The Rewatchables - ‘Ali’ With Bill Simmons, Chris Ryan, and Van Lathan

Episode Date: July 7, 2026

The Rewatchables ain't easy. The Rewatchables is real. And real… is a mother-fucker. Bill, Chris, and Van revisit Michael Mann’s 2001 film ‘Ali’ starring Will Smith, Jamie Foxx, and Jon Voight. Producers: Craig Horlbeck, Chia Hao Tat, Eduardo Ocampo, and Matt Pevic Try ZipRecruiter FOR FREE at https://ziprecruiter.com/REWATCHABLES Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

The rewatchables is brought to by the Ringer Podcast Network where you can find higher learning. Yeah. And Midnight Boys. Don't forget it. And Ringer Tailgate. Going crazy right now. Yeah.

It's going crazy? Yeah, man. Jeff Kessler coming on. Kessler was nuts. We're having so much fun. We talked about Stacey Dash and Ben Carson on the last episode. Damn. CR, the watch.

And then you're doing beautiful pod on Adam Friedland's podcast. Yeah, and talk to Thrones. Pop on big picture and Talk to Thrones. Yeah. Still Thrones, same show? We go backwards. Are we in the 1,200s? Yeah, we're moving slightly forward, yeah.

The Viking era? It is the Viking era. It's the Norwegian national team. Erling Holland's showing up. Yeah. We're going to do a movie called Ali, directed by Michael Mann, who is about to take, I think,

the lead in the director rankings, or at least tied for the race. As he should be. Our guy, Michael Mann, Ali, is next. All right, guys. Ali, a movie that we all love, that's super flawed, and we all love it anyway. And it came out 25 years ago this fall,

starring Will Smith, directed by our guy, Michael Mann. Sports biopics. So there's the biopics about the guys that weren't super-duper famous. Cinderella Man, Rudy. Raging Bull, Lomata was famous, but not famous, famous. King Richard, C. Biscuit, Chairs of Fire. Rush. Really good one.

Borg versus McEnroe. Then you have like the Itanya, the rookie blindside, those types. Give the Disney ones like 42 and race and radio. The biggest athletes, I think they've ever tried to do this with, pre Fontaine and Ali, right? Where there was like the myth around the person almost made it like, oh, you can't do a movie about them. They're too famous.

And they do this with Ali. and it mostly works, right? It's the closest thing that they'll ever have to. We're never going to do better than this. Yes, yes. Yeah. The pre-Fontaine thing was interesting because they released two pre-Fontaine movies

within like two years of each other. Yeah. The better one was without limits, which is a really great movie. Good movie, yeah, really good movie. That's Crudup. Cruddle. So it's Crud and Leto, right?

Yeah. Credible one is great. The little one is watchable. Neither one of them are bad. But I actually didn't know who Steve Prefonte, Tane was before that movie came out. It was like a blind spot.

Whereas Ali was the most famous athlete of the 20th century. Which hangs over the movie. Ali had his own biopic, obviously, that he had started in. And then a couple of years before this movie came out, when We're King's comes out. And which was like this really penetrating look into Ali versus Foreman. And that heightened my expectations for this movie, I think. I think that documentary affected a lot of people the way they went to the movie. I think that's the best sports documentary ever made.

Really? I do. No hoop dress. Hoop Dreams? Whoop Dreams is paralyzing me. Hoop Dreams for a degree of difficulty, yes. Yeah. When we were Kings, I think, the perfect sports documentary.

Do you consider, would you put Last Dance in there? I mean, Last Dance is 10 episodes. Sure. So that's almost like a docu series. I don't think that could be a documentary. When We Were Kings is just like, if you want to, I mean, this is kind of what this movie tries to do, too. If you want to kind of capture how charismatic, lovable, fascinating, galvanizing

Ali was. That probably does the best job. I think the film actually follows documentary structure in some ways. Obviously it follows documentary sensibility style-wise. Man making all these efforts to really recreate moments. And yeah,

it's completely stylized the way all Michael Man stuff is, but like he's out there with lipstick cameras. I mean, like in the middle of the night shooting digitally with Will Smith running through neighborhoods. You know what I mean? So it's like it's as real as it can get,

but it feels almost like a doc in its narrative style in that they have so much to cover that they're just like, we're going to do away with the arc of a character in a lot of ways and just show these crucial moments. But it makes sense how they do it.

I agree with what you said, where they're just like, this is about him winning the title, losing it and getting it back. Yes. Right? They didn't try to do the... And it's about his political awakening,

which I think is... But it's about those 10 years and then they try to go in all this other stuff The problem I had is this either should have been, and I love this movie, and I've watched it a bunch of times, but it's flawed. This either could have been an hour, 45,

or like 10 hours. Right, yeah. You know what I mean? Because we're bringing in all of his female relationships. We're bringing in Islam in a real way, and Malcolm X and all of these other themes that I think you need. But it's also like, we, I mean, this is the weakest link of the movie.

We just moved three years. We go from 1971. to 1974. We're like painstakingly going through all these things. And all of a sudden it's like, I mean, he had 13 fights during that stretch. Yeah. He got his jaw broken by Norton. All these things happen and they just kind of skip ahead.

I think that there's a, the Ebert, we'll get to Robert, Roger Eberon on this, but in his review of the movie, I think is the thing that bothered people the most about the film. is that this movie treats Muhammad Ali in a way that he's not remembered culturally. Hmm. Like, and... Well, way more serious and reflecting than... Right. And like, when you read Roger Ebert's review,

what he essentially says is that, like, Ali was fun. I hung out with Ali, and Ali was quippy, and Ali was, like, quick, and he was that. And when we talk about Muhammad Ali, even when people talk about, you know, all the political trials that he went through in his life, they talk about him in this way that he could put, a smile on it. He did it all with this tremendous flare and twinkle in his eye. A twinkle in his eye. This movie kind of explores that being part performance. And I do not think that people responded

to that very well. Like there's a version of Ali and like, even like somebody like Martin Luther King Jr. You get a Santa Claus version of Martin Luther King Jr. when he's talked about historically. But if you ever really dug into his life, it was very stressful, anxiety written. And in a lot of ways, pain. One of the fascinating aspects of guys, and there's probably only like half a dozen that I can think of where it's like Tiger, Jordan, Ali, these people who wind up becoming almost like some icon

doesn't even feel like enough of a word for them is that the relationship you have to them as like a younger person or as like a fan changes once you find out more about the context of like what made them who they are. So it's like my understanding of Jordan is like, he's the best basketball player in the world he's the most famous athlete in the world he's in the cartoons

he's selling sneakers like he's delightful and now my attitude about him is like almost like a tragedy where he's tortured by competitiveness and like what happened to his father and throughout his life is just like carrying around this millstone of a chip on his shoulder

about every single slight he's ever experienced so that these guys can contain multitudes and I just think man decided in some ways, like, it would have been better if he had called the movie, like, the political awakening of Muhammad Ali or something like that. Like, you know, that would not have...

I have some stuff about that for later. He basically said he thinks it's a movie about defiance. Yeah. Yeah. And so Ali's my favorite athlete ever. I mean, like, for real. Like, I loved him. And when I was five years old, six years old,

I started watching him on Wide World of Sports because he was on all the time. And that was like, basically his weekly window. and he would just go on when he didn't even have fights. There was a joy and a curiosity and like a fun about him. That even as his skills. From Boston, you were like, oh, I just, that's a black person. You would turn on.

You should have no. You're like, wow, dad, look. You told I read about those in school. I would see black people on the NBA. I know. No. But the thing is, you wouldn't know when he was going to be on Wild Road or sports. So you would turn it on on Saturday

or, you know, it was usually Saturdays. Sometimes I'd have special shows, but it would be like, I hope I'll he's on. And then he would come on and it wasn't even like, he didn't even have a fight. He would just come on to make fun of Jim McKay or Howard Roselle. But he had, and that's what I think when we were King's captures, like you just see him moving through Zaire,

and he's just so curious. He just wants to connect with everybody. And I don't think the movie totally captured it. There's one specific saying that I will never forget I'm pretty sure it's from when we were kings. They do it in this movie. They recreate it from that documentary or maybe our earlier documentary. But when Ali is flying to Africa and he sees a cockpit full...

Right, with the pilots. Yeah. That's in the doc. In the documentary, Ali is beaming with pride. Like, he's beaming with pride and he's using that to teach. And what makes Muhammad Ali who he is? is as a speaker and as a personality comes through, they approximated in this,

and it just doesn't quite feel the same. Yeah. But I appreciate the movie for going for it. The movie is trying to show you just how small and big Ali's world was at the same time. That's why I think it's a win, because I think this could have gone badly in so many ways. That quality we're talking about with Ali, the only person I've seen in real life who has it is

Charles Barkley. Oh. Like, I've watched him do it. And he's like that all the time. It doesn't matter what situation he is. He's genuinely curious. He connects with people. He's funny.

Like, just enjoys life and enjoys intersecting with everybody. And everybody said that's what Ali was like. Like, it didn't matter where he was. And the movie hits it a couple times. Like, they have that scene when he goes to meet Joe Morton at the diner. And then he leaves and he goes outside and he runs into like the four people. And he starts. It's like,

I'm going to come see you next fight and he's like, you better get there early. So it taps into it, but I feel like Michael Mann's interpretation of Ali was just kind of darker

than how I think Ali actually was. So it depends on how you want to read the movie. Do you want to read the movie as a sports biopic where you're evaluating it on its rendition of real life events? Do you want to read the movie

as a Will Smith movie, which is a movie star vehicle and as an act of him immersing himself in this character and transforming his body, do you want to read it as a Michael Mann movie? And if you read it as a Michael Man movie, the closest partner it has, many people have commented on this,

is not like an original thought by me, but the closest partner it has is the insider. Which he had just made right before them. And it is about a guy being subsumed by things that no matter how big he is, are larger than him. Right? And it's about the government

and religion and all these institutions trying to suppress him, weighing down on him, trying to hold him back in his evolution as a human being, that's what's interesting to man about this movie. You know what I mean?

And you can see from, like, honestly, what is maybe the best 20 minutes that man's ever put together and maybe, I put it up against almost any other filmmakers, 20 minutes, is that the opening 20 minutes of this movie

are a, Which is the reason it's rewatchable. Symphony. Yeah. It covers like 18 different aspects of American life and does so in a way where your head is spinning around by the time he knocks out. It's almost like that's why he wanted to make the movie and then he tried to figure out the rest. It really, when you watch the open, you start to think like you're thinking, is this going to be one of the best movies? By the way, I still feel that way in 2026 when I watch it.

You watch it and it's like Sam Cook is going, Ali is going, things are happening. Malcolm X is speaking. Malcolm X is speaking. It's moving. We're going backwards on a bus. There's Emmett Till and now we're going forward again. Right. You're like, what the hell is going on?

