Image by Sony Pictures
“Big George Foreman” the movie has finally arrived in theaters. The film focuses on the life of former heavyweight boxing champ George Foreman. The extraordinary and long awaiting comeback story of heavyweight boxing champ George Foreman, has taken numerous years to make. Some might believe that it took so long because Foreman lived in the shadow of his peer Muhammad Ali.
In 1974, George Foreman lost the Rumble In The Jungle boxing match to the sensational Muhammad Ali, who happened to be a heavy underdog in the bout.
After George Foreman’s boxing career ended, He gained popularity as a television pitchman for a line of cooking products including the successful George Foreman Grill. The generation today might not know how extraordinary his boxing career was. Foreman won his first heavyweight title bout in 1973. And after a long period of losing his interest in the sport of boxing, he came back and won another title in 1994, at the age of 45.
His new film “Big George Foreman,” directed by George Tillman, Jr., to me, fell shockingly flat in telling the story of this once great prominent boxer. Instead of being a miraculous feel-good story, it turned out to be a cheesy poorly-made film that fails to latch on to the audience’s emotions. There was no sense of edge-of-your-seat drama in sight.
Even with a great ensemble cast of Foreman which is played by the charismatic “Khris Davis” and his mentor and trainer Doc Broadus played by Forest Whitaker, the film still failed to deliver that powerful biopic that we have seen in the past from other sports films. In my opinion, I believe the creators of this film were afraid of alienating our sympathies to actually reveal the sharper edges of the character.
With that being said, I still feel moviegoers should go out and give the film a chance even if it’s just to get a better understanding of who George Foreman was as a boxer. I give the film a 2 out of 5 stars. Big George Foreman is in theaters now.
