the while talking in his ear, was profound stuff. The victory was somehow more complete than if Ali had won by dancing and moving, which had been his stated intention.

When We Were Kings presents highlights from the fight along with commentary from Norman Mailer and George Plimpton, who were at ringside. Their contributions to the film are a model for the judicious use of talking heads in documentaries. Mailer is wonderful discussing Foreman’s prowess in training and Ali’s use of the right hand lead during the fight, a dangerous punch that no one had expected him to use. Plimpton describes how a witch doctor had informed Ali that a succubus, "a woman with trembling hands," would get to Foreman before the fight and weaken him. Plimpton suddenly remembers this during the epic fifth round, and as Foreman is stunned by an Ali combination, he shouts to Mailer, "the succubus has got him!" The succubus got Foreman for good in the eighth round.

Ali’s victory was the nail in the coffin to his detractors. Those who still clung to the notion that he was not a legitimate gladiator, that his dancing style was dishonorable and that he was more concerned with self-preservation than fighting, were forced to concede that he was a fighter through and through. And those who still resented Ali for his avoidance of the draft and defiance of the U.S. government had to admit that, whatever their differences, there was something winning about the man. The bitterness from the 1960s slowly began to fade and Ali’s own persona evolved from fire-breathing rebel to comic hero. He eventually became, to borrow a phrase from Auden, "a whole climate of opinion." The film captures one of the crucial final stages in that process.

Kings

The film is not as much about the fight as it is about the Ali Phenomenon, in particular his racial appeal. "When We Were Kings" refers to Africa’s storied past, the consciousness of which Ali taps into repeatedly in turning what seems like an entire continent against Foreman. Interviews with Zaireians help explain Ali’s popularity, his Vietnam stand and battle with the government being the most prominent factors. Foreman doesn’t help his cause by arriving in Zaire with a menacing German shepherd, reminding natives of the Belgians and their police dogs. Even unexpected circumstances tend to work in Ali’s favor. When the fight is postponed because of a cut suffered by Foreman, Ali uses the extra time to solidify his bond with the people of Zaire. The film captures irresistible scenes of Ali playing among the children and villagers, dancing, joking, throwing punches into the air, rapping ceaselessly about God, race, and the destruction of George Foreman. He spends much of his time working himself into a state of impervious self-confidence. If he is afraid of Foreman, if he has any doubts, they do not show. The man who conquered the unconquerable Sonny Liston has been down this road before.

Joining Ali in creating this African celebration is the boxing newcomer Don King, who brings not only the fight to Zaire but also a black superstar concert featuring B.B. King, James Brown, the Spinners, and others. "The champions are here," King says, referring to the stars of the sports and entertainments worlds. "We are coming back [to Africa] in an aura of splendor and scintillating glory."

Even in this early incarnation, King is already peddling his counterfeit brand of racial consciousness. He holds court with Brown and music promoter Lloyd Price, quoting Jesse Jackson in one breath, Shakespeare in another, mesmerizing his listeners, black and white. Price is so infatuated he calls King "the Messiah," and speaks of him with the raving, bug-eyed mannerisms of the true acolyte. In another scene, Plimpton swallows whole King’s assurances that some of the proceeds from the fight will go to "a number of people rather than just a few." You can almost hear King thinking to himself, "White liberals are easy."

The final piece in the African equation is Mobutu, the unelected "president" of Zaire, who Mailer compares to Joseph Stalin. The comparison is apt, as Mobutu seems determined to run all the best plays from the totalitarian playbook, including mass executions and quasi-religious ceremonies in his honor. If the fighters have any qualms about all this, they do not say, and they can’t be blamed for staying quiet. Ironically, the film’s release coincided almost exactly with the end of Mobutu’s long and bloody grip on his country, which was renamed Congo after his departure.

Loomings

Call me what you will, but When We Were Kings disturbs me.

I saw the film when it came out in 1997. I was struck by Ali’s ability to reach out across the years and appeal to the audience, many of whom were barely born when the fight took place. The theater crowd reacted to the fight footage as if they were watching a live bout, and perhaps they were. They were all for Ali, and when he triumphed, it was Indiana Jones, Luke Skywalker and Superman all put together. And none of those guys are real, or black.