And the energy of that, he almost sets the movie up with that energy and then he slows it way down. I mean, it's unsustainable. You couldn't do it, right? He says, I want to get into like the finer points. I want the viscera of Ali all over me. But I'll say this, though, I think this movie is also him talking about, man, I mean, talking about what he believes Ali was. Like, he's actually trying to. It's a theory.

talking, they don't want to believe that Muhammad Ali wasn't like that. They don't want to believe that he wasn't on all the time. They don't want to believe that the government and his family, his own personal peccadillos, like, whether or not he could be a good, they don't want to believe that that stuff weighed on him because it kind of ruins their fairy tale about him. And man posits that the actual man is actually more interesting than the fairy tale. You even could have gone, like what you said about Jordan. Ali, I've probably read, I've read every Ali.

book, every Sports Illustrated, I've seen every documentary, every book, like name it, I've consumed it because I loved Ali. Ali was like a pretty mean-spirited guy sometimes. Like the shit he did to Frazier was brutal. And that was one of those things

because I loved Ali and as I got older, Mark Kramer wrote a great book about it called Ghosts of Manila. And he's just like, what Ali did to Frasier was fucked up, you know? The fact that Fraser was helping him and the fact that they had a, and then he tried to present, he tried to push Frazier as he's the he's the uncle Tom

I'm on this side he's on that side he's corporate right Frazier was like Frazier was like dude I was I'm trying to give you yeah Frazier hated his guts to the bitter end like that's what led to Manila where Frazier's like we're fighting to the death now I hate you this much like both

neither of us will ever be the same after this fight because of what you've done for me the last to me the last five years but Ali was a little like Jordan, like pretty could really get mean. Like, yeah. And left like a left like wreckage in his week. Like that stuff he did to Floyd Patterson and Cleveland Williams and then and then Terrell, which the movie hits, where he's so mad that they don't say his name. Like he, he tortured Floyd Patterson.

He keeps Floyd Patterson up for like an extra four rounds. Jesus. So he can like keep eating the shit out of him. As an aside, I don't know what you guys' version of this would be. I'll just ask, what is this athlete is in the prime of who they are, they are unbeatable, the best they've ever been. Just disappearing? No, no, no, not disappearing.

Just in any sport for you. Like, if you wanted to show athletic, dominance and excellence, what would you show? I would show Ali against Cleveland Williams. It, bar none, it's not even close. A lethal, 215-pound killing machine. The way he breaks him down, if you, that fight is. Cleveland Williams was good. That fight is on YouTube.

Watch how, watch him feel it. So you're asking for like a single game. Like a single game. He'd be like Jordan against the 93 sons. Right. Like, but if you watch, he comes out first half of the, half of the first round feels him out. And then he's got, I got him. And he just starts this beautiful symphony of destruction.

Yeah, there's, there's, it's not for me. It's hard for me to pick, like, individual games. There's like swaths of Bo Jackson or Michael Vic. and especially Bonds where you're like this is going out like it doesn't matter and you know

that's it bonds is mentality at that point where he was like there's just nothing you can do to beat me Brady second half Super Bowl Falcons No come on

five straight touchdown drives all the two points yeah but I mean Ollie is he's the best heavyweight ever I would put the Cleveland Williams fight give me every other heavyweight he's winning there's nobody there's no one at that weight you can put in the ring

with him and they're going to beat him. He's the most charismatic athlete we've ever had. He was in the running for most handsome. I mean, Ali was beautiful. Everybody loved him. Everyone was attracted to him. He's probably the richest. Would you say he is the richest subject for sports writing ever?

The sport. He seduced all those sports writers. Like lipsites in the movie, right? He would hang out with all them, especially when they were in Afcroft because Forma got hurt. And Ali had like an extra six weeks with all those guys. like Norman Mailers down there. Or maybe he was in Manila, one of the,

the two times when he was in locations like that, and he would spend real time with them, and they would write the most flattered. Like, they fucking loved him. Dick Schap, all these people. He just knew how to play the game. But it goes back to the Barkley thing I mentioned. Like, he genuinely was like that.

He liked being around whoever. He didn't like being alone. That's why some of the stuff in this movie, I'm like, I just feel like Holly was around people more. The thing is that this- He's constantly around people in this movie. Well, there's times when he's, like, alone and so I think if he was alone, there was probably a woman in there. Like, not to cut your wisdom, C.R., but like, there's, I think one of the constant themes in this movie is that he is suffocated.

He can't do anything. Yeah, well, he's always got a photographer. He's always got a spiritual guy. He's always got a wife or girlfriend. He's got Bundini selling his belt. And all of these people's problems, he's so singular in his charisma and his capability that all of these. these people are like, champ, help me. Champ, what are we going to do?

Champ, what's going on? Well, he's probably the all-time most exploited celebrity we've had. Like, in terms of entourage, in terms of the nation of Islam, just taking most of his purse, multiple wives, like just, you know, he was broke by the time. It was like 1979. He had no money left. Yeah.

People just stealing from him left and right. I tried to find a bunch of interviews. What I was going to say is I tried to find a bunch of interviews. I tried to find a bunch of interviews with Mann about it and he's obviously so articulate about his own work. There was one great one, the Deadline Hollywood one. I haven't found him addressed this necessarily,

but I really wonder whether the half of him wanted to make a Malcolm X movie. Because the first half of this movie is a Malcolm X movie. I mean, in a lot of ways, it's about Ali being enthralled to this guy being pulled away from him by the nation of Islam. It's its own movie and it's fascinating. The same thing happened to me on the rewatch

that happened to me when I saw it the first time. It's basically every time I watch this movie, I started, I'm like, holy shit, this is the best movie ever seen. Huh, this is Malcolm X movie. And then, like, I'm so disoriented that the second half of the film kind of, like, slips away a little bit until Zaire.

And then the second time I watch it, if I go back and restart the film, I'm like, oh, this is really, really, really good. This is awesome. Because once you know the rhythm of it and know where it's going to go, and know what it leaves out and know what it accentuates,

it feels just a little bit more like in the pocket. You know what I mean? First watches with this is tough. You're like... So, you know what the movie doesn't do, which the Malcolm X character does? So a lot of times when you watch films that are set in this, like, racial,

reckoning period of the 60s, they give you a lot of, like, news clipping, stock footage stuff. Hold your hand. They give you fire hoses, and they give you dogs. And they give you look at the people marching. Here's George Wallace. This movie sets all that up through the character of Malcolm X.

Yep. It's like Malcolm X who talks about the black churches and the four little girls. It's Malcolm X who you see like I am a black America's vengeance. I am the pain. You see that in him. And then you see like Cassius Clay at that point learning about it and connecting to it through him. Since the movie doesn't seem concerned

with doing all of the other tropes that other movies do, they put it all into a character, and that performance is phenomenal by Mario Van Peeples. I texted you guys that the other day. I always forget how great he is. This movie, the first half of this film, that performance, a lot of it exists in the shadow of Malcolm X, which happens nine years previous, right?

Then you get into the whole, like, at one point spikes attached to this film. at various points Oliver Stone is and wants Denzel to be in it, like to be Ali. I mean, it is a fascinating text for that decade of filmmaking and those filmmakers in that sense.

That scene when they're in Africa and he's excited to see Malcolm and then slowly realizes he's got to get away from him. And the way being people's plays that. Yeah. I think he's incredible in this movie. And not sure whether you should take a picture of it or not.

He's like, yo, that's my man. That's our guy. Yeah. Like, you see them and then you know that they'll, in the movie, at least, that they won't see each other again. And Ali thinks it, did I read this right? Ali thinks it before he says it. Yes. Oh, yeah.

He goes, he's standing there and he's with his friend. We never get to hear the inner monologue of Muhammad Ali because we think that his talent is so effervescent that it just flows out of him, like gifted by God. But he's standing in front of this incredible historical figure that's been his friend. and he thinks you shouldn't have done it. He builds up the courage to say it. And then Malcolm X's faces just drains, man. They were really close. Like, I think they started hanging out in 62.

And then when he started feuding with Elijah Muhammad, it was about, like, the adultery stuff. And that became the breaking point. And then what? Go ahead. I like this. Tell us more about the nation, Bill. The honorable bills

The honorable bills The honorable bills The Honorable Bill's Honestly, it would be It's just an amazing final act For you is to convert To the nation of Islam I was preaching about Yakut

First of all I'd be William X, not Bill X No, But the movie makes it seem They had a conflict But they don't really explain What the conflict was about And it was about Malcolm X

Who was like the guy Underneath Elijah Muhammad Who didn't like some of the He thought he was a hypocrite Right. But it had a lot today with the adultery stuff. Had a lot to do. And a bunch of others stuff.

There's a bunch of stuff out there. But it's like it's a movie. And the government was involved in driving away. And that's actually the government stuff is the most. It's not the most, but like it's an interesting tactic. And it almost suggests a wider canvas he wanted to work with. But man, when you get the Ted Levine scene with Leon, when he's like, and we want to know about this guy. Well, I want to ask Craig about that because this movie, so, come.

comes out in 01 when everybody knows everything about Ali and Michael Mann makes the movie assuming oh you know you I don't need to go into this because you know this right it's like when when MLK dies and he has and just Ali's looking out he's on the roof yeah and there's just and he's like I don't need to show you like the three minutes of what happened in America because you already know this and there's a lot of see the riots like we see I don't but he does it quick like he gets in and out because he's like oh I assume

you know this I assume you know this but you you're, I mean, you saw this movie for the first time, right? Could you follow all the stuff that happened, or were you confused? I did feel like there were moments where I was a little confused, and I don't think this movie holds your hand in terms of... It's the opposite. It does one...

It's weird that it starts with a declaration of what day the movie starts. And then we never see another day. And it never does a timestamp against the I often felt like, I don't know what year I'm in, I don't know where I am. It helps to, like, basically have his Wikipedia page open and be going to these fights, and as you find out, like,

Okay, so I had that in Wood's Age the worst for this. I actually don't know why he didn't put dates and kind of root you in where we were. It just seemed like a miss. Maybe that Michael Mann's like, I'm too good of a director to do that, but I really think it would have helped.

I think more than anything, the reason why it's such a big swing as a biopic, and Ray kind of follows this same type of basic. Yeah. He really wants it to be about the characters. he tries to tell the story of Muhammad Ali's life and not necessarily a recounting of Muhammad Ali's life. So it's like his discovery with Islam,

his discovery through women, like who he should end up being with, his discovery to what's important to him and he doesn't need the title to be who he is. Almost every single scene where something significant happens, you could leave the scene as if the scene is asking you, what if it were you? Like what if it were you?

and you had found this new religion or movement that you were into, but it went against what your father wanted. What if you fell in love with the woman and she didn't conform to what it was this thing? And you take this huge, huge cultural figure and you just make them a guy. Yeah. And then there are some ideas that are so huge that man's trying to illustrate very quickly. So, like, young Cassius seeing the blonde-haired blue-eyed Jesus that his father's painting, is got to do so much work for like this kid

and the little kid, that's a little kid from the wire, right? That's my sure. Yeah, doing such an amazing job of like, kind of like, what the fuck is this? And then that is why, like, however many years later, he's in this headspace where he's open to converting. So man said,

if there's a team to the movie, it's defiance. We defied that along with every expectation about him, goes through a whole bunch of stuff about when he's going to make himself as heavyweight championship of the world, he's going to be a motivational personification of something totally different, a black man in his own culture with his own pride.

And then that was what I think he's trying to do with the 10 years. Here's the climate Ali walked into. Here was his motivation. Here's where he wanted to end up. And then everything culminates in Africa, which is why the running scene is so long in Zaire. Yeah.

Because I think Michael, that's the one time Michael Mann's doing some handholding. He's like, I really want you to understand this. This running thing. What a big deal is that. He's really having, this is his epiphany. Michael Mann, last the Mohicans, Heat, the insider, Ali. This is the Imperial phase. Jesus Christ.

This is him, like, at the center of everything. And all the big, the major movie stars, the great actors are, like, lining up. Run it off again? Last Mohicans Heat, the insider Ali. I don't know. That's 92 to 01. It's just like

with that, with the variety of the movies, I don't know if it gets much better than that. It's a pretty good four in a row that have nothing to do in common. But then there's common threads in each one. He, I feel like I wrote this when I did my review of this movie a long time ago

that I think he felt like if I pulled this off, this will be my legacy one. I've done some really, good shit. I'm one of the best directors in the world. But this is the hardest IP to pull off. I'm going to try this. I'm going to go for it. It's also like

I think 25 years later, I don't think a white guy's directing this. I just don't think it happens. It was kind of controversial then. It was controversial in 01. I think now it's how did you feel about that, by the way? I've always wondered what

a movie that was a little bit more culturally at home would feel like. What a black, and look, we have not stopped making Muhammad Ali's stories. Like he pops up in all kinds of different stuff. We see it all time. But like, I did one of that. But I'm going to be real with you, man.

