Muhammad Ali: The Greatest (FULL MOVIE)

[Music] he is known as the greatest boxer of all time a controversial and magical figure known and loved throughout the world as soon as he stepped inside a boxing ring it seemed to be home to him and that's where he really flourished Muhammad Ali brought unprecedented speed and grace to the sport of boxing [Music] he's trash-talking forever change what the public expected a champion to be proof was nothing but a [ __ ] he's a bomb I'm the world's greatest he must fall in five rounds but if you talk about me I will cut it for you his accomplishments in the ring are the stuff of legends as he was involved in some of the greatest fights the world has ever seen Fraser's corner man pulls him out and only wins once again one of the greatest bouts that could have been inside the his success as a boxer is widely respected and his techniques copied by many with Ali's greatest triumphs lies in his legacy as a champion leader humanitarian and artist Ali is a tireless worker for what's right because you know you can case it in humanitarian you can use the word you military you can do it your life it just likes to do the right thing his work both inside and outside of the ring truly makes Muhammad Ali a legend Ali at his peak with the greatest sportsman greatest fighter in history this is the incredible story of the greatest sporting icon of all time [Music] you Mohammed Ali's life and career have played out as much on the front pages of newspapers as on the inside sports pages his tale of controversy and success is most definitely a unique one where did it all begin of a sporting legend Cassius Marcellus clay bigger idol of mine and obviously many many others he was born into a Catholic family raised in Louisville Kentucky well unlike many boxers I suppose Ali wasn't somebody who came from the wrong side of the tracks he had a very supportive middle-class family religion was very central to his upbringing his mother Odessa brought he and his brother up Rudy as a Baptist he was born in Louisville he was christened Cassius Marcellus clay what people I don't think fully understand is it was a segregated City it wasn't a city who had been a racial tension it was a black city and a white city and they didn't mix there were three areas where black people live but of those three areas as a mixed the three areas and Ali lived in a sort of middle could have better half there he belonged to a Baptist Church a more than he belonged to a Baptist Church he was dragged along to that church she used to sing in the choir in that church and he was part of that church one of the stories that often that hood out to me there was the story that he's divorced his brother throws stones at him to improve his reflexes in his head movement it showed one the confidence that he had in his own ability and also that he he was fast because they as far as I'm aware he's never actually hit with a stone it was clear that from a very young age he almost had boxing in his mind because he used to get his brother Rudy to try and throw rocks at him in the backyard and tried to hit him and his brother thought he was crazy but he said he never managed to strike Ali once with a rock because he was so light of his feet so clearly even as a developing youngster he had boxing on his mind with boxing clearly in his blood Ali's interest grew even more when he was just 12 years of age asked through a stroke of good luck he met boxing coach Joe Martin well it wasn't till the age of 12 that he really got the boxing bug he was apparently really angry because somebody had stolen his bike if he wanted to beat up the guy who had done it a local policeman called Joe Martin got hold of him and said look if you got to fight somebody you've got to learn to box so Martin took him to a local gym and very quickly Ali showed he was very adept as a boxer Joe Martin describes Cassie's Craven dolly as the hardest-working kid he ever had and where his hard work paid remarkable dividends ultimately Ali was a very very hard worker and Joe Martin the man who in many ways discovered him said that he'd never seen a harder working kid in the gym and so clearly Ali's roots as a boxer went very deep he wanted to apparently and he parked his bike which was his pride and joy and it was stolen and someone says they may listen you know once you go down in a basement there a guy down there called Joe Martin he's a policeman and he runs a boxing program go and tell him Ali goes down the stairs he screaming Joe Martin can't even understand what he's saying but he takes a report then as Ali's leaving you can see all this anger in this young kid and so Joe my system and by the way take this form fill it out few fans had come to the boxing Holly went bingo I'll have a little bit of that it's Holy's parents and they were quite relieved they didn't want him running around the street quite correctly appearance of you know pond but how you gonna get a bite or something no Paul nah borrow someone else's bike with a clear desire to succeed in the ring Ali then went on to begin his amateur career I suppose people must have began to take notice of Ali as an amateur I mean I think he had a hundred eight fights as an amateur only losing a single Bell well very soon Ali was the real name on the American amateur circuit and that was a very hard school only decent boxers knives to flourish he had a 108 fights I know he lost one of them which was a remarkable record well he started to fight first of all for Joe Martin at his gym then he switched across town or across whatever past is the town in Louisville to a guy called Fred stolle achieve this was a slightly better Jim Stone had better finalists on web guys that went off but not just local localized Golden Gloves tournaments but two regional international tournaments that are leaders proud himself into that was receiving small fees but the feet the fees the fees are nothing to do a bit all he was talking about from the age of 13 14 15 was that he would win the national Golden Gloves he would win the Olympic title and he would win the World Heavyweight title people forget that Ali didn't reinvent himself later in life and suddenly become this guy to make these bold claims and wrote things in gloves and wrote poetry he was rattling on like this when he was 14 and 15 the difference is nobody was listening at 14 and 15 ten years later the entire world's media was listening but