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Tyson (2009)
Directed by James Toback

If you are around my age, your first memorable experience of Mike Tyson as a notorious public figure was the “bite heard ‘round the world” against Evander Holyfield in 1997. I remember vividly the L.A. Times’ front page photo close-up of the ear, sweaty and glistening, a bloody hook-shaped chunk torn from its center. I remember watching both bites replayed in slow motion over and over again on television. I have seen people look at photos or televised images of the man, shake their heads, and mutter about what an animal he is, what a violent, unstable maniac. James Toback’s documentary provides something of a response to these simplifying statements; you will not think of Mike Tyson the same way after seeing this movie.

The film is literally all Mike. No one else is interviewed, nobody else gives their opinion, no one is there to explain, analyze, censor, or buffer him. He sits in front of the camera, a hulking giant of a man, calm, honest, and introspective, and does the best he can to explain himself and why he does the things he does.

Through archival footage, we watch Tyson’s rise from the streets of Brooklyn to the home of his mentor and father figure Gus D’Amato, from the heavyweight championship to prison and back again. We see him then and we see him now, a grown man talking about his pigeon-keeping days as a boy, how another boy grabbed one of his beloved birds and twisted its head off before his eyes. He talks about being chubby and being bullied, about how he will to this day do anything to avoid being physically humiliated. He talks about his attraction to beautiful, strong, intelligent, independent women, and his subsequent need to “dominate them sexually” (well said, Mike, well said). He denies the rape conviction that landed him in prison, and calls a man on the street a “little white bitch” before shouting menacingly “I’ll fuck you ‘til you love me.” He discusses the horror of watching prison inmates throw their own feces at one another, and watches with a confused half smile as his ex-wife Robin Givens tells Barbara Walters how frightened she is of him. A complicated man, to say the least, one who seems impossible to explain in any simple terms.

Tyson is absolutely riveting, alternately frightening, funny, shocking, exhilarating, and thought provoking. Director James Toback does a brilliant job of letting Mike speak for himself, which makes it both easier to identify with and easier to criticize him, depending on your personal viewpoint. Toback’s familiarity and close personal relationship with Mike in real life is evident in the sensitivity, respect, and sometimes confusion that come through in the film. And in the midst of the controversy surrounding his personal life, people tend to forget that this guy was an absolutely phenomenal fighter. The boxing footage is jaw-dropping, particularly for those of us who never got to see him in action during his prime. The man was an absolute juggernaut.

This is the best film I have seen this year so far (its is currently June 27), and is certainly one of the most compelling documentaries I have seen in a long time (only Street Fight and Errol Morris’ The Fog of War, a very similar film in terms of style, even come close). Do yourself a favor and see it. You won't forget it.

AND...

Muhammad Ali The Greatest, 1964-1974 (1974)
Directed by William Klein

We can’t talk about boxing without acknowledging the Greatest himself. The man from Louisville, Kentucky, born Cassius Clay, was not only one of the most dominant fighters of his era, but remains one of the most legendary sports figures of all time (perhaps topped only by His Royal Airness, basketball legend Michael Jordan). Ali’s brash, outspoken manner channeled his religious and political beliefs into the public eye with the force of a right hook, making him one of the most notorious and divisive celebrities of his day. Between 1964 and 1974, he was persecuted for his beliefs, refused to fight in the Vietnam War, had his championship belt and title stripped, and was banned from boxing for a number of years. His triumphant return to the top in 1974, chronicled in detail in When We Were Kings (1996), is perhaps the most well-known fight in boxing history. This ten-year period, focusing on Ali’s fights against Sonny Liston in 1964 and 1965, and the “Rumble in the Jungle” against George Foreman in 1974, is compellingly captured by William Klein in his fly-on-the-wall documentary The Greatest.

Klein’s camera is everywhere, in Ali’s gym, at press conferences, hotels, ringside, in the streets. He captures interviews with Don King, Mobutu Sese Seko, and perhaps most incredibly, Malcolm X. He films the Beatles visiting Ali’s gym for a photo shoot in 1964. He follows an all-Black acting class in New York City as they improvise scenes using Ali as a character. And he roams the streets of New York, Boston, Kinshasa, and the fields of Maine, filming the people, young and old, who bear witness to Ali’s athletic prowess and the zeitgeist he was so instrumental in creating. The result is one of the most fascinating documents of Ali in his prime I have seen.

Less a linear narrative than a series of sketches, moods, and drawn out riffs, Klein’s film is not nearly as accessible to an audience conditioned on bare-bones narrative cinema, like we Americans, as When We Were Kings. An American expatriate living in France, Klein seems to have adopted the more European characteristics of a psychological, mood-based filmmaking style, and as a result, the movie drags at times. He tries to give it all a structure by dividing it into chapters, but let’s face it: this film is basically an amorphous mass.

However, if you are willing to stick with it, the rewards are significant. The footage is raw and alive with movement and energy. The film’s strength lies in its complete thoroughness in capturing the time period, focusing just as much on your average citizen as it does on well-known public figures. Though lacking the highly personal depth and intimacy of a film like Tyson (2009), The Greatest is nearly as interesting through a very different approach: instead of focusing on a person, it focuses on people. Yes, it rambles at times, and yes, it may seem a bit shapeless, but this should in no way deter you from watching it. It is definitely worth your while.