The, I think maybe man compensated or overcompensated, the beginning of this movie is very black. Like, it is, it is very black. Maybe he was trying to do a little bit too much, you know, like when you and your homeboys or, like, you, y'all white homeboy, y'all listen to the Tribe Call Quest. And he goes, yeah, man, these guys, they really influence Kanye. And you're like, shut up, bitch. Like, you know. I shouldn't have said that to it.

Yeah, it's like, we, I know, you ain't got to perform. Yeah. Let's just enjoy the music. So, but I, and I. So the version of that in this is like, and be like, what if we also went to the Apollo the night Sam Cook is playing? So he's like, okay, well, I'll show you guys. But I can make, I can make a movie with these people as.

well. But to me, it feels authentic, though. That kind of grounds the movie. I think that's one of the best sports movies scenes ever, and it's one of the best scenes of Michael Mann's career, if not the best one. We'll talk about it when we do rewatchables. Yeah, so he's got that,

and then you have Will Smith. He's only taking two swings in his career. It's this and six degrees of separation. Other than that, every choice was safe. This one, he knows. He even said, I have a quote in here. I guess from later.

I'll find it. But he's 33 years old. And he's basically like, this is it. Like, I'm in the prime of my career. I got to do this. This is my moment. Spends a year learning how to box and talk like Ali. Basically, it takes two years to make this movie

because he wants it to be perfect. And also, like, Ali approved him. Ali had the rights to this and, you know, wasn't going to do it unless he felt good about the weird person. Yeah. he's as close as you're going to get to an actor being Ali, but you're just not, just don't see how somebody becomes Ali.

He does the best job. There's scenes where he comes alive as Ali. But it always feels like Will Smith. Yes. I never, I never forget. It's Mike Lowry playing Ali, basically. Mike Lowry playing Ali. There are moments of real beauty.

I think all of the physicality of his performance is amazing. the boxing, the running. The boxing's excellent. Him like holding court or being in, like at a press conference, the intimate scenes, the scenes of the women, the scenes of his religious conversion. I feel like I'm watching a historical reenactment kind of. Which is usually the problem with biopics.

My hottest take is that this is one of the strongest performances in a biopic whenever Will is not talking. and I know that that feels silly, like that almost can't be a thing, but there's so much action happening, there's so much drama happening that a lot of times in order for, like his reaction to Malcolm X in that scene

and just the one line, like when he's understated. Or when he sees Michael Michelle for the first time. Yeah. And he's like, hey, all, he nails all of that. Every single thing, every way. everything that when they don't call his name

and he decides he's not going to be inducted. All of that, but when he starts trying to do the Ali voice, it's impossible. You can't do that. Yeah. That's not going to happen. And that's kind of when maybe you lose a little bit. And it's weird because there are so many figures around him

that are so iconic and I can't help but feel like Michael T. Williamson is doing Don King. I'm like, this is fucking awesome. That one scene when he does the Don King in the outside when he tells him for him and got hurt. He becomes Don King for like 75 seconds. It's not a little bit of him.

But also like Ron Silver and Jamie Fox. All of these guys. CoSell? You feel like you're in the middle of it. Michael T. Williamson kind of like inhabits the energy of Don King. Like Don King feels like a little

fucking sleazy, a little fucking like dangerous. Like it's a really understating good performance. who some people said was super naive at all times, but then other people would say had pretty good sense. So he sniffed out the Don King thing pretty early. We'll talk about all those actors in a second. Craig, who is, who's Ali now?

Like, this is the most beloved celebrity we had for, I would say, the entire 1970s and 80s. I think people loved him the most. You guys could probably tell me what year or what kind of era that it flipped. But boxing just culturally expired. And I have no relationship to boxing other than like... Do you think there's a celebrity, though, anybody?

In boxing? Or you're saying in all sports? In anything. Well, it's hard for me to even know how you felt about OLLI because I wasn't there and I don't really get it. So I... Trying to think like who is... Who is that for you?

The biggest athlete of your life. Highest approval rating. Highest approval rating? Who's the biggest athlete? I mean, probably Tom Brady or Lerner. It's just, it's nowhere close to the significance. Yeah. And LeBron James is a massive, huge guy who has political, it's just nowhere near.

Nowhere near the importance. There's no way. There's no way. It's impossible. I've only seen it. Ali, which I caught in the tail end as a little kid growing up into it, Jordan. And then Tiger got close. He didn't have the personality.

No, I think it's almost more common for us now to experience that kind of thing, or at least in our lifetimes, like on a local level. like I would say Iverson in Philly for a couple of years had like this magic to him and this larger than life aspect. A lot of people also didn't like him. I know. Which would put some more toward Ali in the 60s. But he was not, I mean, we were talking about like a global, like if this dude walked into a restaurant in China, people would be like, that's fucking Muhammad Ali. You know what I mean?

Well, also, it's sometimes unfair when we do this because like the 60s are the adolescents of America. Yeah, and of mass culture. Right, of mass, of mass culture, of America. Like, this is when we're like, okay, it seems like we're going through it again. Is this thing going to work, or we're going to figure out a way around this? And the people who embody that, they live as symbols for that forever. And we're just in a different spot. Now, Jordan is probably that guy for my direct generation.

But his grand contribution is his ability to be like. light and sneakers. That would have been amazing if you were like, it's Mr. Beast. That would be... I'm like Taylor Swift. I don't know. I like Mr. Beat. I like Mr. Beat, too. Well, I think the thing that pushed Ali over the top for everybody was that he actually

sacrificed something. That's what I'm saying. Which I think when you're sacrificing your own, all the, not just money, but this part of his prime, all these different things, that's, then you're at another level. Well, I do think now there's a bit of like a sanitation to the most famous people in the world now. Yeah, true. There's nobody putting themselves out there like, Mom. Yeah, what would Ali be like in social media era?

I even know. The thing is, though, is it's like, I don't, he's got a personal photographer flying, like following around. He knows he's important. He's going on wide world of sports. He's got sports writers, like, in his coterie. Like, he is documenting himself in real time. But was never overexposed.

Okay. I don't think. Well, it might have been impossible to always expose yourself. Might have been impossible in the 70s to be. But also in many ways. And the Jordan thing I was talking about, you actually double down on it when you said to sneakers. Jordan kind of invents that type of sneaker culture. But at the same time, Jordan's main thing is that, like, he was beloved as a pitchman

and that that became what people wanted to be. Before Jordan, the actual archetype for the modern athlete was Muhammad Ali. That's who people wanted to be. Jordan actually kind of changed that. Jordan didn't want to have any type of political stance. He didn't want to have any type of countercultural significance or relevance. He just wanted to be the guy that had the number one approval rating everywhere. So whatever he told you to buy you and bought it.

It worked. Also super handsome like Ali. Super handsome. I gave for Will Smith. I'm giving him the Peter North Award for most effort put in a movie. Okay. He put on 35 pounds. Yeah.

He had to try to figure out Ali's weird Louisville accent, which I think is like almost impossible. It's like a drawl combined with like there's a sync songiness to it. I don't know. I've never heard anybody do it 100% successfully. It's almost like when people try to do Barclay. Like you just can't do it.

It's like a one-on-one voice. Right. We'll take a break. There's a couple other things to discuss them. We'll do the categories. This episode is brought to you by a zip recruiter. A lot of times it feels like there's, It's just not enough time in the day, especially when you get older.

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within the first day. Yeah, that's been the same stats for like 10, 12 years. Try it for free at ZipRecruiter.com slash rewatchables. Once again, ziprecruiter.com slash rewatchables. Once again, ZipRecruiter.com slash rewatchables. Meet your match on ZipRecruiter. So one thing Michael Mann said about Ali, he said he represented the enormous possibility, the poetics of actual self-determination, had to defy not just the establishment,

not just white America, not just people who are feared militancy, but also the NAACP, Joe Lewis, you name it. Everybody who was centrist and had an interest in maintaining the status quo, Now he says this in 2017. He says, we are still talking identity politics in 2017. Try understanding that perspective in 1964. That's a good point.

That's a good point. Jamie Fox. Yeah. So he was in and he gave it Sunday as Willie Beeman. It's the first time we're like, oh, Jamie can act. This is pretty good. He's unbelievable in this. And I remember one of my big takeaways of seeing this in the theater was like,

fuck, Jamie Fox is a great actor. I had no idea. There's an interesting dynamic here, Van, where he's kind of the Tom Brady sixth round pick to Will Smith-Paeton Manning of like, oh, you're just supposed to be over here. It's Will Smith's time. And nobody sees the Jamie Fox thing really coming yet. And who wins the Oscar first? Jamie Fox. Yeah.

There's actually a, Jamie Fox was hosting something. It might have been the MTV Awards or something like that to where Will was. still in the era of unveiling his body. Before the movie came out, we looked at us, God damn, Will and got swole. And I remember Jamie comes over to say on this whatever bit they're doing on stage, Jamie comes over to, like, say what's up to Will, and Will takes off his jacket, everybody's like, oh, my God, is Will Smith. And then he gives his jacket to Jamie Fox.

And then Jamie Fox kind of slinks away. He plays it up. You know, Will's kind of the star. He's kind of the co-star and everything like that. the whole elite thing is happening. In two years, legitimately that changed. It didn't change to where

Jamie Fox ever usurped Will as a star. I don't think that that quite happened. But I think, do you think that happened? I don't. I think it was inconceivable that he would be in the conversation. But he caught up. And then he was.

Because like, yes. The collateral Ray year is what? 2004? In 2000s, yeah. By that point, everybody's in awe of Jamie and everything that he could do. He was also more, I think, liked in the Hollywood range.

Yeah, and Will Smith? Well, Will Smith at that point was like he was married. He was just a major star. Jamie was accessible. Oh. Jamie was at the, you know, partying. He would come on in the late night shows. I think they were, I think they had two different parts of Hollywood.

I think Jamie's Hollywood was a little bit more rap hat. Will's Hollywood was a little bit more corporate. Yes. And it was probably real rap back. And I think that they kind of managed their career. of a certain point where it was like Fox is still like, I want to do TV, I want to host stuff, I want to do music.

Comedy, all that. Yeah, like, I want to be in everything and Smith's running his career, essentially on the Tom Cruise track of like, when you do this, it has to hit. You have to count. Jamie busted everybody's ass. They did, like, Jamie is legitimately

one of the most talented people, like Sammy Davis Jr. type shit that we've ever seen. He's great. And then as soon, he's funny. is fucking shit too. Like Bundini almost greases

the skids for Ray. You see the same type of DNA in this performance. Like the same type and then what he's out of there then. And then we have Van Peebles as Malcolm who I think this is probably

the best he's been in a movie like this, right? He had a good career, but I think... I mean, can you imagine how fucking hard it must be to play Malcolm X after Denzel Washington?

Right after Denzel. Mm-hmm. Like not that far after. Man, Mario Van Peoples is a fucking genius. Like, Mario Van Peoples is one of those guys. When you go back and look at the totality of things that Mario Van Peoples has done and done them well, that is a fucking A-plus creative, man.

