To some people he is an “as seen on TV” pitchman who spent much of the last thirty years shilling for the Lean Mean Fat-Reducing Grilling Machine. To others he is an indestructible two-time world heavyweight champion and an Olympic gold medalist. To still others, he is Reverend Foreman, a man of faith who preached on street corners before becoming the minister of the Church of the Lord Jesus Christ in Houston.
He’s George Foreman, the subject of “Big George Foreman: The Miraculous Story of the Once and Future Heavyweight Champion of the World,” a new biopic now playing in theatres.
When we first meet Foreman (Khris Davis) he is a young boxer from an impoverished background with a mighty punch and anger issues. “George should change his name from Foreman to Poor-man,” taunt the kids at his school.
Scarred by a troubled past, and narrowly avoiding being arrested, he leaves Houston to find “his unrealized potential” with the Job Corps, a government run vocational training center.
It’s here, under the tutelage of trainer Doc Broadus (Forest Whitaker), that he learns to channel his anger into a winning streak in the squared circle. “Listen to me George,” says Broadus, “you got a punch like I’ve never seen. But in every battle, the greatest foe we will combat, is in here,” he continues, pointing at the fighter’s forehead.
After the 1968 Summer Olympics, where he won a gold medal in the boxing/heavyweight division, he followed a string of knockouts to the big time, a 1972 match against the undefeated and undisputed World Heavyweight Champion Joe Frazier. He walked into the ring a 3:1 underdog, and left it with a champion belt.
Two years later he lost the belt to Muhammad Ali (Sullivan Jones) at the historic “Rumble in the Jungle” in Zaire. With no title, he spent the balance of the 1970s chasing a rematch and another chance at the belt before a near death experience set him on a spiritual path that saw him spend ten years as a minister. “It’s like He reached inside me and took all my anger,” he says. “I can’t even make a fist anymore.”
When his church and community center fall into financial trouble, he laces up the gloves again. “There’s only two thongs I know how to do,” he says, “box and preach. And preachin’ won’t pay the bills.”
Sports commentators call him an old man in a young man’s game, but he is a minister on a mission, and unbelievably, becomes, at age 45, the oldest World Heavyweight Boxing Champion ever.
“Big George Foreman” is a by-the-book biopic, by the way of the good book. It’s a standard, faith-based cradle to grill biography that hits the highs and some of the lows—like hiding under an open sewer pipe to avoid police—in service of its messaging.
“Raging Bull” this ain’t.
Davis captures the glower, born out of internalized anger, that characterized Foreman’s early career, and the lighter attitude that came to the fore in his later life. He makes Foreman a compelling, charismatic character, despite a script that plays it safe and without a hint of grit.
“Big George Foreman” shaves down all the rough edges of the boxer’s story, replacing them with uplift and life lessons. It never feels entirely authentic, but its messages of the importance of faith are heard loud and clear.
Richard joins Jay Michaels and guest host Deb Hutton of the NewsTalk 1010 afternoon show The Rush to talk about the morbid history of the Sourtoe Cocktail and some new releases in theatres, the Ryan Reynolds action comedy “Free Guy” and the Aretha Franklin biopic “Respect.”
Two years ago, the documentary “Amazing Grace” showcased Aretha Franklin remarkable 1972 two-night stand at the New Temple Missionary Baptist Church in Los Angeles. It’s a soul stirring window into Franklin’s vocal ability as she caresses and stretches the notes of the songs to maximum effect.
A new film, “Respect,” starring Jennifer Hudson and now playing in theatres, broadens the scope, detailing Franklin’s life from her beginnings, singing in her father’s church, to the height of her fame.
We first meet Aretha as a ten-year-old (Sky Dakota Turner) phenom, blessed with a beautiful voice. “You have a talent,” her Baptist minister father Clarence (Forest Whitaker) says, “they call genius.” She’s ten, says a friend, but her voice is going on thirty. Her guiding light is mother Barbara (Audra McDonald), who tells her, “Singing in sacred and you shouldn’t do it because somebody wants you to. What’s important is that you are treated with dignity and respect.”
Despite that advice, her father controls every aspect of her life. Using his connections, Rev. Franklin secures a recording contact with music producer John Hammond (Tate Donovan) at Columbia Records. Four low-selling albums of jazz and blues standards follow as she struggles to find her voice on vinyl.