In part, Ali appeals to us because he is appealing--he's funny, he’s charming, he’s attractive, he’s fighting a man who is supposed to kill him, and so on. But he also appeals to us because the film is set up to ensure that he does. When We Were Kings is hagiography, plain and simple, and while hagiography is a venerable form, it is a limited one. It leaves a curious unease, a sense of incompleteness. Underneath the joy, excitement and wonder of When We Were Kings, darker stories lurk.

The main characters in the film--Ali, Foreman, Mobutu, King--are figures about whom nary a modest word is ever uttered. All portraits are wildly out of proportion. Foreman is the most powerful puncher in millennia, the terminator, "Negritude" itself, according to Mailer. Mobutu is Joseph Stalin and "Jehovah" (another gem from Mailer). Don King is the Messiah. And Ali is Ali, which is gigantic enough, but for good measure Bundini Brown calls him a "prophet" and a "fisherman for Elijah Muhammad." The Zaireans view Ali as something of a messenger as well.

Every culture has its demagogues. Currently, Africa is overrun by murderous strongmen in the Mobutu mold, while in America the black community’s most prominent political voices continue to be charlatans (Jesse Jackson), ambulance chasers (Al Sharpton) and hate preachers (Louis Farrakhan), all of them with charisma to burn. When We Were Kings celebrates a moment when the eyes of the world were upon Africa, and the principals of the drama were all black men. Unfortunately, I counted at least three demagogues among them--Mobutu, King, and Muhammad Ali.

Ali’s is a soft demagoguery. It is mostly composed of charm, but it also mingles cruelty, thoughtlessness and egomania. All of these qualities are essential to making Ali what he is, and for the most part, the world is better off for having had him. Joe Frazier and a few other opponents who bore the brunt of his vicious insults would disagree with that assessment, but every man spills some blood on the tracks. The problem is, Ali cultivates in his fans and followers the kind of messianic devotion that is inseparable from demagogic power. He is there to be worshipped, not analyzed.

George Plimpton ends the film by saying, "What a fighter he was. And what a man." In one sense, the second sentence is totally redundant, because any great fighter is by definition a remarkable man. Plimpton, though, is really saying, "What a great fighter he was. And what a great man." But Ali was not a great man, either in his personal behavior or in his accomplishments outside of boxing. Greatness in more than one field is given to very few, and sainthood in personal behavior is given to almost none. Why bother pretending otherwise for Ali’s sake? Why construct this mighty idol?

Don King’s demagoguery is harder, composed of estimable charm and even erudition, but avaricious to the core. The angle here, as it has been for much of King’s career, is racial essentialism and solidarity: a hallmark of the demagogue, the appeal to primordial blood loyalties. It’s disheartening to see James Brown cheering on King’s rap in the film. One wonders if King can find a way to steal from a musician the way he steals from fighters. With his gift for distortion, anything is possible.

Finally, there is Mobutu, whose demagoguery is charmless and deadly. The dictator no longer needs charm. He only needs guns and death, and Mobutu has plenty of both.

The film does identify King and Mobutu for what they are. Ali, safely ensconced in the hagiographic portrait, appears as something of an antidote. In truth, he bears a closer connection to them than the film realizes.

The three men--three kings--represent a continuum of demagoguery, from idol to swindler to murderer. Making this connection has nothing to do with liking or disliking Ali. Rather, it merely illustrates that the road of idol worship leads to the palace of Mobutu. Even the most benign forms of adulation represent a surrender of our capacity for skepticism. When that happens, we start down the path best described by Chief Joseph: "The end of living and the beginning of survival."

Silence

The film’s subtitle is "The Untold Story of the Rumble in the Jungle." But it is really another re-telling of a now familiar Ali story. The film crystallizes the culture’s verdict on Ali and closes the sale, perhaps once and for all. It’s a shame, though, because the real untold story of Ali would be even more fascinating. It would retain the fabulous heroism of Ali in the boxing ring, and dispense with the messianic elements. It would say little of gods or kings. It would focus on men, it would live within a mass of contradictions and disappointments.

It would do the best it could to be honest.




Recommended:
Yes

Viewing Format: VHS
Video Occasion: Good for Groups
Suitability For Children: Suitable for Children Age 13 and Older