New Jack City, it's Mario Van Peoples. You know what I'm saying? So, like... Here's who else is in this movie. Jeffrey Wright, it's Howard Bingham. Gene Carlo Esposito, who's great in this movie. I like that there's only, like, one scene with him

and J.B. Fox when they're drinking, and I was like, I could have done five more of those. It's water. Ron Silver, is Angela Dundee. Joe Morton. Chauncey Ascourge. Ted Levine? Briefly. Leon?

Barry Shabaca Henley. Michael T. Bruce McCall even has a... McGill. Bruce McGill. I wrote down McCall again. Bruce McGill. All of them are great.

All of them are graduated. That guys. Nona Gay, Michael Michelle. Yeah. Paul Rodriguez is Freddie Pacheco. Yeah. Florida Pacheco. Does he have a line?

No. I think maybe in the director's cut he has a line. Yeah. And then John Void is Coceau. Mm-hmm. Which is another one. Shouldn't have worked. Did you say Jada?

Well, we haven't even gotten to the ladies yet. Yeah. But John Void is Cocell, he gets nominated for an Oscar. That's like, you can't, who can play Howard Cocell? That's like doing an S&O sketch and he's really good.

Yeah. And I think probably makes him a little more kind of a good hang than Howard Kosso was, by all accounts. The intimate moments between Ali and Kassel are the ones that really sell it when he's like doing the coffee. He's like, have some coffee with your sugar. And then he's like, they're coming for you.

They're coming for you. And then Nona Gay, Jada Pinkett, and Michael Michelle. I went to an Ali Junkett because I wrote a piece for page two. I got to spend 10 minutes with Nona Gay. Yes. Who was the best looking person I'd ever seen up to that point in 2001. It's a thing. It's impressive.

It was really, really impressive. It's a thing, man. That's a. Beautiful, beautiful, beautiful woman. First script was Sony, 1992, ended up at Columbia Pictures in 98. Ron Howard, Barry Sondonfield. Can I have five seconds on this?

It is worth noting that this script was like in development hell. This was like a... Almost 10 years. In the 80s, they were talking about doing this. I think there was different guys attached. There's the credits are, I think Gregory Howard has the story credit or some original credit. There's four screenplay people.

There's two other writers credited. Then Eric Roth and Michael Mann also get a screenplay credit. At various points, this was going to be the childhood story of him up to 40. Like, it was, there's lots of different versions of this out there. It's kind of a miracle of the movie hangs together as well as it does. Well, how about Ali with approval of everything? Yes. Which never really works either.

And he was 11. And had, at that point, he was fading. But he had his wife. And they keep trying to do it. And it never makes good movies. Basically, everybody from you older is like, that's not Ali. You know what I mean?

Like you're going to have to... Including Ali. Voting public is going to be pretty harsh with this. So Spike Lee wanted to do it, was in negotiations, and Will Smith really wanted Michael Mann to do it. Interesting. Is it apocryphal that Will

told Spike Lee he was going to have to expand his boundaries if you wanted to direct this? Had that in my notes. Couldn't imagine him saying that to Spike Lee. Now, I got to say, like, Malcolm's too important to this movie. I don't know how Spike could have directed it. I don't know if that...

I think it's too weird. It would have been the same film. It would not have been the same film. I think that there's a version of this... I think that the Spike Lee movie, they're two vastly different movies. Vastly different movies. I think the Spike Lee movie

might have had more cultural relevance. It might have been more... It might have been thematically tighter in terms of what he was trying to say about Malcolm X. Excuse me, Malcolm X. Ali. It would have been a smaller movie and Will just liked movies for everyone.

And Spike... doesn't make movies for everyone. And probably wanted to work with Michael Mann, too, who was scorching hot at the time. Has Will ever worked with Spike? I don't think this was never worked with Spike. What year's 25th hour? Is that O2? Yeah.

So we get that instead. Yeah. I mean, like, I think that's a win for us. For us. Yeah, maybe Spike Lee would have liked to do it. The Muhammad Ali movie. But I will say this. It is interesting that Will Smith has never worked

with Spike Lee. Most of the guy guys. So the biggest black actor we've had since younger than Denzel. Right. And probably the only person who didn't work with Spike Lee was Will Smith. Yeah. It's just an interesting thing. Did Jamie work with him?

With Spike? I don't think so. I don't think so. But it is worth noting also that Will was the first person. I think he turned down Django and then Jamie does Django. Because I think maybe the... types of movies. Are like, I can't do it.

I don't do it. He can't make, you know, after Earth or whatever the fuck that was, you know. Like, you won't remember that first year, Grantland, I wrote a huge piece about this. Did you? About Will Smith. It was the Will Smith career arc. And it was about Will Smith, the Django thing, saying everything about his career decisions in the 21st century, basically. It was too hot for him.

It was, he studied it. He was honestly like an advanced metrics guy. Him and his agent studied box office and the movies that made the most money and they were all like outer space, big action. And that was like, he's just like, I just want to do those. And never really wanted to experiment with anything else.

So Django was like too much for him. After Earth. Jamie stepped right in. I liked it. I mean, it's also the craziest thing about the slap is that's the dude who had the most, like, his whole... The most carefully... Public perception and his career was so carefully managed.

The crazy thing about the slap... is that the slap might have been, might have not been as efficient as it was, if not for this movie. Because Will had to learn how to throw punches. Right, but without decking somebody. We'll have to learn how to throw punches and get his shit straight.

So years later, that slap came through and you couldn't get out the way of that bitch because of this movie. I think COVID, everyone's... Hey, that motherfucker. Everyone's in a haze from COVID. I think the Fox, I mean, now the Will Smith, Chris Rock slap is the weirdest thing that's happened.

this century. 21st century, that's my number one pick. Weirdest thing that's happened. So listen. I watch it sometimes. I'm like, I can't believe this happened.

So our movie... And then he won an Oscar. Won an Oscar. Yeah. Afterwards. Our movie won the year before. So we're still in the haze, right? So that year,

everyone that was involved in two-distance strangers is at an Oscar party. Yeah. Because they act like they care about you for like two years after you... Then they dumped it. Then it's like, whatever.

So everyone's at it. I'm in New York doing hip-hop homicides, I have worked all day I have gone to sleep. I wake up it's a million fucking text messages, but the first one is from

Kalika and it says Will Smith just punched Chris Rock in the face on stage live at the Oscars. Where are you? I'm like, there's no way that happened.

Some facsimile of that might have happened, but there's no way that that happened. And when I, I looked up, that's what the fuck happened. Will Smith walked on stage at the Academy Awards and slapped the shit.

Did it affect how you watch Ali? I always feel like I have Will Smith. I always feel like I have a little Will Smith baggage now when I watch Wolf Smith movies because that slap was so weird. I have zero. It's in the back of my head. It's like way down on the list of the most deplorable things. People have done those movies

I still watch. I don't give a fuck. It was just so weird. You're one of those guys. No, I'm just always like, I can't believe he hit Chris Rock. Yeah. That's so interesting to me. I still can't believe that happened. Little Rell is the best on this. Little Rell goes, yeah, Will's shouldn't he.

He goes, yeah, Will shouldn't they hit Chris. But I get it. He's the funniest on that. It's just like, yeah, he lost itself. You wouldn't up you smack the guy. It happens. Michael Mann did a director's cut in 2017. Yeah.

Where he basically said I was totally happy with his finished product of this movie. he said with the hindsight of history I felt the drama didn't get all the way there because he made some tweaks it wasn't as strong as it should have been I don't think I'd change anything on a movie like heat but here the proportion how it made you feel wasn't quite right

and then he made his little tweak so I'm sure he had to hand this in it's like over 150 minutes it's yeah it's two hours 40 minutes and I'm sure he's like oh man there's so many things I like in this movie but I can't totally in the plan

casting of like the film like there's there's got to be footage of, there's probably more Angelo, Freddie, and Bundini footage out there. Come on, Daddy. Yeah. Outside. Let's go, Daddy. Don't jump in one place. It's probably just more boxing, period. That would have been sick.

Oscar Noms. Will Smith nominated for Best Actor, loses to Denzel in Training Day. We're good with that. That works. Yeah. John Voight nominated for Howard Kosso. He lost to Jim Broadbent and Iris. Jamie Fox's not nominated.

Should have been nominated. Should have been nominated. Should have been nominated. 1010 million made 87. Lost money. Big, big, big, big. It's kind of crazy. Ebert, two stars.

When this came out, did you feel like the thing that was working against it was the critical reception as we're about to get to? Or why didn't this do better? It came out a week after Lord of the Rings also. Critical response was like, eh, this is good. But it just, I don't know. know. 87 million is still not awful for O-1, but the fact that it costs $110 million

because man's like, I'm going to Africa. We're going to Africa. Yeah. We're going here. We're going here. We're recreating this. 87 million is bad for one reason. It's looking at Will Smith movies before that.

I knew that the movie would have problems resonating with people when my dad didn't like it. My dad is the man that handed me VHS tapes of Muhammad Ali. And for some reason, he couldn't connect with the movie. Like, the movie, for some reason, he just, he didn't like it. It's also too long for, if you're going to be two hours, 45 minutes, then you only get the two screenings a day instead of the three.

So you're cutting into your own money. I almost had a stroke. I did split it into two different viewings. Ibert, two stars. A long, flat, curiously muted film about the heavyweight champion lacks much of the flashfire and humor, Muhammad Ali, shot more in the tone of a eulogy than a celebration. his review is really good for this I would encourage people to read it but he does say no modern actor could capture Ali completely

I've never read him and disagree with the review more would you disagree with the fact that the movie in some way should have been like a celebration of Muhammad Ali I think the best thing about this movie is to examine this extraordinary life Like, we don't need Maham... The celebration is his life itself. Yeah.

What I always want to know from a biopic, my one question, from every biopic is what it cost you. That's the only thing I ever want to know about a biopic. We know that you were great. We're making the movie about you. We know that you did what it cost you. Like, what did you have to give up? Like, what love did you leave on the table?

What personal situations did you leave on the table? What skeletons or bones do you have behind you to achieve that type of greatness because that sacrifice is what it takes. That's what this movie is about to me. It's obviously a character and a person that's just too close to Ebert. I mean, Michael Mann doesn't make humorous

in celebratory movies, so it's kind of like... You know what, with Tain and Ebert? He wrote a great, great piece about the Rocky movie watching it with Ali. And he said... He talked about it. He spent one day with him, I saw a man enormously entertained by life,

twinkling with amusement, lowering the tinted glass window of his rolls, limousine so pedestrians could do a double take when they saw it was him and then he's like he he thought smith played him as more meditative and subdued sad um and i just think he was like that's not the guy i spent a day with and that seemed like it colored it anyway um most rewatchable scene we mentioned the opening uh sam cook all the way into the bundini intro into the list and way in what's a better michael man's sequence other than

Maybe the bank shootout. I mean, the opening of heat is pretty high up there in terms of, like, an opening of a film. There's several battles in Mohicans that I think attain this kind of like nirvana. Diner scene and thief? The diner scene. This big type romance, yeah. But this is among the best things he's ever put together. The collateral, the jazz scene when he shoots Barry Shibaka.

Yeah, that stuff is all. I was just looking at collateral. That stuff all really works. But, hey, homie, is that my briefcase? God damn, we used to be a real country, man. Hey, homie, is that my brief? I like one list that goes, keep talking. I'm going to fuck you up.

It's like, oh, Jesus. Don't kill Tom in that movie. Don't kill Tom in the movie. He's just talking about collateral. Yeah, don't kill him. Don't kill him. And just run it back three years later. For collateral, too?

For collateral two. That's right. Day of the Sodario. More rewatchable scenes that aren't going to win because we already have the winner. Third round, sixth round of the Liston fight is really good. I like when Liston quits, when Ali's on the stool, kind of watching Liston.

