Colibel Terrible acting, screenplay and direction.

ChampDavSlim The acting is good, and the firecracker script has some excellent ideas.

filippaberry84 I think this is a new genre that they're all sort of working their way through it and haven't got all the kinks worked out yet but it's a genre that works for me.

Jerrie It's a good bad... and worth a popcorn matinée. While it's easy to lament what could have been...

SnoopyStyle It's 1974 Zaire. President Mobutu Sese Seko and Don King organize the Heavyweight championship fight between the 32 year old challenger Muhammed Ali and the much younger murderous champion George Foreman. Ali is assumed to be pass his prime and the definitive underdog. It is the "Rumble in the Jungle". It's also suppose to have a music festival featuring James Brown and B.B. King.Muhammed Ali's charisma is undeniable. This movie soaks in all of his charms and power. I wouldn't say the documentary gets behind his overwhelming persona but the audience gets a small glimpse. This is simply Ali in the greatest of his greatness. I also love the music.

calvinnme If such an event as the Foreman/Ali fight occurred today, this film would probably not be such a big deal. That is because we would have pretty much round the clock cable coverage of the event courtesy ESPN. However, given that this fight occurred in 1974, this is the closest thing you are going to get to the kind of coverage you would see if that event was held today. In spite of the reversal of fortune that this fight gave to both Foreman and Ali's careers, this film really does not focus on either one of these individual fighters that much. Instead, it gives you a real feel for the excitement surrounding the fight overall, with significant commentary by George Plimpton and Norman Mailer, who were both there to cover the event.Of course there are segments on Foreman and Ali, and at the end, after the segment on the fight itself, there is basically a tribute to Ali both through his words and then through a series of still shots showing highlights of his life and career. However, I also learned quite a bit about Don King, the guy who made the fight happen, and how this event helped him "break out of the pack" when it came to managing fights and fighters. However, there is no romanticizing of the man. They mention both his strong points - his incredible intellect and that he always seemed to have a quotation from Shakespeare for ever occasion - and his weaknesses, mainly that he was "amoral in his handling of the individual fighters' careers". These are the film's words, not mine. Interviews and footage of the fighters and their staff preparing both physically and mentally for the big "rumble in the jungle" are skillfully interspersed with footage of the sportswriters of the 70's marking up copy and working old-fashioned teletypes back in the age before computers were common, along with film of the inhabitants of Zaire going about their daily life often balancing huge baskets on their heads, and also shots of the live entertainment going on including some great footage of B.B. King and James Brown. Also included is a little bit of explanation as to why the people of Zaire found Ali so endearing versus George Foreman. They said they found Ali to come across as "a real person". Apparently the fact that Foreman was so monosyllabic most of the time did not help his image overseas.The footage of the fight itself is very good considering it was shot in 1974. Mailer and Plimpton do a great job of explaining everything that is going on at each phase of the fight, including trying to get inside Ali's head as to what he might have been thinking as he employed first one strategy and then another against his mountain of an opponent.The film does mention that losing to Ali threw Foreman into a two year depression, and when he emerged he reinvented himself to the point that, as Norman Mailer says in the film, "you would be hard pressed to find someone more affable than George Foreman is today." The postscript on Ali is interesting too. Mailer mentions that after this fight, Ali went on to fight 22 times, and all of these additional fights ruined his health. Mailer mentions that it is often said that you wind up destroying the thing you love, but in Ali's case it was the thing he loved that ultimately destroyed him, or at least his physical health.This is a very good and complete portrait of a unique sports event and the very interesting people involved. You don't have to be a boxing fan to enjoy it. If you enjoy a good tale about the triumph of an underdog, the intersection of two very different cultures, and anecdotes about some of the more interesting sports figures of the 20th century, you'll like this film. I highly recommend it.

protek22 'When We Were Kings', is one of those rare cinematic treats, that occurs when a good filmmaker latches on to an epic tale in the making. Just about everyone at the time, expected Foreman to demolish Ali, as he had done to both, Joe Frazier and Ken Norton. To many, Ali was washed up, and just asking for the whipping of his life! George Foreman up until then, had proved to be such a consummate destroyer of quality heavyweights, the dread of Ali's impending defeat, was noticeable in the commentary of both George Plimpton, and Norman Mailer. This enhanced the drama and foreboding, of this classic struggle, romantically set in the Central African nation of Zaire. Epic tales of course require epic figures, and through it all, Ali commands center stage. We see him at the height of his powers, charming, witty, and above all, revealing the immense champion's heart, that made him "The Greatest"! 'When We Were Kings' beautifully captures the epic boxing story, known as the 'Rumble in the Jungle'!

vincent-27 This is a pretty documentary of the legendary fight between Muhammad Ali and George Foreman in 1974. Apparently a lot of this footage has been lost for over 20 years and there is some good stuff, good performances by James Brown and of course a lot of Ali talking his jive and poetry, and some of it is pretty good "yesterday I hospitalized a brick, i'm so mean I make medicine sick". Ali is mesmerizing, I was born in 1970 so I missed the whole Ali phenom, he was just a vague idea of somebody important, like Evel Knievel and Farah Fawcett. Lately I've become very interested in this guy, I guess because the legend has passed and Ali is more of a distant memory, the hype has died down and you can study the real man. I think a lot of the sports writers at the time had a romanticized view of boxing, it is not a pleasant sport, it's too men beating the hell out of each other. Now there is some skill involved and Ali proved that you can win brains and will power as well as brawn, but they seemed almost amazed that a black man would stand up and say he was the greatest, and when he said that you knew he meant of EVERYBODY, black or white. I think that's what annoyed them the most, he wasn't the quiet humble lap dog they wanted from a black athlete who just did his job, thanked everyone and shut the hell up.Sorry, my reviews tend to wander. Ali truly showed has smart he was and Foreman was oblivious to how he was being played. Ali realized during his build up to the Norton fight that having a psychological edge was as important as a physical one. Telling everyone you're the greatest has two effects, if builds yourself up and it frustrates your opponent. It's one thing to see a man boast that he's a scientist, it's another thing to see him actually deliver on the promise, and it is a wondrous thing to behold. Also, the fact that monsoon rains held off until 20 minutes after the fight finished, what a story! My major complaint with this film is that there a lot of Norman Mailer telling slightly exaggerated tales of the fight and Plimpton pompous pontificating (two men who probably never got into a fight their whole lives) but very little of the actual fight. Did they lose some footage? I would have liked to have seen some more rounds of Ali getting pounded on. I'm amazed he could take that punishment, considering what Foreman did to the punching bag. But in the end he fell right into Ali's trap and the fight ended in one of the biggest upsets in boxing history.