it was no difference well he won six Kentucky Gold Gloves which really gives you an indication of how good he was as a man was a boxer because American amateur boxing at that time was a very very hard school but Ali quickly adapted to the sport and made a real impression and he got four dollars a fight which was nothing compared to what he got when he was a professional in his later career having experienced huge success in his early amateur career Ali earned the right to represent his country at the 1960 Olympic Games in Rome this was when the world started to take note of Muhammad Ali Muhammad Ali in later life seemed scared of absolutely nothing when he was a youngster he had a real fear of flying so he almost didn't make it to the 1960 Olympics because it was a long flight throughout the whole flight he actually took his own parachute on board and he spent the whole flight on his knees praying in the aisles but eventually he got there and of course he ended up walking away with a gold medal the European media hadn't really heard of this guy Casias Clay suddenly became aware of this very very stylish boxer Cassius Clay was selected for the Rome Olympics apparently they had a real battle to get him on the plane in the first place because he had a fear of flying we need the guy fought all the top heavyweights of his era and showed no fear at all but apparently he was a he was praying in the aisle of the plane he arrives in Rome where obviously he goes and wins a gold medal well Ollie was only 18 but he was far from a callow youth in the Olympic Games the journalists who were there covering at many of whom had never heard of Cassius Clay but were quick to praise him for his supreme confidence and six years after somebody stole his bike in Kentucky he was the Olympic champion he just plowed his way through display and a show of boxing this shocked people who coaches from Poland and Russia they'd never seen that before suddenly there was an 18 year old kid doing it to their boxes European champions Olympique champions veterans of the amateur circuit making them look like they were statues that was quality after his Olympic success Ali returned back to the USA as a national hero but to some people he was just another black man who they wanted nothing to do with well after the Olympics Ali returned to America as a real hero the American Olympic Association had a huge parade to honor all their gold medalists and Ali was central to that he won a gold medal in the Rome Olympics and returns home to the US his own country he's represented the whole country and brought home a gold medal he found it very difficult to understand and to relate to the political and the the social environment that was going on in America vast sections of society just saw him as a as a black guy and wanted nothing to do with him but once the Olympics had moved on and memories faded in the eyes of many people he became just another black person on the streets and of course at that time in America segregation was a real issue and Ali and a friend went into what was then a whites-only restaurant in Kentucky his home city and he was refused service and that made Ali really angry and it was claimed at the time he actually took his gold medal and threw it into the Ohio River because he believed it was worth nothing because even though he had been praised greatly for it by the American sporting public once he came home of course it was worthless he arrived home to Louisville he was given a good reception he chose to go with a friend of his to a bikers but the waitress serving him said look you know it's gonna be a problem you should best leave he sat down nodded to one of the bikers who he'd seen at some of his fights over comes the boss man now you've got this guy in your mind's eye he's a fat white guy covered in bacon grease and he stands in front of our Lee and says to Ally we don't serve [ __ ] in here now Ali said that's good because I don't eat them after his achievements at the 1960 Olympics Ali went on to sign his first professional contract the Louisville sporting group so he wins a gold medal in the Olympics and he signs a contract with a consortium from Louisville called the Louisville sporting group and they set out to finance his his career well after Ali returned from Rome with the Olympic gold medal he was always going to be hot property in the American professional ranks and the Louisville sponsoring group paid $100,000 to sign him up to a professional contract now of course that pales into insignificance when you consider how much money boxers get paid now but in the early 1960s $100,000 was an awful amount of money and Ali and his family must have believed he was made but Ali was always somebody of generous spirit and the first thing he did when he got his money was go out and buy his mother Odessa a pink Cadillac he gets his paycheck the first thing he does what does he do he buy a house does he invest it he buys a pink Cadillac and gives it to his mom I think his managers would have been probably putting the hair out at that but that was man-made he was his own man and he followed his own his own path and it was a pink Cadillac that he wanted that's what he got he went with ten businessman ten local millionaire they threw the money in the kitty and then they started to promote it they got him started that gave him the stability that really did is that allowed him to pay off the heavy mortgage on the family home that his father had so he was keen to to share the money around but with that money and with his status as a professional many people believe that Ali had really arrived as a boxer Cassius Clay of Chicago challengers Gary joy the eastern heavyweight champ and Josh is in trouble from the first round on after signing his first professional contract Ali managed to persuade legendary trainer Angelo Dundee to become his coach and it was a partnership that was about to change the boxing world well Angelo Dundee first came across a very young Cassius Clay in the late 1950s when Ali was building up his amateur career and Ali was determined to have great boxing figures surrounding him when he became a professional he picks out Angelo Dundee who is one of the most high esteemed trainers of the moment he picks him as his trainer and Dundee had brought through some great fighters and got good results oh he had faith in him well he went to a hotel lobby in Louisville when Dundee was