I was going to ask you, what's the rap on the Liston cheating with the blinding Ali thing? Liston definitely did that. Some people think that it was just that it happened on its own. They rub you with stuff, it got on the gloves, and it got out with his eyes. No way. Most people look at it.

Liston was a scumback. Like, there's no way he didn't do that. He was a bad person. Bad man, he was a heavyweight champion of world. Sunn Liston was a bad person. Don't you know you're talking to Bill X? Come on. William X did not like Sunny Liston.

William X did not like Sunny Liston. William X did not like Sunny Liston, but he stood for it. William X should be a recurring character on this show. No, we can't do it. Let's not be a good. William X not approving of Denzel and Julia Roberts' relationship in Belkin brief. No, sir. I won't have it

Well you know I had this in Nipix The movie avoids The Muslims thought Angela Dundee doctored the gloves Because he was trying to tank The fight for Ali

It's like a big part of the lore of that fight Yeah so I start coming to the corner Because they're like a fight Angela I'm not a huge boxing guy So I didn't know about that Yeah yeah That's a real thing I don't know why that wasn't in the movie

Because they take a moment in the film To show Dundee putting like shit in his pockets and then he puts pills in his pockets, right? And then he's, like, getting all of his stuff together. And I was like, oh, this is cool. This is just Michael Mann doing, like, look at this master of his craft. But I wasn't sure that I read about, like, there are all these, like, allegations both ways. It's amazing that he was blind for one of the six rounds and one of the fight.

And then if you watch it, like, the sixth round, Liston quits after the six, like, he kills Liston in the sixth round. He's, like, really fucks him up. Malcolm in the hotel room with Ali that camera angle of Vain Peoples with Ali behind him just kind of staring out and it's a long scene too that's great

we mentioned Ali turning his back on Malcolm in Africa obviously not rewatchable for the typical reasons but I thought the scene when Malcolm gets murdered and then Ali in the car is just really great

that's really good phone making that I believe is Chauncey Eskridge was on the phone and was taught because like Yeah, it's an amazing sequence. The second list and fight,

just because of Jada Pink has performance in the stance. Kosso, they're coming after you. Will Coward. Ali on the phone? Yeah, I know where Vietnam is. It's on TV when he does the Viacong thing. And then Howard Bingham's like, you know what you just did?

Will Smith's best scene in the movie When he comes out of the courtroom He's like, you're my oppressors And he does that 45 second You my enemy, not no Chinese, no Viscan, no Japanese You're my opposer when I want freedom And does that whole I think that's his best scene in the movie

Leading into the Terrell Way in and all that stuff Do you like this scene with Ali and Bundini When he sells the belt? Love it. I sold your belt. My two favorite scenes in the movie, that one, and for some reason, Ali watching Foreman knockout Joe Frazier. That's just such a real fucking scene to where you feel like you got everything lined up.

Right. And then all of a sudden, that scene, another boxing thing, if you want to see the greatest destruction ever, go watch of a great champion. Go watch the way. I know you guys have seen these. You guys are sports fans. How Foreman destroyed fucking Joe Farrow.

Down goes Frasian! It's just like a child. It's cool how they're all sitting on the couch and they're like, this is a good... This is not a big deal. And it's like, what the fuck? Like we... Like, we...

This guy's announcing himself. But the Bundini scene is particularly moving to me. Ali goes on wide road of sports. Right into Frazier takes Ali for a ride. You beat core. I'm going to get in the ring. I'm going to kick your hat. James Tony's good in that scene

James Tony does a good job Coasef tells Ali he won the trial Ali loses to Frazier Move legs And it's like okay Hook coming I like how they did that But they get into that fight fast

Ale Bume running through the streets And then Ali Forman heading into the 8th round When the ring girl Winks in him and he winks back And then leading to like him Kind of all right now I'm going to go

And he gets for him Which is still, that had to have been the most thrilling moment you could possibly have if you loved a team or an athlete when he actually beats four men in the eighth round. That has to be number one. What do you guys think of the boxing in this film? I like it. I like it too. I think he took a more deliberate approach to it. Like, some boxing is about movement.

Some boxing is about, some boxing, I'm talking about when I'm talking about boxing in movies. Some of it's about movement. Some of us about thuds. Like, he wanted you to feel the thuds. You couldn't really approximate the speed of a prime Muhammad Ali. You would almost have to do CGI stuff. Right. But, like, as far as the movement and the actual impact,

I thought they did a good job. And the guys, like, unlike other movies, they look like heavy. Yeah, they are fighting. And they're hitting each other. Yeah. I thought the Foreman fight specifically was really, really, really close to the actual fight. The way he's leaning back, the way Foreman was just... I thought,

Foreman was pounding them. It felt like Will was taking a lot of those shots. What did you think? It's just interesting because, like, I look at it from a purely cinematic. It sometimes is a little bit, the fights in this movie lack a little bit of the stylistic diversity. I think Raging Bull has. Like, Raging Bull, he shot each fight in this different kind of way. And I feel like he shot to my eye.

He shot these fights in a very similar fashion, the entire, like... Well, he was trying to be exactly, like, the actual fight. Yes. And I think, but there, I guess I prefer ultimately Scorsese trying to re-event the experience of looking at a Life magazine photograph rather than like perfectly like. The foreman actor took that punch. Yeah. I will say that the whole face shake. I will say that those two fighters are also different.

With Jake Lamata, you have to capture brutality, which that movie captures the brutality of who Jake Lamata was. With Ali, obviously he was a very dangerous fighter, but there's an elegance to it. Like, there are times where he's delivering performance inside of the air. And that's what's so good about the final fight in this movie is a smart decision to end the movie with that fight because it's Ali at the peak of his performance. Yep. Not as a fighter. Athletically, he had been, but how he could be theatrically inside of the ring and outside of the ring.

What's your favorite boxing in a movie? Not necessarily boxing movie, but the, like, fighting in a movie. It's such a stupid answer. It's a really stupid answer. Diggs Town. It's not a bad answer. It's not a very serious movie, but for me... It's a good one, though.

It's like Diggs Town. I like Dixown. I think the first, the first Creed fight, the actual fight. You're talking about in Mexico? No, not Mexico. saying Rocky Creed won. I forget who he fights when that first round when it's like the entire year of the round.

Oh, wait, that's the Tijuana fight in Creed. That's what I'm saying, in Mexico. The one in Mexico? The first time you see Adonis Creed fight period. No, the next time. He's Creed by this point. When Stallone is in his corner. Oh, okay.

Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. I thought they did a really good job with that. Mike's a good boxer. Well, and also that it was one shot for like three straight minutes. I thought that's probably the best thing I've seen. What was your favorite scene, Craig? I really liked all the CoSEL stuff. I found that to be really fascinating.

Mainly also probably just because I can't believe that's something that was happening culturally. And that's something that would never happen now, those type of conversations on air like that. And like their interaction and like even... I was watching old videos of Ali talking to Dick Cavett. And I was just like, man, this is crazy. Like the types of conversations that they're having

is just not really what you get. Closest thing we had was Bill and KD. That's right. Yeah. Yeah. A long time ago, man. I remember it was the second Ali, Frazier, after the fight at Maud World of Sports,

and Ali started making fun of Frazier that he went to the hospital, and they got in the actual fight in Maud World of Sports. I think it was the second fight. I think it's obviously the first 10 minutes. You could even say the first 24 minutes. The only thing that approaches that for me is the Zaire arrival, like the Kinshasa arrival.

Oh, that's awesome. Or running through. Yeah. Also, like, the fact that it rained right after he'd not form it out, which is something to happen in real life, is one of the craziest things that's happened in a sporting event. My dad always said God wanted him to finish. Like two minutes after the knockout,

pouring hurricane rain. Yeah. Unbelievable. Like, you can't make that shit up. Would I have been like a terribly hot day in the whole nine? It's like, what's the most 2001 thing about this movie, CR? I guess I just had Will Smith critical and critical. commercial sensation.

What do you have? Kind of the same, but I will say the cast itself is this mixture, oh shit, he's got something's brewing, the cast itself is this mixture of like ascending people. Yeah.

Like, I mean, Jamie and some of these other people, but also like staples of people. The ascending people are Jeffrey Wright and Jamie and all of this stuff and then you had your older guard and well, that's a very 2001 cast. What are you about to say? Including Ron Silver.

Is he the most 2001 thing? No, when I did the junket, it was the only time I'd ever been to a movie junket, and I had 10 minutes with Ron Silver, and I immediately went into Silent Rage. Got him excited about Silent Rage. I was like, I'm a huge silent rage guy, and he's like, the killer wouldn't die!

And he was all excited, and we talked about it. What was the movie that he was in with Jamie Lee Curtis? Blue Steel. Blue Steel. It's a good movie. To be classic. Where he was like a killer, Blue steel is that shit.

You might have to crank that one up on that after Liz's Caputin Biggleow, isn't it? Yeah, it's a blue steel. It would make the 2B all-stars last year. My most 2001 thing. Will and Jada, young love. Real chemistry. There you go.

Yeah. Great to see them happy. Really believed in those two. Some good things ahead. They're still together. The Floyd Gundali butter on my ass and lollipops in my mouth of word for something I just enjoy. What do you have, Van?

I like whenever actors take on athletic roles and commit to it. There's nothing that I hate more than some half-ass actor trying to play basketball. But whenever they really commit to it, or Matt Damon doing Legend of Bagger Vance and doing two weeks ago for us and when they bullshit about it, I don't like it. But when they really commit to it and bring that to it, I always find myself in time. C.R. Cosell's voice.

and I just miss the Pat Somerall, Keith Jackson That era Bob Cod I mean even cut through Costas She's just missed White and answers No I didn't say that I was gonna I just miss like guys who tried to Capture the poetry of a moment

Yeah rather than just be like Welcome to the fucking like Shit Dome for like Stephen A's not cutting it for you? No who's left Bob Costas Breen Breen

Breen's not like that. Joe Bucke? No? No, there's nobody left. Nobody's left? Those guys are all gone? There's nobody who can levitate. Nance? Nance a little bit, yeah. But Nance? Who can levitate above the event with some monologue for three minutes. Like Vince Scully or...

I was going to say it's easy to do it on the Masters. You know what I mean? But even college basketball dance had it. Yeah. It's what Tom Rinaldi tries to do. My Floyd Gondali. God damn. the uh-oh I got my bell rung

slow motion moment in every boxing movie where it's like and they do like the weird and it's like I always like that it's like uh-oh he got fucked up have you ever actually had your bell rung not by a punch

what happened I've hit my head a couple times where I'm like fuck right yeah I got elbowed in basketball once oh that's a good one I hit my head in the attic where I didn't realize the doorway was low

and I just got clocked and like fell to the ground. Clark W. probably got a concussion. What stage is the best? Mentioned any moment with Jean-Claherlo-Esposito and J.B. Fox together. That just should have been all the deleted scenes. James Tony acting.

I love Foreman, the actor playing Foreman, just hitting the heavy bag in that scene. Jesus. And man just stays with it for like 10 seconds. No lines for Paul Ruff. Rodriguez, and then Jim Gray and Bill Plashke being in scenes. Yeah. Bill Plashke has a line.

He's to ask a question, right? Yes, too, doesn't he? Yeah. Yeah. Jim Gray is just smiling like a maniac for some reason? What do you have? I have The Champ is here as a rap sample. Yeah.

