Muhammad Ali - Portrayal Of ‘The greatest’

Muhammad Ali, a former professional boxer with the nationality of America, was born on 17 January, 1942 in Kentucky, USA. Born as Cassius Marcellus Clay, Ali is considered as one of the greatest boxers and heavyweight champions of all time. In his career, Ali won numerous championships, such as, “Light heavyweight boxing gold medalist, 1960 Olympics, World heavyweight boxing champion (1964-1967, 1974-1978, 1978-1979), and was Inducted into the International Boxing Hall of Fame, 1990.

Due to his ultimate career and a humble personality, artists from all industries were tempted to include Ali’s life into their agenda and respective professions. Various writers were attracted to his magnetic personality and wanted to write about him and incidences of his life. A book called "Muhammad Ali: Unseen Archives" by William Stratmore was released that depicted a lot about Ali’s career and his personal life. Another book, "Soul of a Butterfly: Reflections on Life's Journey" was written by Muhammad Ali and his daughter reflecting the journey of Ali.

The music industry was also tempted to present their token of love to this great man, and hence, the song "Powder Blue" by the US band Ween was composed. “The Louisville Lip” (a name given to Ali by media and people), was deeply touched by this gratitude.

And then it was the film industry, which had a relatively better medium to portray the life of Muhammad Ali on a much wider scale. There were majorly two movies that drew light on the life of Muhammad Ali, and Ali played himself in these movies.

The first one was “The greatest”, directed by Tom Gries and Monte Hellman which released in May 1977. This movie showed the rise and fall and the subsequent regain of Ali’s fame in real life. The film was based on the book written by Muhammad Ali, Herbert Muhammad and Richard Durham. Some of the footage of fights in the movie were actually from the real life match footage of Ali. The famous fight “Rumble in the Jungle” was included in the film.

Another film that focused on Ali was “Facing Ali”, which was based on the experiences and opinions of  the former rivals of Ali, who confessed in the film how it was to face Muhammad Ali in the ring.

There are several other films like “Soul Power, Ali’s Dozen, Ali Rap, The Last round, etc.” and around a dozen more.

As quoted by Ali, “He who is not courageous enough to take risks will accomplish nothing in life.”