14 Best Boxing Movies (from The Art of Manliness)

Regarded as one of the best boxing documentaries ever made, When We Were Kings follows the story of one of the most famous bouts in boxing history: The Rumble in the Jungle between Muhammad Ali and George Foreman. The story behind the fight is epic. Ali’s 32 years old and thought to be past his prime. Foreman is ten years younger and the reigning heavyweight champion of the world. Fight promoter Don King offers the two boxers $5 million a piece to fight each other. Of course, King doesn’t have the cash, so he finds a financial backer in Mobutu Sese Seko, the dictator of Zaire. Ali’s the underdog in the fight, even his own team doesn’t believe he can win. But with his unfaltering confidence and tenacity, Ali comes out on top.

Three words: Boxing. Ken. Burns. That’s really all you need to know since everything Mr. Burns does it certifiably awesome (well, Jazz wasn’t that hot). Burns uses his signature style to cover the life of one of the most interesting characters in sports history: Jack Johnson. Boxing is really just the backdrop in this documentary, the stage on which the dynamics of race relations in the early 20th century can be explored. Johnson pushed through bigoted barriers and flaunted social conventions of the day, rebelling not as a civil rights activist, but as a man who simply wanted to live exactly how he pleased. He was a complicated guy, a man of both talent and bravado who could be proud to be a black boxer while also denying fellow African-American fighters the chance for similar fame and achievement. Burns deftly explores these issues and more during this almost four hour biography.