upstairs with his world light heavyweight champion Willie Pastrano and he picked the phone up and he said no mr. mr. Dundee my name's Cassius Marcellus clay and I'm gonna win the Golden Gloves I'm gonna win the Olympics I'm gonna win the World Heavyweight title and he went for Angelo Dundee as his trainer and Sugar Ray Robinson who was a legendary American fighter as his manager what Robinson turned him down but Angelo Dundee did agree to speak to him when he signed as a professional but he thought he was mad he'd seen all of the the work that Arlie did outside of the ring and he wasn't too sure he wanted to become involved but but once he met Harley he really saw the fire and the desire in his eyes to become the greatest which of course he eventually did yeah as we've done these confidence and instilling confidence and instill in his work ethic into Angelo Dundee was almost persuaded to become our least trader and I think without him Ali wouldn't have been the box that he became Muhammad Ali is world famous for his trash-talking toward opponents where did this controversial persona originate from after a fight in Vegas Ali met gorgeous George who was a professional wrestler at the time and he's a footnote in Ali's career but he's a very significant one because he was a brush larger-than-life figure who indulged in the trash-talking both before his bouts and and during them as well and Ali saw this and he clearly resonated with him because basically he he then produced a persona which was very similar to gorgeous George which he took on throughout his boxing career casillas Marcellus played age 24 in his own view of the greatest and the prettiest but as others see him the loudest and the brashest [Applause] [Music] no contest this will be a total knowledge Holly who has been a good talker but in 1961 he had a fight of a guy called Jukes a Murdock in Las Vegas and a few days before the fight he managed to get himself on the radio and he's sitting down in this radio studio and in comes this guy were blond they're making loads of noise and sits down the radio interviewer says you know this Saturday at the dunes are bugging on this young ki young Cassius Clay Olympic gold medal is from last year's gonna be fighting Duke Sabbath on what have you got to say about it and Ollie then says you know it's gonna be a good fight you know I'm gonna give it my all I'm gonna do what I've got to do and I hope I win and I hope the fans come out hope they like it you know because you know I think I'm gonna be a great champion suddenly the radio announces and George and you're fighting at the convention center the next night what's gonna happen you well I'm gonna tear his head off I'm gonna rip his head off I'm gonna send effective his mother in a box then I'm gonna stamp on him then I'm gonna take his calls and then someone and Ollie is looking off clay is looking at this guy thinking whoa so he leaves there he has like an epiphany you think listen I'm a bad talker and then from then on that's when he switches at the time boxing was was relatively straight outside the ring boxers were basically have the weigh-in look at each other walk away there were there were no quotes there were now sound bites there was certainly no no circus before fights so you be ready for you here and be ready because I'm coming to get you then Ollie arrived he was talking about floating like a butterfly stinging like a bee he was going out to really insult his opponent and after I'm through beat him I think he'll have to join the Beatles and be a single nobody had done this before Ollie was the first and of course as we see now virtually every single other boxer in the professional rank indulges in the trash-talking indulges in the showmanship and that's because of Muhammad Ali and what he saw in Gorgeous George he time to get in the ring with me again well he'll get his chance in 1963 Ali travelled to London England to fight his first professional fare abroad and took on the UK's hard-hitting Henry Cooper well it was a big deal for Olli to fight outside of America and he came to one of the most iconic venues in London Wembley Stadium and there were 55,000 people there to see Ali fight Henry Cooper the Cooper was what a heavyweight really was accepted to be at that time he was a big puncher he was a strong man he was aggressive a gentle giant but in the ring of brutal man - when Ali it was a slight betting underdog Cooper was seasoned you know he'd been there he'd down there right at the end of the fourth round he caught Ali with his famous Henry's hammer the left hook an Ali went down [Applause] fantastic prank genesis uses honey punch as he's on the floor gone but he's got a great sense of recovery he wakes up as he hits the floor hits the ropes he gets up bail goes comes back to the corner [Applause] now Angelo Dundee notice the tiny little tear in one of the gloves okay so what he did is he manipulated the tear a little bit more called over the referee and gained a bit of extra time and significantly the end of that round was far longer than it should have been so Ali was able to recover and Cooper wasn't able to capitalize and in the end Cooper received a cut in the following round and the fight was stopped [Applause] Hemis problem wasn't his heart or his power his problem his eyebrows and his cheeks he was lacerated cutter bits and cuts Cooper and goes back to America is still undefeated Ali from that moment had a great deal of respect for Henry Cooper which endured right to the end of Cooper's life and he said when that left hook hit him it hit him so hard even his ancestors in Africa felt the punch after beating Cooper Ali's professional record stood at 19 wins from 19 fights which earned him the chance to fight the much-feared heavyweight champion Sonny Liston before the Ali and Liston fight Ali had been stalking him his backers in Louisville had paid for him to get on a plane and go to Las Vegas to harass list them when he was training to harass Liston before and after his fight with Floyd Patterson in Las Vegas Ali fades the ring he was inside Sonny Liston's tunnel-vision Sonny Liston was the man in American boxing and the Builder was something which nobody had ever really seen before Ali were drive to Liston's house at 3:00 a.m. in the morning and sit outside and shout abuse at him to try and rile him he said in the pre-match press conferences he was a big ugly bear and Ali was going to donate