The climb to the top of the charts came with advice from a legend, Dinah Washington (Mary J. Blige), who told her, “Honey, find the songs that move you. Until you do that, you ain’t going nowhere,” and a new manager (and love interest) in the form of Ted White (Marlon Wayans). Taking the career reigns from Franklin’s father, White breaks ranks with Columbia, and gets a new record deal and a new sound with producer Jerry Wexler (Marc Maron).
As Franklin becomes known as the Queen of Soul, she and White struggle with personal demons that threaten to sidetrack her rise to superstardom.
First and foremost, “Respect” is a tribute to the genius of Aretha Franklin and the talent of Jennifer Hudson. Franklin left an indelible mark on several generation and styles of music, and her life’s work is well represented here, from her roots in the church, to her genre-bending chart toppers and the civil rights activism that defined her life off stage.
Hudson is given ample opportunity to showcase Franklin’s vocal stylings, and does so with a voice that sounds heaven sent. As a rousing jukebox musical “Respect” succeeds spectacularly well.
It’s in the telling of Franklin’s life that the movie hits a few sour notes. There is a lot of ground to cover, from alcoholism and racism to sexism and becoming pregnant at the age of 12, it’s a complicated story told in fits and starts, wedged between musical numbers.
The film’s early scenes, featuring the wonderful Skye Dakota Turner as the ten-year-old “Ree,” are nicely developed and paint a vivid picture of Franklin’s young life. It’s when “Respect” adopts the Wikipedia bullet point approach to quickly cover a lot of ground that the movie loses some of its dramatic thrust.
“Respect” skims the surface of a long, interesting life—the story ends rather abruptly in 1972 with the recording of Franklin’s landmark “Amazing Grace” gospel album—but presents a rousing tribute to Franklin’s lifeblood, the music.
Richard and CTV NewsChannel anchor Marcia MacMillan have a look at some movies to pass the time over the holidays including the Amazon Prime Video holiday flick “The Happiest Season” with Kristen Stewart and Dan Levy, the stop motion “Alien Xmas” on Netflix, the Netflix musical “Jingle Jangle: A Christmas Journey” starring Forest Whitaker, the Jillian Bell comedy “Godmothered” on Disney+ and Kurt Russell and Goldie Hawn as Mr. and Mrs. Claus in “The Christmas Chronicles: Part Two” on Netflix.
“Black Panther is on track to make $165 million this weekend, so we will be seeing more of that character, we’ll be seeing more of films that stretch the dimensions of what a big superhero movie can be,” said film critic Richard Crouse… Read the whole thing HERE!
For those who complain that the recent spate of superhero movies aren’t about anything other than bombast and reaching into your wallet, I give you Black Panther. Directed by Ryan Coogler and starring Chadwick Boseman in the title role, it’s a movie that delivers wham-bam action but serves it up with compelling sides of mythology and social awareness.
“Part of my frustration that led me to write,” says playwright of the Tony Award-winning play Eclipsed and Black Panther star Danai Gurira, “was that I didn’t see stories that allowed truths to be told about the continent and about our potential and our power and our dimensionality and our perspective and our personality and our languages. What was really exciting to me was to see all of that embodied in what Wakanda and the Black Panther narrative bring with the African perspective. It is completely unprecedented.”
The film starts with a quick origin story, detailing the introduction of vibranium to the small (fictional) African nation of Wakanda. This mysterious metal is a wonder. Near indestructible, it can absorb kinetic energy and has imbued a Wakandan flower called the Heart-Shaped Herb with a supercharge that gives superpowers when ingested.
Cut to modern day. After his father’s death T’Challa (Boseman) is crowned king but just as he is ordained a rare Wakandan artifact made of vibranium is lifted from a London museum by two very bad men, Ulysses Klaue (Andy Serkis) and Erik “Killmonger” Stevens (Michael B. Jordan).
To retrieve the precious metal, T’Challa, a.k.a. Black Panther, along with spy Nakia (Lupita Nyong’o) and warrior Okoye (Gurira), travel to Korea where the artefact is about to be sold to CIA agent Everett K. Ross (Martin Freeman).
A wild battle leads to a power struggle that may not only compromise the throne of Wakanda but also threaten the safety of the world.
