a review of 一代拳王

1st Annual Criterion Challenge Week 8: Oscar Winners I went into this one having no real knowledge of the impact of the Rumble in the Jungle fight beyond a basic understanding of Muhammad Ali as an icon who came along a bit before my time. I came away feeling a lot more informed about Ali, the music festival held around the fight, and his opponent George Foreman's early career, while also wanting to do some more research on all three. Although Foreman was a familiar face to me from his boxing comeback in the late '80s (and later as a commercial pitchman/sitcom star), I realized that I didn't know much about him as a contemporary of Ali. And the documentary does a great job of building a portrait of Foreman as a figure with many of the same qualities of Ali, but without the electrifying charisma that made Ali the superstar of his sport. Knowing how Foreman was able to build a much bigger following for his comeback, it makes me wonder if he spent time studying how Ali got people on his side and tuned his image to become a more approachable/rootable personality.