him to the zoo afterwards and Liston was thinking who is this guy he's a young pretender and he's coming into my ring to tell me how he's going to beat me here's the thing nobody nobody thought all he could do it I believe inside the Ali Kent there was a crisis of confidence the bookies didn't think he could do it nobody thought he could do it but he kept on singing I won't there bear I'm welcome here bear what's gonna happen he may be great but he'll fall in hey Ali was a huge underdog going into the fight and what followed was quite simply the biggest upset in boxing history the Challenger from Louisville Kentucky wearing white trunks with red stripes weighing 210 and 1/2 pound the former Olympic light heavyweight champion Cassius wait well right from the first bell Liston charged out to Darlene it was clear he wanted to rush him and catch him off-guard but Ali was so light on his feet so nimble that he made Liston look really awkward [Applause] - displays on the move as we see looking the good side Oh run it was obvious in the first bill that listened the world champion had miscalculated he hadn't factored in how far and how elusive and how good and I also think how powerfully built and how strong holly was at the end of the fourth round he went back to his corner and he complained that his eyes were burning and Ally said he couldn't carry on and the reason for that was Liston had applied some ointment to his gloves and he had got into Ali's face and had really created problems for his eyesight which was of course beyond the rules but apparently it's something that Liston used to do MacLean did I say that ladies and gentlemen we don't know exactly what happened they're yelling from Cassius Clay's corners something got in his right eye and he went back out there and the sweat and the the tears which were flowing at the time washed the ointment away and all he managed to work his way back into the fight and then when it came to the end of a sixth round Liston sat on his stool and never got up again they might be laughing at that might be a lot slowly unfolded inside that ring of the Convention Center in Miami was not only one of the biggest shocks in boxing history but it was a master class on how to beat the bully and then at the end as he said I shocked the world that he started pointing at different journalists at rings I said I told you I was taking names and I'm taking names and he wasn't joking in the early 1960s Ali became very close with the American Muslim leader and human rights activist Malcolm X and it was a friendship that was making headlines across America well Malcolm X was an American Muslim leader and also somebody who fought very hard for human rights and Ali first met him in 1962 when he was a rising star he was clearly really affected by what Malcolm X was saying he attended many of his speeches and rallies over the next few years he's been in some circles quite widely criticized for his relationship with Malcolm X but I think if you try and put yourself in his shoes you can see he's a black guy in a country where black people are not getting a fair deal a lot of the black people I would imagine they weren't really in a position to change but Malcolm X he was and their relationship was a little bit like father and son in the sense that Malcolm X embraced clion alley and tutored him and talked to him he was a very charismatic man and most of what he said seemed to appeal to to climb but Ollie was having to secretly go the Nation of Islam meetings and mostly with Malcolm X or they were generally just spending time in hotel and a great deal of what Malcolm X was saying really resonated with our Lee and he very quickly became a spiritual mentor for him because all he saw Malcolm X as somebody who was standing up for black power and black human rights at a time in America when there was segregation and a good deal of racism to what Ali saw as his people so the more he listened to Malcolm X the more he spoke to him the more that Malcolm X became an influence on him play almost aligns himself with Malcolm X and now commits seem to become like a spiritual mentor to him and together they're they join forces in 1964 Ali announced his official membership with the Nation of Islam and it was an announcement that was surrounded by controversy with your next fight be billed as Cassius Clay or as Mohammed or Muhammad Ali the conversion had been slow and word seeped out and the press were against it even the black writers were against it the people around him were against it Dundee was against it not on any religious grounds just because he knew it would cause problems he wanted his guy to be popular he didn't want him to be victimized they didn't want him to touch us to somehow be sort of plop on this pedestal as some kind of radical as some kind of bad guy because he knew his guy was a good guy was a tricky time that for the Nation of Islam X was kicked out and then X was killed and all sorts of complaints against the lives of Muhammad and the way he ran the Nation of Islam the FBI was seriously involved Muhammad Ali has got an enormous FBI farm he was being monitored left right and center that that was what I think upset Dundee most in my opinion was the fact he didn't want his guy to be painted as a bad guy it was his choice how he practiced was his choice and he no longer wanted to take the name Cassius Clay because he said that was a slave name so he was given the name Muhammad Ali from the Nation of Islam and he said that was the name which he wished to be now known as and that was huge news in America because he was now such a massive star and if you want to look at it in the cold light of day it could have been a risky move as well because it would jeopardize many money-making opportunities and sponsorship deals which he was setting up and could potentially win as his boxing career grew but that wasn't important to Harley he felt that by taking a name from the Nation of Islam he was really doing something important not for his sporting career but for his life as a whole and he always stuck to it in 1965 a year after their first fight a rematch was agreed between Ali and Liston the fight proved to be hugely controversial as Sonny Liston fell in the first round to a blow that was labeled as the phantom punch many fans and journalists started to speculate Liston had taken a dive [Music] well the rematch would list him was one of the biggest letdowns