4/5
Bonded By Blood.
'If Beale Street Could Talk' Oscar winner Regina King gave us 'One Night In Miami' last year before hosting the Academy Awards in a bubbled Union Station to start this one. The incredible actor turned director showing more substance beneath the beautiful South Beach setting adapted from the stage. She played out to us a critical and pivotal moment in American and Black History...behind closed doors. One hotel room. Four icons. The soul stirring Sam Cooke. The football hero Jim Brown. And Muhammed Ali and Malcolm X. X's Hampton House Miami motel room was the invite. Boxer Muhammad Ali-then Cassius Clay-had just shook up the world that ate their words. Shocking and beating Sonny Liston to become the Heavyweight Champion of the World. The same man who had thrown his Olympic Gold Medal in the river after being refused entry to a restaurant due to the color of his skin was now holding court at the bar like people in protest with all his brothers around him. Civil Rights activist Malcolm X taking candid Canon photos from behind the bar like he was tending it. Someone else taking perfect pictures of the pair musing over ice cream and what not with what looked like millions of men around them that they both influenced with all their inspiration. When they were King's like Martin Luther or John F. Kennedy and Bobby, leading in social and political commentary for these a-changin' times like Dylan, we don't know what went on behind closed doors like Regina's fantastic fictionalised account of what all this Miami heat led to in 'One Night' to remember like no other. But before a friendship was fractured, X was assassinated, Muhammad stripped of his title and right to fight for refusing to do so in the Vietnam war (making a solidarity stand because "no Vietcong ever called" him a world I'll never say), all before coming back and taking it back during father time. Decades before Ali succumbed to the one opponent he couldn't beat, Parkinson's Disease-but boy did he go twelve rounds with it-eventually passing away in a 2016 were we lost Ali, Prince and Bowie and got nothing but Brexit and Trump (you could literally feel the world change for the worse). Years before right now were both men will live in legendary memory...always. All before all this you can feel the palpable camaraderie of these photographs. Oh to be a fly on the wall in that hotel room.
Netflix have another story to tell in the same year they gave us a big documentary about the Notorious B.I.G. And this one could rival the thrilling 'Quincy', last years 'Who Killed Malcolm X' deep-dive series, or the remastered classic of 'The Two Killings Of Sam Cooke' in all it revelation, hurt and heart. You can see in the Michael Mann movie when Sam Cooke joined Ali on the same canvas he left Liston of as Ali proclaimed before their night in the hotel, "I'm the greatest boxer in the world and he's the greatest singer in the world", as we marvelled at these two heroic talents in South Beach. Malcolm X however was backstage not allowed to be seen at the fight, despite his support. You can see it in the undeniable yet underrated biopic starring no other to match the charm of the greatest Will Smith (who may finally get his award due when he serves up the 'King Richard' father of Venus and Serena Williams this fall), with a subtle, but incredible portrayal by Mario Van Peebles. This doc like Spike Lee's 'Malcolm X' movie starring an iconic Denzel Washington attempts to shed more light on the situation. A situation that led to what you can see in the 'Ali' movie when Will's Muhammed tells Mario's Malcolm, "you should have never quarrelled with the honourable Elijah Muhammad". And that was all she wrote. From some literal animated moments of documentation, to testimony from both Malcolm and Muhammed's family (to see how alike Ali's brother Rahman is to Muhammed is both beautiful and heartbreaking as the moment he breaks down after saying he can't wait to see and "hug and kiss" his brother again), this documentary delves and details it all. Civil Rights Activist Al Sharpton and many people involved with the Nation of Islam give their accounts to this 90 minute documentary based on the brilliant book by Johnny Smith and Randy Roberts. As far as we know (or more aptly knew until now), Malcolm and Muhammed were fond friends just like their family and their extended feeling of that brotherhood. They loved each other deeply and held their head high proudly. Refusing to hunch their back in the face of a racist world that hosed them down, even when they marched in their millions. One that made men and women drink from different fountains and ride at the back of the bus until the 'First Lady Of Civil Rights', Rosa Parks changed all that. Like MLK or JFK they were instrumental in changing the world, but instead of waiting for their turn. They kicked in the door notoriously and paved the way for others to have their seat at the table. Do you think you would be sitting with the friends and extended family you have from all over the world, sharing in beautiful cultures and ways of life without people like these two? One things for sure it would have taken a hell of a lot longer than the men who made everything move faster like the second-time Ali beat Liston in a rematch that didn't make it past the first minute, let alone the first round. But then it all changed.
Anger like Marvin Gaye once sang was prevelant like sadly it is today in a world were everyone asked what's going on? Why leaders were gunned down in the light of day with no justice or peace brought to the same. Ali hurt to the core by the pictures of a mutilated Emmett Till (respect to actor Taye Diggs for all his work these days, still searching for justice for Emmett) wanted to change the world (he did) he shook up. Malcolm-who refused to turn the other cheek-leaning more towards Martin's non-violent, peaceful protest before violence brutally and tragically took both of them. Becoming less radicalised in his last years, when Malcolm Little was a young man he witnessed a racist murder himself that would never leave his mind and fuel his fire. The killing of his father. White supremacists dragged his Dad onto cable car tracks and waited for a carriage to kill him. It's little wonder both young men grew up wanting to avenge racism, no matter what it took. By all means necessary. But following his exile from the Nation of Islam after rightfully questioning some of the Elijah Muhammed's controversial contradictions Muhammed had to choose between the nation and his friend. Later he learnt that that was the wrong choice as he severed ties with the organisation that did the same to him once he was stripped of his title and license to box after refusing to fight in the Vietnam war...not dodging the draft like some Presidents who want to make a mockery of war heroes like Senator John McCain (just to give some subtext to this subliminal message, Donald Trump said of John McCain, "I like my war heroes who don't get caught." John who survived torture as a prisoner of war, could have been set free, but bravely rejected a deal by his captors that would have put his father and country at a disadvantage. Now that's a hero...that's a hero). Only "letting" the King of the world practice Islam again when he was back on the throne ("I never stopped" he replied). Reconnecting with X's family and expressing his deepest regret in losing his friendship with Malcolm. Its a sobering end to a story that soared and floated with the soul of a butterfly, before life stung like a bee. And this real and raw, relevatory documentary paints the imperfect picture in all its broad strokes. Like Springsteen once sang, "We stood side by side each one fighting for the other/And we said until we died we'd always be blood brothers". Blood will always be thicker than water under the bridge. One may have been burnt, but at the pearly gates in the kingdom of heaven you know these two late, great men will be brothers again. TIM DAVID HARVEY.
Further Filming: 'When We Were Kings', 'Who Killed Malcolm X', 'The Two Killings Of Sam Cooke'.
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