I have Smith's fighting ability. You are never like he's not fighting or they're about a double in or anything like that. I talked about this, but the low-key, the fact that it's a Loki Malcolm X movie for an hour. Mm-hmm. Yeah, that was mine Since then they've put Muhammad Ali in a bunch of different shows and stuff And there's another one coming out

They're doing the greatest And so like just Muhammad Ali As a cultural figure that they want to put On a narrative Yeah Has exploded after this Hmm I will also say that

However I don't know anything about like what I assume The guy was singing Because it's not Sam Cook Exactly he's not lip-syncing Sam Cooke's voice but it's a very good approximation of Sam Cooke

and that is on the live record the call and response that goes on is exactly how it is on the live record and it's fucking amazing to watch a bunch of other stuff happening while Sam Cooke is playing it was just that that whole sequence is just so brilliant

I'm disappointed I thought Vain was going to have a what stage the best hair and I'm sad I'm going to have to do it Okay. A bunch of beautiful black woman in this movie, Van. William X is back. William X is here. Even in the Apollo scene, there's like good ones in the crowd.

It's just like Michael Mann. Michael Man was tapping into something. Do you think that? He really was. You should go back to writing. And it should be from the author of the book of basketball, he's changed his name. William X. And it's the book.

of black women. The book of black women. Good ones. Oh, my God. Good ones. The pyramid. Here's my prologue about Jane Kennedy. See, that's a good one.

It's a good one. Very important person. Very important person. The 70s. I will say this, though, is that, like, for me personally, if we get into this, there's an era of fine that this movie represents and it is harkening back to in the 60s that a lot of people wish was still around. Everybody looked good.

I'm not coming down on no one. I got to lose weight, so don't come for me, right? Everybody looks good. Oh, you're saying? There's a 90s fine aesthetic. All of these women look different. They don't have the same body. They're petite women.

They're tall women. And women are all different complexions. It doesn't seem like this assembly line of beauty that we've seen now, and that's kind of how the 90s were. That's a chapter for William X's book. Me and Thelma from Good Times. Who's that on the left? Rembert. You lying.

Yeah. It's me and Rember. Met Thelma. That's Remberd right there. Yeah. Remberg. You blind? That's Rember. Yeah. I think he and I wear the same shirt right now. Okay. That looks nothing like the rim that I know. We were so excited to meet Thelma. Shout out. That's my nigga.

All right. What's our next category? Rim is really excited to meet Thelma. Like, really? We were like starstruck. The fight scenes, one last thing for what's age the best? The only limitation placed on the fighters they could hit Smith as hard as they could as long as they didn't knock them out.

So it's why a lot of it is like shoulders, body. Nobody's like head hunting with them, but they're fucking hitting them. Also, like, if they are shooting other stuff, he can't have like black eyes and be swelling and shit. Yeah. Yeah, that's bad. And then they had Angelo helping out.

We'll take one more break and then we'll do the rest of the categories. CR, what do you got for great chat, Gordo? So there's a ton in this. But my favorite is in that opening sequence when he's training his clay, and he's on the speed bag. The camera's behind the speed bag, and the way that he is punching it creates the illusion that he's almost on a film strip. And it's being hit in time with the music.

But it almost feels like you're watching like an old film strip because of the way the bag is affecting the way the camera is. That's a good one. I'm just like, dude, you're the fucking good. There's a man, bro. I love in that extended opening scene how fast they're walking when they're coming around the ramp. And it's everybody in concert almost like they're... When they're going into the press conference?

With like real speed and purpose, it's just really cool. And Ollie's entrance for the foreman fights good when the camera's behind him. And he comes out and he doesn't kind of realize how many people are there. And he's kind of like, holy shit. And the camera comes around and catches it, which I think was actually Will Smith's reaction because I don't think he had seen it. So he's kind of like, Jesus. Yeah, there's also like the way that it'll be,

that the screen's completely dark when he gets off the plane in Zaire and it goes out. And then the running in Zaire where it like is like basically somehow above him. Yeah. And then comes in behind him. That's my favorite shot. The running in Zay. He just, the, it goes from being this is this full world that he hasn't explored yet

to this is a guy who. can fill up any world once he gets there. Yeah. So the camera, the camera, like, tells you that. The camera goes,

oh my God, this is a guy, this is a big place. He doesn't know where he's at, blah, blah, blah, blah, but this is Muhammad Ali, so it's just like a matter of time before this world becomes his.

Den of Thieves, Benihana, word, Zaire, obviously. For sure, yeah, Zaire. Kid Cuddy Pursuit Happiness. That's the opening. Sam Cuck. Was there a better title for this movie?

You floated one. Or did you, float one. Yeah, would you say? What was yours? You said, you said, one of you guys. The awakening of Ali? Like the political education, the political awakening. Yeah. The education of Muhammad Ali. The redemption of Muhammad Ali.

Something like that. Like, if you just wanted to do a boxing movie, I'd call it The Champ is here. You know, like, I mean... The Champ is here. The Champ is here is not bad. What do you think of that one, Craig? I like it. Ali should have fucking sold itself. Like, Ali is... Ali is... I know what I know what movie I'm going to You probably have to go with Ali.

Yeah. But you have to go with Ali. I think now it would probably be Ali colon, the champ is here. The way they name movies now. Cash or sex. In game. What's your flex?

The Todd Parker Award for Best Character Entrance goes to Jamie Fox as Bundini Brown. I'm called Bundini. Rhyms with Houdini. He was a Jew too. Some people call me Fast Black. Some people call him a Daddy Mac. And then the show where he's just like,

call him Shorty because he likes him circumcise. Like, this movie in her. he introduces Fox. I know he's only in like six scenes or seven scenes or whatever, but man, like when Michael Mann introduces Jamie Fox, he's like, that's the star.

And I'm telling you, the reason why I think he introduces him that way is because he's really introducing Muhammad Ali's performance persona to the audience. That's what these characters are all. Yeah. Like Malcolm X is his political stuff. This is the making of this guy.

And then when Jamie Fox comes in, the reason why, because even when you watch it, you go like, this guy's not in the movie at a tone. Well, when they go into the press conference, they're saying the lines together. Right. Like, he's introducing you to that part of him. Because the first thing we see from him is the Emmettille stuff, the work ethic, you see the building of a champion. And Angelo is running everything. And Angelo's running everything. And then when Bundini comes in, it's like, oh, my God, this is how.

This is what's took for this guy to become Ali. I like how he also just talks during between rounds as Dundee's talking. Yeah. Because that's why if you watch the fights, he's just fucking yapping. He's doing a podcast as Dundee's like, hey, watch the right.

Bundy's just done the side going nuts. Nobody can touch you, champ. You're the best. Butch's girlfriend, weak link of the film. We mentioned this. This has to be the answer. We just jump three years. I have a different one.

We miss so much. Are you a different one? What do you got? The original music. I do not think this is the right score for this movie. Oh, would you have help? So it's Peter Bork and Lisa Girard who did the insider music and it really works for the insider.

But I think they should have either had an orchestral score or they should have had like a jazz score. Like it does not feel appropriate. It takes you out of the time zone, the time period. And I think it would have just been benefited if they had had like a really good Terran's Blanchard-style jazz orchestral score. I had something different, but it was also

in the actual creative. Michael Mann's grainy, digital type of look works. I love it in collateral, obviously love it in. In this one, I don't know if it works for period. In this one, parts of it didn't feel. Like when you're in 1968?

Yeah. Yeah, sometimes it would just take you out of it a little bit. I think that the trade-off is that the, like, Kinshasa just is a different situation if you're there with, like, a bunch of lights. Obviously. You know, like a lot of, and I don't, you know, he will make a movie with a ton of stakes and a ton on the line, and he will be like, but the camera is on the tip of this pen. And I'm going to shove it in between these two guys while they're fighting. Right. He's a risk taker.

Yeah, but, like, you know. if this movie had to you, the orchestral and for me, the visual sweeping scale of La Clas of the Mohicans, maybe it lands with people differently. I threw this in the Sasha Jenkins Award.

Shasha Gray. Even though it's Sasha Jensen. For actor, you can't believe, didn't become a bigger star. No, to Gay. I don't know. I don't know why she,

she feels like she could have gone pound for pound with all the other ones from that era. Right? Yeah. Yeah. I mean, she, I think she's really good in this movie. She's good and everything. She's good.

I have Michael T for this. That's another one. Why wasn't he a bigger star? Hey, guys, is it possible? That there's some boy. Forces. Hold on me get William X? Van X.

Van X. Is there, is it possible? Van X. Is it possible? There wasn't a climate in the town that could have as many roles for these people as what they need. to explore all of their different. Well, Michael Michelle was on ER. She was on ER. I mean, look.

When the movie came out. Nona Gay was in Crash. Nona Gay was in the Matrix sequel. So is it possible that they're just not enough roles for all of these. Very possible. Performers, yeah. Marvin Gay's daughter. Another special category.

How would Van Lathen get out of this one? Which one? Well, you're in Zaire, and you just started dating a new girl, and your wife said she was. going back to Chicago to take care of your sick child. But now she's back in your room. She's upset. Do you love this new woman?

And she's upset about your new girl, and you're about to have a fight in two weeks. So what do you tell your wife? Do I love her? Yeah, I love her. And let me tell you why. I love her because I have to love her because the CIA is watching me. And by the way, you know the CIA is watching me. You know I'm being watched by the CIA.

The press is on my back. Everyone's on my back. All right? I'm being surveilled. I got a lot of pressure. You know what pressure I don't need? I don't need the pressure of you. When I'm about to have the biggest fight in my entire life.

Why are you doing this to me right now? Why are you doing this to me? Like, ain't nothing happened? Look at that woman. That's way too light skin for me. That's not how I even like him. I'm like you. Right.

But the reality is you're here now. Now I got to think about this. I can go out there and be killed. Have you seen this guy hit the heavy back? Let's go. You know what? Don't even worry about this. We're going to go watch this guy hit the heavy back.

And then after we watch this, this guy hit the heavy bag, you then can make your mind up about whether or not you want to put this on my mind right now. Because I can be killed. Then what? You're killing me right now.

Just by bringing this up to me. Do you know what a much shorter version of this would be? What? Is if Ali just did Vincent from Heat and was like, you knew when we hooked up, baby, that you were going to have to share me. With all the dead people, they should have thrown that in.

What stage of work? Will and Jada, the romance? No, come on, they're doing together. We still got a lot of runway. We are a lot of runway. And by the way, it's a long life. It's working for them. They still got a family.

You know, it's working for them. I didn't really have any of the Westage's the worst that we didn't mention. On the original soundtrack, there is a ton of R. Kelly. Oh, he's in this one. He's in the greatest. The greatest. Is he? It plays in the movie.

I thought one of y'all was going to use that as a needle drop. That's why I'm waiting. That's Bill's last sack. Bill's last zag is... Where am I going? William X's last zag is... William X's last zag is... Guys, I was hanging out with some people this weekend.

Art Kelly, I'm back in on him. That's your... Why would I be hanging out with R. Kelly in this scenario? You're not hanging out with R. Kelly. I'm just listening to his music. Just listen to his music. I'm back in on R. Kelly. That's your last sack.

And then we'll know that it's over when you do that. But that's not... I bet that's... I never really liked Arkelly's music. Ever. I was never a huge fan. What's your favorite R&B? Not R. Kelly.

But just tell me, though. Bill's R&B party. What's that Bill's R&B party? Give me like three songs. I know Sean shit. I'm excuse me, I know... It was never like a huge R&B guy, though. Oh, so you don't like it?

You don't like our music. Oh, it's like early 90s was my era for it. Right. The Keith Sweat. Luther Vandros. See, why are you... You second-guessing yourself, but you're talking that shit right now. I'm just saying, like, I never in the 2000s.