not just an American boxing history but in American sporting history as well because there been so much anticipation after what had happened in the first fight when Ali took the title but in the end halfway through the first round Ali allegedly threw a punch many people called it the Phantom punch and list and hit the deck Arleen ox Liston out in the in the first round with what is called a phantom punch but here's the thing if you hit somebody on the chin perfectly you knock them out that's why he's called the greatest and even Ali was surprised that Liston had hit the deck but of course after 20 seconds Liston was counted out and Walcott eventually said hang on you're out and that was the end of the fight and the public were let down and I think Ali felt that down deep inside because he wanted to take on Liston at his best and there were all sorts of rumors circulating that Liston had huge debts and he bet against himself and and that's why I took a dive and if you look at slow-motion replays of the fight there is a shopping right hand from Ali which does catch Liston but whether it was strong enough to actually knock him out we'll never know in 1967 Ali was drafted into the US Army but dude his religious views he refused the draft it was a decision that was going to have major repercussions on his personal life in boxing career and shortly after he rejected the call of the army boxing license was revoked and his title was stripped away well by 1967 Harley was reaching the peak as a boxer but of course the Vietnam War was carrying on at the same time and in that year he was drafted to serve in the army but he refused saying he wasn't going to fight because if his religious beliefs and he famously said he had no problem with the Vietcong but of course the American authorities weren't going to allow this to happen and he was still called up to become drafted into the army but when his name was called he refused to stand up and basically he refused to fight those heavyweight champion Cassius Clay at a federal court in Houston is found guilty of violating the u.s. Selective Service laws by refusing to be inducted he refuses to cross the line in Houston within hours New York had dropped him taken away his license to fight even though he was world champ at the time an arrest of America father before he'd even been charged before not even been a court date for his trial which of course he went through got sentenced to five years which took a few years to be suspended completely something terrible happened there because possibly if not definitely the greatest heavyweight that we ever had had his greatest years taken away from him but what it did is it robbed sport of its greatest boxer during his peak period the years we lost were the best Muhammad Ali years Ali agrees with that and Dundee Angelo Dundee told me that personally the people that were with him in the sixties will tell you that gap we lost the greatest sportsman and obviously the greatest boxer of all time during his exile from boxing Ali took it upon himself to speak at schools and colleges across the u.s. against the war in Vietnam he did tours of colleges and universities all around America lecturing against the Vietnam War and also spreading a word of peace and also emphasizing his religious beliefs and that took a huge amount of backbone it would have been very easy for early to have said okay I'll join the army I'll do my tour of duty and I'll come back I'll carry on boxing but to him not fighting being a man at peace was more important and it cost him the peak years of his career in January of 1970 certain states and boxing commissions began to reconsider allowing Ally to fight again and just a few months later his boxing license was reinstated after three and a half years of Exile Muhammad Ali was back in the ring well of course in the three and a half years where Ali was in exile the boxing public the fans were really disappointed because Ali was the man Ali was the hero and they were denied seeing the greatest fighter in the world strut his stuff new of 1970 some athletic commissions were rumored to be considering to give him his license back and sure enough he gets his license back and Atlanta were the first state to give Ali his license back so he was able to fight and in 1970 he fought Jerry quarry who had become the man in Holly's absence a walkover you know he could pull a bomb he could afford a guy that was hopeless so many champions now when they come back they would have fought rubbish garbage he went to a top-five heavyweight and had a proper good war first time back you know what cuz he wanted to test himself because he knew he was gonna go on and keep using the same rhetoric and keep pointing and keep claiming he needs it to know himself that he still had it in his feet and in his head he did in 1971 Ali took on Joe Frazier who was so famously given Ali's title when it was stripped away from him in 1967 it was one of the most anticipated bouts of all time and was labeled a fight of the century the first fight between Ali and Frazier became known as the fight of the century and no Wanda once again we had a huge buildup and Ali was at his trash-talkin best and he was saying that Frazier was a tool of the white establishment and he was the man fighting for the blacks in the ghetto and this may shock and amaze you but I will destroy Frazier some people say you better watch the Joe Frazier he's awful strong I said tell him to try and roll and that really got under Frazier skin and as a result it was a brutal fight by the century doesn't quite capture it they sold ringside seats for that fight the same price as they sell ringside seats now in Las Vegas in fact that generate 90 million dollars now you pay the same for a ringside seat as you were paying there the fighter said she was correctly named it was a fight that ever flown and it was obvious to anybody watching that the early in the ring was still terrific he was still great but he just lost that little engine speed that had been lost in that three and a half year gap and Frazier had that little bit extra but it was still a tight fight in the 15th and final round Frazier lands arguably the most famous left hook in history to drop Ali if you see that in slow motion you just get up and leave at the fights over there's no way that man that goes down from that shot that late in a fight it's only gonna feed the cow and if he does beat the