Reviewed by Colin Jacobson (March 3, 2026)
Biopics can be very tough to pull off and they become toughest when they involve already-famous personalities. Heck, the makers of A Beautiful Mind ran into trouble for some liberties, and John Nash was not a terribly well known person prior to that effort.
When filmmakers take on subjects like George Patton or Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart, the challenges escalate. However, at least we don’t know those folks well through vivid historical documents.
The actors involved in those tales had a fair amount of leeway to make the personalities their own. When a movie takes on someone who became famous in the TV age, the challenges increase so the more famous the person, the more difficult a successful biopic could be.
So what do you do when you create a biography about one of the world’s most famous men? Pray, I suppose.
In any case, that didn’t stop director Michael Mann from trying. He attempted to tell us the story of Muhammad Ali in this 2001 epic.
Actually, Mann didn’t try to cover all of Ali’s life. Just like Patton only covered the general’s World War II experiences, Ali sticks with a specific period of time, albeit one that lasted longer than WWII.
Ali starts in early 1964 and covers a decade of the boxer’s life. It begins with his seminal bout against Sonny Liston and concludes with his rousing battle against George Foreman.
In between the film focuses on a few specific topics. We watch the relationship between Cassius Clay (Will Smith) and black Muslim leaders like Malcolm X (Mario Van Peebles) and Elijah Muhammad (Albert Hall).
The latter eventually redubs Clay as Muhammad Ali. The boxer becomes a huge star due to his flamboyant personality, but he takes some knocks via his involvement with the controversial Muslims.
Matters become worse for Ali when the military drafts him and he refuses to go. Though he avoids jail time through a series of court appeals, but Ali loses scads of money because he can’t get permits to fight.
Eventually he earns his freedom again, and he engages in a few different bouts. The movie climaxes with the 1974 “Rumble in the Jungle” against Foreman.
Back in 2001, I looked forward to Ali and expected to like it. However, I felt disappointed by the film.
Although I’m too young to have experienced Ali’s early days, I clearly recall the huge fame the boxer enjoyed during my childhood. Heck, I even owned an Ali action figure when I was seven or so!
Since the film covers a period before I became old enough to follow Ali, I was interested to get a better idea of what had happened. To be sure, I had a rudimentary understanding of Ali’s life, but I hoped the movie would flesh out those days.
Unfortunately, my knowledge of the era remains pretty basic because Ali doesn’t dig deeply. In many ways, the movie feels like a “greatest hits” reel.
Ali flits from topic to topic fairly quickly and it rarely offers any depth. Ali’s interactions with the Muslims during the mid-Sixties and his fight to stay out of jail toward the end of the decade make up most of the film, but they seem somewhat rushed.
Granted, that may be inevitable for a movie with such a wide scope. Nonetheless, I think director Michael Mann could have followed his subject in a more substantial way.
Ali often feels like it elevates style over substance. Mann offers his usual flash and panache, but those elements fall flat for the most part.
Even the boxing sequences lack much impact, and a lot of the film honestly comes across like a wannabe. Toward the end, Ali runs through Zaire and people follow along with him in a manner that prompted me to wonder when “Gonna Fly Now” would swell in my speakers.
The movie also rarely seems like anything more than a puff piece that glorifies Ali. I can’t say I expected it to be really down and dirty, but it glosses over his flaws and comes across too much like a hagiography.
We see his adultery and some other issues, but we’re never given any indications of problems caused by these. Ali’s women come and go, and they make no impact whatsoever.
However, with the exception of most of the female characters, the supporting cast of Ali does make the film seem more substantial. The flick packs a fine roster of talent, and most overcome the slim nature of their parts.
Some get totally lost in the shuffle, though. For example, I knew LeVar Burton appeared in the film, but not until I watched the credits did I realize he portrayed Martin Luther King in a couple of “blink and you’ll miss him” scenes.
Otherwise, some of them bring a lot to the table. Jon Voight earned a well-deserved Oscar nod for his warm and human take on Howard Cosell.
This is a tough part. I suppose younger folks don’t recall Cosell well, but for many of us, he remains a vividly remembered presence.
Voight had a lot to lose, but he manages to make the broadcaster seem real and three-dimensional. Never does his work come across like a simple impersonation. Even buried under much makeup, Voight does nicely.
Mykelti Williamson imbues promoter Don King with all of the appropriate bluster, and Ron Silver miraculously brings substance to the nearly unwritten part of trainer Angelo Dundee. Of course, Mann never fleshes this out Dundee’s relationship with Ali but Silver’s presence almost makes us understand it without exposition.
Jamie Foxx displays remarkably little ego as cornerman Drew “Bundini” Brown. Shown with balding head and paunchy gut, Foxx looks miles away from the aspiring hunk and hero of 2000’s Bait.
Brown’s another woefully underwritten part, but Foxx adds some life and zest to the role. He really lets himself show the depths to which the character sinks.
As I’ve perused other reviews of Ali, I’ve noticed many people who express that they usually don’t like Will Smith as an actor but they loved him here. My feelings run the other way: normally I like Smith a lot, but I didn’t care for his take on Ali.
One of the most charismatic men of our time, Smith fails to bring much spark or life to the role. He seems oddly dazed and subdued much of the time so Smith’s own natural charisma is nowhere to be seen.
I also found it tough to suspend my disbelief. I could buy Voight and Williamson as well-known personalities, but Smith couldn’t pull off the title role.
Since he remains onscreen for virtually the whole film, Smith suffers the tougher challenge, but he simply never makes me feel I’m watching the Champ. Instead, it feels like a flat and bland imitation.
Considering that director Mann made the tale of a fat, middle-aged corporate whistle-blower compelling two years earlier with The Insider, you’d think he could do wonders with The Greatest. However, the movie suffers from scattershot storytelling, an excessive emphasis on style, and a surprisingly uncharismatic performance from its lead actor.
Muhammad Ali’s life merits a great film. Ali fails to become that movie.