No, forget it. The 90s is where you want to be. Okay, one last. Make it last forever. Make it last. He loves Keith Sweat. I really did love Keith Sweat. All right.

But that's the, but you know, the 2000s is not when the R&B. The 90s is the heyday of the R&B. Yeah, it's New Jack Swing and All that. You need a baker, but it's the third. Now, let me tell you something. I don't know if you know this. But these are, like sex music songs.

There you go. Yeah. That's how you do it. Bill X likes to get down. Or William X. I screwed up the joke. Okay. Any other one stage the worst for you?

One thing. I know the kids when they watch this movie. When he's talking to Nona Gay's character, there's a conversation that they have where she talks about how he came to her school. Yeah, that's a tough one. And he remembers her, even though she was like close. She was 11 years old. She had a brain on.

I called you a little Indian girl. It's the type of she... I told you when I came to your school, baby. Craig, what do you got for a flex? I'm acknowledging that John Voight is very famous and successful as an actor and the whole thing. But for my millennial experience with John Voight, it's not great.

I want to give him the BAM out of Bio 83 point. I did not know this was John Voight until I saw the credits. Wow. Because I try to not look up a lot. I just watch the movie. Credits role, John Void, Howard Cosell, blown away. To me, like, that's Mr. Comer. That's my guy, Mr. Sir, you know, from Holes.

That's National Treasure Guy. And to see him as Howard Cosell crushing it unrecognizable, I thought he was fantastic. He's a phenomenal actor. Whatever he thinks about anything else is his fucking business. But when he gets in front of that camera, he can get. I'm just saying, I'm not going to hope that that is what it is, but he can get busy. Like, he really can. He's good.

the greatest grandfather. The CR thinks Luke Wilson could have been Harrison for it hottest take award. This isn't really a hot take. I think that there is a version of this film that could have been made

and I think Michael Mann would have made an incredible film out of this that's just the Chauncey Eskridge story that's like pretty phenomenal. Now, I don't want it as an alternative to Ali but the idea that a guy was Martin Luther King and Muhammad Ali's lawyer at the same time.

It's fucking incredible, and I can't believe we don't have... The Joe Morton character. Yeah, the Joe Morton character. And that we don't have a film about that, and a film about that guy, is pretty wild. What do you have? This I said already, that Will acts better when he doesn't speak in the movie, and that's, like, really tough to do. But it's a great performance, but a fantastic performance when there's no dialogue. Mine is... I think there's a greatest sports movie about time in here with a different angle, which is basically Ali and Frasier.

and doing it that way. And I would dump all the other stuff. Even though I like it in this movie, I don't care about who is with. I don't care about Malcolm X. I'm just doing him versus Frazier. I don't care about Malcolm X. I'm saying for this movie.

Are you doing basically, Ollie, Frasier, and it's heat? It's these two guys. It's Ollie and Frazier and it's their three fights. Oh, the whole trilogy. That's it. That's my movie. Okay.

And it's about like it's Frazier coming up. And then it's all losing the title. And I'm not in with Islam in the 64. I'm like starting around 68. There's what I'm going through. Okay, wait. So are you doing co-leads in this movie? Yeah.

That's the only thing. That's why it didn't happen because it was an early biopic. You're going to have to sell Joe Frazier to people. For boxing people, Joe Frazier is an incredible. Do you think Michael T. Williamson could have done Joe Frazier? Probably. I had a turn at some point in my life where I actually became T. Joe Frazier because of, I just thought he was putting such a horrible spot with the

all these stuff. I feel like he became the sympathetic figure eventually. It took me, I don't think I was in until my mid-30s until I really fully saw it. So Brian Gumbo had this same thing. Brian Gumbo actually wrote this article back in the day. I remember. Oh, you, yeah. Oh, you talked to you, so that's in when we were kings.

So Brian Gamble had to say, but growing up to me is understanding, like when you listen to Marvish Fraser talk about. about, like, going to school and everybody's making fun of him at school because Ali says your dad is an Uncle Tom. When really this guy was not Uncle Tom. Well, he called him guerrilla. Like, he did some really bad stuff. But growing up is realizing that you're, you know, that's that about your heroes. And once again, the biopic is, what did it cost you?

What are the skeletons? That's what I, you know, and Joe Frazier was the ghost of Minoah book that Mark Kram wrote. There was a Frazier documentary, too. Frazier Ali that's tilted more toward Frazier. That's good. but I just think they're dynamic. And then Ali, to him, it was all about selling the fight, not realizing the cost that was doing to Frasier.

To me, it's a more interesting movie. There is a, so I read an article back in the day about how Joe Frazier carried this his entire life, right? So bitter about it. His entire life. And this actually spilled over into Joe Frazier, a lot of times being way less than sensitive about Ali's Parkinson's

later on his life. He was kind of a joke about it. Yeah, he's like, I still have my faculties. You can tell who won those fights. Yeah, who actually won. Who won those fights. So there's, they were at an event together. And because the article was talking about

how Joe Frazier need to let it go. They were at an event together. And they were like, yo, you guys should hit the heavy bag. And Joe Frazier goes, I'll hit it. And Joe Frazier, who was still in control of all of his shit, gets up there and starts wailing on the heavy bag, you know. This is like in the 80s. So he's probably like in his 50s or something like that.

He hasn't lost any of the time and any of the power. He does all of that stuff. And he comes back feeling like I finally fucked over this guy, right? Ali walks up to the heavy bag and goes, did you guys see that? And the whole room starts laughing. And he made a fool out of him again. And they were just like, Joe just give it up.

He just couldn't get around him. casting what ifs couldn't find any except for Will Smith turned down Ali and then Ali called Will Smith and asked him to do it and at that point you can't say no to Ali and that was that what type of shit do will be on? I don't know but no I think it's justifiable that it's too intimidating of a role

like what are you going to do the man wants to do the you're only like one Smith he got to try it well he needed to get there yeah he's like no I got to do I robot seriously that's probably I mean, that's not a deal. Hold on a Hutzman.

I got to do bagger vans. Do you think that, I mean, do you play out, huh? Do you play out in your head, Denzel, doing this? As Muhammad Ali? I don't think it works. I don't think it works either. I don't think he's big enough either.

He's not big enough. The Will Smith was 6-3. That was part of what made this. He's perfect. He looks like a heavyweight. Yeah, yeah. Best That Guy Award. It's all graduated that guys as, as we mentioned.

Yeah. It's not Barry. Barry Shabon? I think Barry was the one I would go with. But he's a Michael man, that guy. Yeah. Dion Waiters. Don King,

Joe Frazier, or Veronica. Is Jamie eligible? No? No. Too much? Or Veronica, Portia. I think you gotta go... I go Michael T. I go to Don King. I go that too as well.

Recasting couch director, city... Slight case for James, Tony. Just put it out there. I had him on the list. Yeah. Spike Lee. We can talk it out. We can talk Oliver Stone out.

I'm glad it played out the way it did with Michael Mann, because I don't think there was any way to make this movie perfect, so you might as well make it stylistically incredible. And again, like, when did he make Malcolm X? It was like 92. 91 or 92. So if you're doing this version of the movie, I don't know how he just was like, yeah, I'm going to run back my Malcolm X stuff.

I don't know. I think he would have made a different film. He probably would have not had that stuff in at all, right? I think it would have been a really awesome movie, but I don't, like, I accept and like this movie the way it is. Half a Saturday research. Will Smith was a pallbearer at Ali's funeral. Will Smith and Michael Mann put up their salaries

that the movie went over budget. Yeah, because Will Smith was coming off Wild West, so, like, there was some money stuff. Smith didn't want to meet Ali for months, and then seven months in the filming, Ali came to the set and Smith did his whole trash talk Ali thing

for 15 minutes and Ali was impressed and turned to Howard Bingham and said how come he didn't tell me I was so crazy Imagine doing Ali for Ali? This is the guy, bro. Oh you know what? For Dion John Carlo, I think Esposito would

count for Dion wouldn't it? Yeah, he's in four scenes. He's a Moflex category. Okay. What's your flex category? Let's hear it. The David Caruso's Stuff of Legends Award for character who definitely should have been spun off into their own sequel.

I would love to see a movie with Giancarlo as Ali's dad. It's him watching all of this crazy-ass shit happen to his son. I love that character. That character reminded me so much of my dad. That character, think about it. That character's going from watching his son be the best amateur heavyweight to getting it. Then his son joins the nation of Islam. Changes his name.

He got to tell. It's his name. Yeah. So he's done all of this work. And now his name, Cash's Clay, is going to be everywhere. Except it's not. It's not going to be everywhere. A new name will be everywhere.

His son marries the woman, loves the woman. He meets Bundini Brown. I think it would have been a really fucking interesting movie. It was awesome. There's so much. many characters in this movie that you could make a Howard Bingham movie. You could make a Bundini Brown movie. You could make a Bundini movie. You could make a

Cassel movie. You could make a Don King movie. I mean, Frazier. But the more I saw Gene Carlow on screen, the more I wanted to see him. Apex Mountain. Oh, I got one more half that as in the research. The guy, does the actor name Albert Hall in this movie? Yeah. He plays

Elijah Muhammad in this, but in Malcolm X, yeah. In Malcolm X, he plays a character named Baines, who is a fictitious character that was there to sort of be like He leads an amalgam. Malcolm in his prison conversion, right? Right, and he introduces Malcolm to Elijah Muhammad.

In this movie, he plays Elijah Muhammad. He is also the boat commander in Apocalypse now. I had some notes on his living room. Thought we could have needed more furniture. Oh, yeah, William? Yeah. You could say that to the... William X.

...into your designer for the nation of yours. Yeah. What's the last time we read, Way of Superior Man? Pretty big. Best to the Black Man. Apex Mountain. Will Smith This is the apex.

He's taking an L though. He's coming off while west, so he is like, he's wobbling a little. So if not this, what's his apex then? I think it's the Independence Day Man and Ben and Black.

We litigated this when we did enemy of this state, I think. It's in the late 90s. After this, he does a series of like sequels and stuff. Like, yeah. I can make an argument.

He goes, Fresh Prince, Independence Day, men and black. It's tough to be. I make an argument that Will Smith at the absolute peak of his powers is Hitch. Oh, five? Absolute peak of his powers.

Hitch is a movie that legitimately, everything else that we're talking about, all of that stuff, those movies have conceits, big aliens, all that type of shit. Fresh Prince is very close to what I'm talking about. Hitch is Will Smith directly demonstrating what a devastating movie star he is.

He charms us through the entire movie and makes it into a really good film. It's on the rewatcher list. Fox, no. Ali movies, yes. The Jada Will relationship, probably. James Tony, still fighting?

And he's in Ali? Yeah, maybe. Yeah. I think it's 90s for James Day. He was like the undisputed Super Middleweight champion. Don King impersonations in a movie? Yes.

CoSell impersonations, yes. Boxing movies, no. Apex Mountain for Cocelling Impersonation. Oh, hold on. Don King, Ving Rames? Do you remember that one? What was he? Ving Rames did the Don King movie.

Oh, that's on Showtime, right? Like HBO. Or HBO, one of those. HBO, so there's a lot more. The devil is a motherfucker. Michael Mann. No, it's the insider. I think that this is, like I said,

this is the end. We can call Apex Mountain. You can call it the imperial phase, which is like a pop music term, but they're both like, at the peak of their powers, per se. But I don't think this is his apex matter. I think it's insider.

Insider was kind of a box office disappointment, though. No, but it got Oscars. And it leads to, like, I'm going to spend $110 million on my Ali movie. And they're like, go ahead, Michael, man. Right. Yeah, I think that run is the apex. And it might be anybody's apex.