count he's not going to go I'll continue he beat the count he continued he was back on his feet very quickly Fraser couldn't believe it but when it came to the decision Frazier won Ali lost for the first time he'd really lost a marquee fight in America and it took a long time for the animosity between Ali and Frazier to dissipate in many ways it never did but now Ali had a real challenged because he was no longer the greatest and he had to get back on the pedestal once again after the first professional defeat of his career Ally dusted himself down and powered through his next opponents and went on a winning run that proved he would always get back up after being knocked down after that fight ollie is exhausted his crowd has been taken by Joe Frazier that wasn't the best Ollie was a great ollie but it wasn't the best ally but now he wants to prove he's the best ollie and once again he goes on a tour fighting people all over many of them brilliant fighters he runs up ten five some boots these are hard fights against guys that would even win world titles now had won World titles in the case of Floyd Patterson or will be competing really seriously for world title something happened with those guys in the 60s and Stemmons I mean the 1670s because they had that profile and they had those fights and all he just wasn't afraid to take good fight hard fight good fight very hard fight good fight he could have just trod Walter he could have had ten fights against ten nobodies and still got well title fights he didn't he went the hard way he went to the tank or a bank every single time in those fighters in 1974 world-famous boxing promoter Don King organized a fight between Ali and the world heavyweight champion George Foreman the fight took place in Zaire and was labeled the rumble in the jungle [Music] to the World Heavyweight Championship fight between the champion George Foreman and the former champion now the Challenger Muhammad Ali in 74 Don King strikes a deal with the government in ins ie he arranges a boxing match a world title world heavyweight title fight between Muhammad Ali and George Foreman while the rumble in the jungle is now steeped in boxing legends and many people believed Ali had no chance because the people who are beaten Ali had been destroyed by Foreman in previous title fights the rumble in the jungle was inevitable from early 1973 it was inevitable for when George Foreman destroyed Joe Frazier was inevitable and if people thought that Ali had no chance against Liston against Foreman they feared for his help and Ali very quickly got everybody behind him Foreman went into that ring not just facing Muhammad Ali but basically facing the whole of Zaire as well and it was an incredible fight it was extremely brutal [Applause] our Lee's got a fantastic plan worked out with Angelo Dundee ding-ding shrug the plan out the window sits on the ropes let's George Foreman the most feared heavyweight ever possibly even more ferocious and more dangerous than Sonny Liston he sits on the rope and lets him hit him our Lea's worked out that he probably hasn't got eight rounds of speed eight rounds of movement and eight rounds of power in it to put off big George he needs big George to play his part in his own downfall by ruining himself by just hitting at elbows and it's in an air that's what he done so when Ali delivers the finish just before storms here and the greatest fight in history around in the jungle as our Lee delivers the finish Foreman would have gone down if a mosquito had bumped into his head it was the sweetest moment [Applause] [Applause] an ally had won and it was astonishing at the age of 32 he was world champion once again he had beaten the man who was destroying every other contender in world boxing is it the greatest moment in sport it probably is if you take into account the build-up I think I truly believe it is and they just added to the early legend and in many ways that was his defining moment after so famously winning back his title a rematch was arranged between Ali and Joe Frazier and it was to be the third fight between the two legends fight is regarded as possibly the greatest battle between two heavyweights and will always be known as the Thrilla in Manilla 1975 was the Thrilla in Manilla we have the third meeting between Ali and Frazier and it was fought in temperatures of over 100 degrees Celsius it were brutal conditions and it was a brutal fight as well but Ali dredged up every single ounce of energy he had in his body and it was an horrendous fight both boxers took an immense amount of punishment so they go in this ring the Thrilla in Manilla and what a fight they just hit each other and abused each other the savagery is almost unprecedented and it's saying something to an ally or Frasier but right quickly by olly olly punching better in this round there's another right a left and a right suddenly Ally seems to have recaptured some crunching about and it came to the final round Eddie Futch the the legendary trainer for Frazer threw in the towel and Fraser complained and said I want to fight but foot said you can't see because both the phrases eyes were huge and blown up and he he was basically blinded by a leap 14 ground Eddie Futch who's in phrases corner says basically that's his job no one will ever forget what you did here today and that's the end of the fire phrases corner man pulls him out and only wins once again one of the greatest bouts that they could have been inside the boxing ring after winning possibly the greatest battle ever to be witnessed inside a boxing ring Ali went on to lose his title to Leon Spinks however just seven months later Ali won his title back in a rematch with Spinks making him boxing's first three-time heavyweight champion well of course by now Ali was somebody in his mid to late 30s which was getting old even for a world heavyweight boxer and he lost his title to Leon Spinks in 1978 and again it seemed that are they had taken this challenger to lightly Spinks was a young up-and-coming heavyweight and just picked Ali off when he wanted to and won that fight but but typically ivali a few months later he came back and he beat Spinks and won his title again for an unprecedented third time everything post Manila is a bonus in many ways and you know by then people not necessarily inside the arleigh business but certainly inside the boxing business was saying you shouldn't be fine so Ali manages to win the