The Great White Hope (1970)

Save your money for something good and enjoyable

One of my all time favorites.

Entertaining from beginning to end, it maintains the spirit of the franchise while establishing it's own seal with a fun cast

A movie that not only functions as a solid scarefest but a razor-sharp satire.

James Earl Jones has certainly done fine in his career; if he ever feels his talent has been overlooked, I'm sure that, after supplying the voice of Darth Vader and CNN, he's crying all the way to the bank.Still, I regret that he hasn't left us a greater body of work on film that is worthy of his talent. Much of his best work has been performed on stage. (For instance, right now he's performing with Cicely Tyson on Broadway in a hit revival of *The Gin Game* -- go see it if you can!)But in films? After *The Great White Hope*, you'd think Jones would have been deluged with offers for Oscar-caliber roles in Oscar-caliber films; instead, we saw him (performing admirably) in a series of mediocre films and a short-lived TV series. Like many actors, he was probably glad to be working at all -- a gig's a gig, as they say. But he deserved better. No wonder he seems to prefer the theater.So I treasure *The Great White Hope*, not only because it's a great, great movie,but also because it is the single shining gem in the film career of a great actor -- who deserved more recognition from Hollywood than he got.(And to be fair to this magnificent film, I must also acknowledge the other actors, all superb.)

Martin Ritt's "Great White Hope" is loosely based on the public life of famed black heavyweight champ Jack Johnson, who won a series of highly promoted boxing matches during the early 1900s. The film's derived from a Howard Sackler play by the same name.Loosely affiliated with communist movements, Ritt spent several years under a Hollywood blacklist. When McCarthyism died down, and directorial reigns were returned to him, Ritt made a series of socially conscious films, most about struggles for equality, or which portrayed the downtrodden (African Americans, Native Indians, society's poor and marginalised) in a sympathetic light. In this regard, "Hope" deals with a black man who finds himself besieged by both a white status quo and black groups which wish he'd dump his white lover and stop pandering to white gaze's."The Great White Hope" is an interesting film, very underrated, but its script is thin and can't accommodate any of the ideas it pretends to be about. Ritt's direction is classy throughout, and the film sports a powerful performance by actor Jams Earl Jones; he plays Johnson as an overwhelming bear of a man.Incidentally, "Hope" ends with our hero losing a climactic match. Johnson won this match in real life, but the film's going for a more generalised sense of failure. The real Johnson would die in a car crash after being refused a meal at a "white's only" diner. Today, activists continue to fight for the expungement of Johnson's criminal record (he was arrested on the basis of the racist Mann Act).7.9/10 – Thin but underrated.

I'm reminded of the tag line to the 1962 Western film "The Man Who Shot Liberty Valance" - "When the legend becomes fact, print the legend"."The Great White Hope" is a thinly veiled portrayal of the first black world heavyweight boxing champion Jack Johnson, who reigned from 1908 to 1915. The 'real' story put to celluloid would have been even more compelling than what was presented here, and I have to wonder why virtually every boxing story about real fighters put to film follows this pattern of poetic license. It was true as far back as 1942's "Gentleman Jim" (about champion Jim Corbett) right up to the modern era's "The Hurricane" (Rubin Carter). An exception might be the 1956 film "Somebody Up There Likes Me"; former champ Rocky Graziano gave the picture thumbs up regarding his life story.Apart from the historical aspects though, and treating the picture as a fictional story, the movie is actually quite compelling and provocative. I must say, I never considered James Earl Jones as the athletic type, but he's really sensational as Jack Jefferson. His physique supports the idea that he's a formidable boxer, though not in the same way as Stallone's Rocky who was cut to the crisp in "Rocky III". As Jack's girlfriend Eleanor, Jane Alexander delivers a stunning performance culminating in that Mexican breakup scene that's heart rending in emotional impact. That has to be one of the most intense personal scenes ever put to film, the result of which ends in tragedy that's almost unbearable.Even though this is a largely fictional film portrayal, I was still left somewhat frustrated by the lack of historical perspective as to when events were taking place. Reference was made at one point to the onset of World War I, but even then it was referred to as 'the war' which might offer some doubt to the casual viewer. For those interested in the picture's real life counterparts, former champ Brady (Larry Pennell) coming out of retirement represented James J. Jeffries (it didn't happen that way); Cap'n Dan (R.G. Armstrong) is a stand-in for former champ Gentleman Jim Corbett, and Jefferson's final rival in the ring, simply called The Kid, would have been Jess Willard, who actually did take the title away from Jack Johnson in Havana on April 5th, 1915. That fight went twenty six rounds and ended in controversy for many years, furthered by Johnson's signed statement that he threw the match in exchange for fifty thousand dollars (which he never got) and a government promise not to hassle him any more. In reality, the 'Galveston Giant' as he was known, simply ran out of gas and fell to a thunderous right to the jaw.

This movie is a biography of the first black heavyweight champion of the world, Jack Johnson. In real life he was as assertive , cunning , loud and fearless, like depicted in the movie. He tried to get resume his boxing career but he had many setbacks. Many of these setbacks dealt with the fact that he was a Black man; in the 1900's the Whites did not want to have a black man as the heavyweight champion , so they tried to find the great "White hope" who would ultimately defeat Johnson and bring back the heavyweight title to the White man. James Earl Jones delivers quite a remarkable performance as Jack Johnson. Overall a very good biography movie.