Maybe, like, Spielberg, Deni. It's not too many guys that have them back-to-back like that. Best name for a racehorse, Ali Bumae? or just Bumay Bundini Bundini's right Cruiser Hanks Who would you want to see

Play Ali CR Is it in blackface Or is it No it's just makeup William X Get your guy I had Hanks

As CoSell Okay I mean you'd have to Is that the only way So that Cruz Cruz doesn't have any place Cruz as Angelo Denny

Come on Danny Can I Can I run with you? What do you have, Craig? Sure. Hank's just because. What options do we have? A lot of lot.

Bob Arrow. Scorsese or Spielberg? Bringing it back for this one. Scorsese. Scorsese. Okay. Picking Nets. We mentioned a few.

A big one for me, they show the L.S. Quarry fight. And then Ali goes and meets Joe Morton in the diner. And then three weeks later, MLK gets killed the quarry fight Ellis Quarry happens three weeks after MLK got killed they fucked up the scenes

I was also wondering do you think that Ali found out he won the Supreme Court case from Howard Kosell is that true and sitting at just a table I don't think that was true I think they probably took some liberties when Joe Frazier asked Ali if you needed any money Ali took the money in real life

that scene was true Really? Yeah, yeah, you almost broke. Yeah, he ran out of money. And Joe will bring that up, which is you shouldn't do, by the way. We mentioned the dates that this movie desperately needed dates

and then it's a hardcore Ali Nipik, but he's speaking differently by the time we're in Zaire. He's a little slower. Yeah, he's not as bad as after Manila, but it's definitely like the guy in the 60s is You start to watch it.

You start to watch it happen. He's a little, you know, it's just slowing down a little bit in that they didn't. He just seems the same throughout the movie. Actually, the slowing down becomes a part of it too. They're two very distinct ali's.

There's a super fast talking Ali, and then there's a slower talking Ali. Which is where we are. Yeah, a lot of people remember. Any other nitpics? No. Sequel prequel prestige TV, all black castor untouchable.

Prestage TV would have been, they had like $150 million dollars for a 10 hour. They're doing it. That's what the greatest is? Yeah. That's what it is? Yeah, it's a prestige.

It's an Amazon joint, Michael B. Jordan and them are doing, yeah. Who's playing Ali? I can't remember. But I know that my man, Amon from Snowfall, is playing Sunny Liston. Okay. Is this movie better with Wayne Jenkins, Fergie the Flores, Zane Lo, Robert Evans, Dr. Charles Nichols, or someone else here? Obviously, Fox is incredible, but have you guys thought about Pete Possoway as Bundini Brown? No, I have not.

Now I'm Jewish and he's Muslim. And because of that, he tells me I need to give up certain things like pork and white women. I can give up pork, but white women, not after a little taste. I had Ted Levine as the FBI agent, but as Buffalo Bell. Yeah. Yeah. You heard of Malcolm. You're a big fat person.

Just one, Oscar, who gets it? Interesting category. Fox. I go with Jamie. It's Fox. Would you have Fox or Voight? Oh. I'm going void.

Okay. That's Ali in the thing. A guy named Jalen Best. Okay. Probably in answerable questions. I only had one. Why didn't more boxers try Sunny Liston's Dr. Gloves trick?

Of course they tried the shit out of it. This seems like a great idea for evil boxers. And did Sunny Liston throw the second fight? I mean, almost definitely. Phantom Punch, it depends on which lore you believe. Do you believe the lore that Ali was so quick, he could land a right that the camera couldn't even catch, knock somebody clean out?

Probably the most crooked boxer of the last 75 years? Or do you believe the lore about the fact that the mafia owns Sunny List? I see. They made him take a thought. Also, like, if you watch it, there's a moment when he's down, when he tries to get up and he does like this almost like pro wrestling and falls back down. It's really bad. I always thought he threw it. You'd think he threw it, right?

Yeah, probably. The memorabilia you'd most want from this movie. The one of the toughest ones we've ever had to do for me. The hand tape that the ref signs to be like, I've checked, you know, in the beginning. That's awesome, yeah. I don't know what I would do with used hand tape, but still would be cool. I have the movie robe from the first Liston's fight, Liston fight, where you can see it says the lip on the back.

They try to get him going as the lip. They didn't go. Guess they didn't need a name, Ali. She's calling the greatest. I always like those old vintage gloves. So either the gloves used that Will Smith used and the thing. Zaire. way, with the fight scenes, they tried

all kinds of stuff with gloves to make it so they would look more realistic and nothing worked. Like big, bigger, softer gloves, so it could really, and nothing worked. Coach Finstock, Mr. Marguer were, best, worst life lesson? Dude, free ain't easy, free is real and real as

a motherfucker. Yep. Okay. Best double future choice. I have when we were kings. Malcolm X. I have Malcolm X. Okay. Chris X. Tough one. Who won the movie? I'm to say Michael, man, because that's why I watched the movie. Now, I would say that,

but I do think that his visual style, while fans' points really well taken about whether it works for period, I think his visual style is the reason I return to this film. All I know is you can't necessarily say that Will won the movie. I think actually this is one of the rare

situations where Will's kind of out. And after that, he did get nominated for the first time. He did get nominated for the first time. He did get nominated for the first time. I personally, when I watch on a rewatch this stupid. I kind of think Jamie Fox won the movie. I think as like

a blueprint or And using it as like the springboard. Yeah, I think kind of Jamie Fox won't the movie. And obviously man is like, that's my fucking guy. Yeah, they go back and they do collateral again. Yeah, that makes sense. I have Will Smith in the moment

and then over the years Michael Mann. Because I think he's the reason to keep coming back to this, even though it's a pretty, you know, it's a biopic. Yeah. I don't think I'll be watching the Freddie Mercury biopic.

25 years from now, but this keeps sucking me in. Freddie Mercury biopic has some good scenes in it. What's William X think of Freddie Mercury Biop? Yeah. Enjoyes it. Oh, okay. Yeah. Like Freddy's music. Yeah. William X contains so many different.

Craig, you never saw this movie. No. You blanched at the time. He were scared. I mean, it really was long. It's like a fucking football game. Yeah, but once you get, once he gets rolling, you're like, all right. I thought the acting across the board in this movie was

superb. I thought everybody was just fantastic. I thought there were a lot of shit. Like Zaire was amazing. The CoSel stuff I thought was great. The Malcolm X stuff I thought was great. I don't know. It's probably a generational thing, but I felt they just kind of disconnected to this movie. I don't know why. I just felt like something was missing out of this movie and I don't know what it was.

I think I struggled with, I couldn't really feel the weight of all these talent as a boxer in this movie. Like, to be honest, I wasn't like this guy's an amazing boxer watching the movie. I didn't know what's funny about that? that's the one thing that the movie being made for us that you don't have to convince us of.

Right. And I, you know, other than like clips here and there, I don't really know. Like, I was kind of bummed that we didn't really get a lot of the feet stuff, which I understand Will Smith can't do. But the movie magic of trying to really make, maybe I'm just like rocky and creed brained or I like a little bit more of the theatrical boxing style. But like when the movie ended, I was kind of like, I don't know. I was like, I don't exactly know what my takeaway is supposed to be or what the point of view is supposed to be from this movie. But I enjoyed it. Maybe it's about too many different things. Maybe.

It could be. Maybe the movie is a little bit about political stuff, a little bit about personal stuff. Like, it didn't seem that much about boxing to me. When the movie ended at boxing, I was like, oh, okay. Do you think we'll ever get to the point where we can just CGI the actor's face

over the actual boxing footage for a boxing movie? We don't want that. Why would you want that? I don't know. I'm asking. I'm asking. The answer is yes. We could definitely do that.

Probably do it right now. Like it's... With Smith's face on old Muhammad Ali footage. I'm saying for some of the... Just slide it in so that we get all the athleticism and stuff from Ali. They do, like, D-H actors and put them and make them right. The Irishman.

You like the Irishman. I'm saying, would we ever cheat? Could you accept it? Like you put Muhammad Ali's legs on Will Smith or something? Almost like what they tried to do with Forrest Gump when they put Forrest and the different... Well, I mean, what you're really asking for is for there to be like an AI facsimile of

because that would work the best, right? Like, what you're asking for is an AI facsimile that can approximate the speed, power, and position at time. Just watch a fucking Muhammad Ali YouTube video. That's the problem. Yeah. That's the thing. I think if you wanted to do something where it was like,

I want Timothy Shalameh to play like a middleweight fighter, but he's, you know, like, there are limits of what he can do. Well, that's a good example, though, because the ping pong was all AI. Yeah. He wasn't actually playing ping pong. It was CGI. I mean, CGA.

Yeah. So he wasn't playing, he was playing ping pong, but wasn't playing at the level of the movie. The deal here is that, like, when you're a boxer, it's something you've been doing, most of the great, it's not all of them. But most of it's something you've been doing since you're eight or nine years old. And they're like fast and slow twitch muscle things. There's movement. There's angles. There's all of that stuff that you just can't get ready for in a movie camp to kind of like look like you know how to do it.

That's a lot of things like that. Yeah. So you just spend. But it's refreshing to see William X open to new technology. Right. Because a lot of our religious leaders are a little bit, you know.

But you, you know, oh, William X, when is the next Million Man March? You know what's a good boxing movie? For boxing scenes, the hammer with Adam Carolla. Is that? Oh, yeah, it is. Because Corolla actually boxed.

One of the rare ones. Everyone else kind of learns how to box for the movie. But rarely do we get the actor leading the movie who actually boxes. Boxes a little bit. Did Stallone box? Did he mess around in the gym? No, he kind of learned how to do it.

Is there a boxing story that you would love to see made into a movie? A fighter, a fight. Easy for me. Emil Griffin. Oh, good documentary. Emil Griffin. Why, Bill?

He killed somebody in the ring. That's not why. Well, and had some, just hiding some secrets. Yeah. He was gay the whole time Middleweight Yeah

Like just one of the Most dominant Middleweight Fucking over everybody But also Gay guy And the guy He killed in the ring

Kept making fun of him For being gay Oh wow And he killed him in the ring Jesus It's a good documentary Did they make a Ward Gotti movie Well they did not

But they made the fighter But somehow Ward Gotti was in it I always thought a great movie Would be Sugar Ray Leonard winning the Hearns fight, getting into like cocaine and the detached retina and then the five years leading to the Haggar fight.

Did Sugar Ray get to, and obviously Emil Gryffin is much more obscure than Sugar Ray, that would be about the story and not about the thing. Did Sugar Ray get to biopic level? I mean, I personally think he did for some of the movies that have been biopics. Like, did Cinderella man get to a biopic level?

That's more about the depression. Shigray was the most famous fighter since Ali before Tyson. He was. Like, he definitely was. But, like, there was something to where he seemed, like, a bridge between Ali and Tyson. Like, he held it down. So...

But to me, that the Sugar Ray story is, like, Ralph Samson getting hurt in the 86 finals, but then coming back and winning the 93 finals or something. Like, it felt like his career was kind of over. detached retina seemed like a death sentence. And he started to have a whole bunch of issues. Right. Then came back and then when he fought Hagler,

it was like a four to one underdog. Like four years, three years off? How many years off? It took five. Yeah, like, it just comes back. Fought him in 87. Like, do you, does any of this ring a bell or none of you?

I mean, I know all these names, obviously, but yeah. Yeah. 80s, man. CR, thank you. Thank you for having, Nathan. Thank you. Craig and Gahow, thank you. Eduardo, thank you. us to think. Matt.

Matt, thank you. We'll be back next week on the rewatchables with the 30-year anniversary of She's the One, which you can watch on Netflix before we do the podcast. There you go.