title back they're both really good fights in a bizarre kind of way but when you look at them in a cold light of day and hate to sound like an old man but the hourly from the late 60s would have barely broke a sweat against neon Leone in any of those rounds in those two completed fights even the arleigh from the early 70s I think what about maybe a bit too much power but certainly the sixties our leader greatest our league he would have made mincemeat of young Neil but it's significant that between the two fights Ferdie Paquito Ali's doctor resigned because it looked at examinations of our Lee's body after the first fight and he said that he simply wasn't fit enough to carry on and he said Ali should retire typically of our leap he wanted his world title back so he fought on but by now we were starting to see Ali's body was breaking down he he wasn't the infallible figure he was in his youth but he was determined to fight on that unquenchable spirit was literally carrying him into the ring and carrying him to the world title after making history by becoming Fox's first three-time champion Ali lost his title to Larry Holmes in 1980 he went on to fight top heavyweight contender Trevor Berbick Ali lost the fight in Ram 10 and just a day later he announced his retirement from boxing but he ain't finally came in the Bahamas against Trevor Berbick of course the end had really come in Las Vegas when he lost to Larry Holmes in a fight that was horrible - what horrible for Larry Holmes he ended up in Ali's suite at Caesars crying at the feet of his hero the Berbick fight woulda less said about that the better it was a fight it shouldn't happen and the people around them should have known better they know that shouldn't happen everybody knew that shouldn't happen that it's one of the most unedifying spectacles in sport they left him no option but to retire he didn't retire at the top which of course is a great shame but when he did go out of course he still went out as the man who would retained his world title on so many occasions he was a legend he should have been nowhere near a boxing ring to take on Larry Holmes and Trevor Berbick but he was and then of course he suffered for it [Music] after having retired from boxing Ali's house started to noticeably decline his speech became extremely slurred and his movements became slower and in 1984 came the sad announcement that Muhammad Ali had Parkinson's disease it was no surprise when Muhammad Ali was diagnosed with Parkinson's and at the same time nobody's really guilty of that he wanted to fight and if the people around him had walked away one or two did walk away then he would have just replaced them the reason why I say it's no surprise is that if you listen to Arlene 60 64 66 during his exile when he comes back for and after a round ball before and after the thriller leading into the Larry arms you've only got to look at these fights you ready one look at his movement but more than that you're gonna do the simplest thing you're just gonna listen to his voice well even before he retired arleigh discovered he was having problems with his hand shaking and his speech was beginning to get slower and also become slurred and in 1984 he was eventually diagnosed with Parkinson's disease and the punishment had taken towards the end of his career against the likes of Spinks homes and Berbick had really taken their toll and and life became a real struggle for him the debate is did the boxing calls the Parkers did the boxing make the Parkinson's worse my understanding is that the medical experts say yes it did was there anything that could have been done well I suppose he should have retired after the rumble in the jungle he'd already made 30 million quid there's the last thing that fighters want to be told is that they have to return how could anyone say to him your Health's not what it used to be he's just beaten you know one of the best heavyweights ever how can you didn't go to that guy what in his suite you know next to the Congo say okay listen mommy's great last night but listen about a look at your health you're bit slow you should retire it's like a joke he was never gonna retire it was always gonna fight too long but the key is and I really believe this in too many people equipped to blame the people around them those people loved him Angelo Dundee loved it gene cooing wife still loves him still loves him Howard Bingham still loves him they were there with him because they knew that they loved him and that at least they could take care of him to a degree rather than walking away and having mercenaries coming many people believe that Ali was infallible but of course he wasn't the legend may have been and when he got Parkinson's disease it was a real sad moment not just for boxing but for many people around the world of any walk of life Ali is often noted for his courage and fearlessness and in 1990 he visited Iraq and managed to successfully negotiate the release of 14 US hostages from Saddam Hussein it was an act of extreme bravery and heroism and speaks volumes about the character of Muhammad Ali as he grew older and certainly in retirement I think he did become bit more politically active found that he could because of his position he status denied he could in some ways influence the way things were done and it's my understanding that he attempted to release several hostages in different crises around that time most famously he succeeded Jim Brown the great American footballer says there are bigger stars now bigger black stars now singers and sports men on women who just will not do anything that might hinder a sponsorship deal all he didn't care about that he did what he had to do and I think it's true what Angelo Dundee once told me that Ali always followed his heart well of course Ali refused to fight in the US Army but during the the Gulf War in 1990 he did intervene and help to rescue 14 American hostages from Iraq and he personally went there and negotiated their release with Saddam Hussein which speaks volumes about the courage of the man because he was always looking to do something for other people and this was a man who pleads stricken by Parkinson's disease but he went to Iraq he spoke directly with Saddam Hussein and then he came home to America with the 14 hostages so he was a hero all over again this time outside the boxing ring and this part of his life often doesn't get the coverage of course when you