“I loved the idea of being able to enact a nation that was never colonized,” says Gurira, who also plays the katana-wielding Michonne on The Walking Dead. “I grew up in post-colonial Africa. There is a lot of work that goes into reclaiming who you are, how you define your place in the world and what your power potential truly is when you have been colonized.
“One thing that colonized people don’t have is that part of their history that tells them who they would have been had they never been colonized. The beauty of Wakanda is that is shows us something. It’s a celebration. So many things are pulled from actual stories and narratives. The costumes, the language are actually African. It is a celebration of a place that often gets distorted or misrepresented or presented as something deficient, which we all know, Africa is so not.”
Black Panther takes place in a couple of time frames (NO SPOILERS HERE!) but at its heart it is a timely story about social responsibility — a wealthy nation state must confront its role in the world — that pulsates with smart commentary about race and revolution. It takes a well-known comic book character, the first Black standalone superhero in the Marvel Universe, and delivers a movie ripe with subtext. Black Panther is not only capable of fighting the bad guys but is also a vessel for the film’s study of legacy and identity.
For those who complain that the recent spate of superhero movies aren’t about anything other than bombast and reaching into your wallet, I give you “Black Panther.” Directed by Ryan Coogler and starring Chadwick Boseman in the title role, it’s a movie that delivers wham-bam action but serves it up with compelling sides of mythology and social awareness.
The film starts with a quick origin story, detailing the introduction of vibranium to the small (fictional) African nation of Wakanda. This mysterious metal is a wonder. Near indestructible, it can absorb kinetic energy and has imbued a Wakandan flower called the Heart-Shaped Herb with a supercharge that gives superpowers when ingested.
Cut to modern day. After his father’s death T’Challa (Boseman) is crowned King but just as he is ordained a rare Wakandan artefact made of vibranium is lifted from a London museum by two very bad men, Ulysses Klaue (Andy Serkis) and Erik “Killmonger” Stevens (Michael B. Jordan).
To retrieve the precious metal T’Challa, a.k.a. Black Panther, along with spy Nakia (Lupita Nyong’o) and warrior Okoye (Danai Gurira), travel to Korea where the artefact is about to be sold to CIA agent Everett K. Ross (Martin Freeman).
A wild battle ensues to a power struggle that may not only compromise the throne of Wakanda but also threaten the safety of the world.
“Black Panther” takes place in a couple of time frames—NO SPOILERS HERE!—but at its heart it is a timely story about social responsibility—a wealthy nation state confronting its role in the world—that pulsates with smart commentary about race and revolution.
“The world is going to start over,” Killmonger declares, “and this time we are on top!” It’s the kind of thing movie bad guys have been saying for years but this time around the villain is so multi-layered and interesting it packs an extra punch. Jordan isn’t just evil—although he is pretty bad; covered in scars for every person he’s ever killed—he’s a villain with a purpose. His motivations are personal—AGAIN: NO SPOILERS HERE!—but when he suggests arming the, “two billion people who look like me all over the world,” with vibranium he’s not just speaking as a revolutionary but as someone hungry for representation and recognition. It’s a powerful message and Jordan brings it home in a performance that is both intense and very emotional.
Letitia Wright plays T’Challa’s sixteen-year old sister Shuri and steals most every scene she appears in. Imagine James Bond’s Q with a snappier wit and more brains than Tony Stark. She has some of the movie’s best lines and is destined to become a featured player in future instalments.
Boseman has made a career of playing iconic characters on screen. As sports legend Jackie Robinson in “42” or James Brown, the Godfather of Soul, in “Get on Up,” or Thurgood Marshall, the first African-American Supreme Court Justice in “Marshall,”: he has breathed new life into characters we thought we already knew. Here he takes a well-known comic book character, the first black standalone superhero in the Marvel Universe, and delivers a performance ripe with subtext. His Black Panther is not only capable of fighting the bad guys but is also a vessel for the film’s study of the importance of legacy and identity.
“Black Panther” pushes the Marvel Universe past the typical Avengers style bombast fests like “Age of Ultron.” This is a breath of fresh air, a warm breeze along the lines of “Ant-Man” or “Doctor Strange,” films that transcend the superhero genre, pushing the form into new, unexplored territory. It may be a tad too long and slightly uneven in it’s first hour but with its strong female characters—who work together rather than as opponents—an Afrocentric story and social commentary it feels like the perfect movie for right now.