compare it to what he did in the boxing ring but in many ways it's more significant because it shows that Ali's beliefs his backbone were with him at all times that even though he was somebody who physically had been broken by disease his spirit was still there to help other people in the 1996 Olympic Games in Atlanta Georgia there was much speculation as to who will be given the honor of lighting the Olympic flame Tiana is generally given to a sporting great of a hosting country and at the Georgia Olympic Games the honor was given to the greatest sporting icon of all time Muhammad Ali there were lots of rumors about who would be lighting the flame and who would be carrying the flame and Ali's name never really came up because he wasn't in great Nick and he didn't look great suggestion being that he wouldn't be asked because it wouldn't look good with him shaking well I tell what how wrong was everybody and I was in the stadium that night and it makes me well up now even thinking about it something happened and I've been at some great sports event Olympics and World Cups and great fights over the last 30 odd years but as he got there and as he lit that thing as he took it as he Lydia that's about the top well of course in 1960 Ali really came to prominence by winning the Olympic gold medal in Rome at the age of 18 and 36 years later the Olympics were in the deep south in Atlanta pallies homeland and of course there was only one man who could light the Olympic flame for those Olympics and it was Muhammad Ali and even though he was now struggling hugely with Parkinson's disease his bravery and his courage were evident at the heart of an opening ceremony when he lit the Olympic flame and the whole stadium was almost in all because it was Muhammad Ali and he was back on an international stage and it was amazing to see him again it was quite mesmerizing when people left there that night people wouldn't leave it slightly mesmerized that night by what they'd seen energized but they weren't all it wasn't gung-ho it was really strange I think people realized they'd witnessed in 2005 Holly was awarded the Presidential Medal of Freedom at a ceremony with George W Bush it's the highest medal a US civilian can receive and it was the recognition of all the amazing humanitarian work Allie had done throughout his life well despite the brutality which are they often dished out in a boxing ring he was a man of peace and we saw that in what happened when he went to Iraq to negotiate the release of the American hostages he also went to Afghanistan for the UN as one of their peace and voice and that was recognized by George W Bush in 2005 when he was given this special honor and I think it was right he was given this because throughout his life Ollie was somebody who had huge ironclad beliefs about peace and about helping other people you go back to when he first got his professional contra the first thing he did was by his mother a pink Cadillac and that just gives you an indication of his generosity of spirit he likes to do the good thing now whether this is on a grand scale like getting hostages out out of Iraq and getting them back safely to America where it was on a smaller scale it's right that the American people always saw him of somebody who was an icon and that's why George Bush was was giving him this award Muhammad Ali's annual celebrity fight night has helped to raise millions of dollars for charities all around the world his testament to the character of Ali the fact that he is willing to put his time and effort into raising huge sums of money for the benefit of others goes a long way to convey the kind and compassionate side Muhammad Ali Mohammed Ali's celebrity fight night has helped raise 45 million dollars I think that goes a long way to confirming the impact that he's had and he continues to have long after his careers over I'm really that sums up Ali as a man because he was often a brutal brooding figure to many people he was inside the boxing ring but when he discovered he had Parkinson's disease he wasn't somebody who withdrew from public life who became very bitter he became almost even more determined to do more for other people and now the celebrity nights and many other charity initiatives around the world generate huge sums of money for the Muhammad Ali Parkinson centers and many people have benefited from them and really that just sums up our Lee as a man because he's used to celebrity he's used his legendary status to really help others and a many sportsmen become legends and are then simply done it all for themselves Ali has done it for everyone there is no doubt that Muhammad Ali's the greatest sporting icon of all time he was involved in some of the greatest battles ever seen inside a boxing ring battles that inspired and mesmerized people all around the world Muhammad Ali is quite simply the greatest ally at his peak and that was in the late sixties was the greatest sportsman greatest fighter in history in the 70s he was involved in some of the greatest fights in history great sporting events in history to fire the century remember in the jungle and the Thrilla in Manilla since then he's battled bravely against an illness that claims people and he's just fought against that but I always think about Harley and I always go back to some of the Gene Kilroy told me 20 odd years ago in Las Vegas when he was recalling traveling with Ollie and dining with kings and darling with despots and dining with presidents and dining with princesses and showers and he said you know what said there was a point when Ollie was the most recognizable man on the planet then gene pool sensation and he was my friend and I think nak really that's probably what they'll put in somewhere or any all these to say the most recognizable man in the world and a friend to everybody and he's a man who's who's now over 70 years old but he's still active despite his disease despite a failing body he's still looking to help other people he said he was the greatest and when you look at boxing and in many ways when you look at life he was the greatest [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music]

Channel: 1091 ON DEMAND

Views: 333,565

Rating: 4.7964816 out of 5

Keywords: Muhammadali, Ali, full movie, full documentary, full film, free movie, free documentary, free film, boxing, on demand, 1091

Id: qfyrENI8n2s

Length: 60min 22sec (3622 seconds)

Published: Wed Oct 17 2018