One Night in Miami (Amazon Prime)

 

One Night in Miami (Amazon Prime)

One Night in Miami is a fictional drama of a meeting among four black icons in 1964: Malcom X, Cassius Clay (Muhammad Ali), James Brown and Sam Cooke. The gathering is in celebration of Cassius Clay’s  defeat of Sonny Liston to become the heavy weight champion. It takes place in the Miami motel room of Malcom X.

The subject matter is quite heady encompassing race relations, religion, life changing decisions  and prejudice. The movie is based on a play of the same name and the majority of the film is discourse  rather than action. The main interaction is between Malcom X and Sam Cooke and they are  polar opposites regarding the black experience. Malcolm X’s  focus is on black nationalism while Cooke was seen as pandering to white audiences. Not only is Cooke a successful singer but also a businessman and in a heated argument Cooke tells Malcom X  real power is economic power. The film covers other major events; the conversion of Cassius Clay to Islam and changing his name to Muhammad Ali and James Brown making the decision to leave the NFL and pursue his acting career.

Some of the actors are better known than others. Lesli Odem Jr plays Sam Cooke, Kingsley Ben-Adir is Malcom X, Eli Goree plays Cassius Clay and Aldis Hodge as James Brown. Lesli Odem played Aaron Burr in Hamilton. The best and most intense performances were between Sam Cooke and Malcom X. I was not too impressed with the Cassius Clay performance. Actors try to mimic Clay but they just do not get it right. James Brown made the least contribution.

The tension of the film is more philosophical than physical, although arguments do get heated. At times, the film is more about their differences rather than what they have in common.  This is  social commentary worth watching and remembering.

This is the directorial debut of Regina King (Watchmen). This film is a novel way of capturing  the black movements of the 1960’s. It would have been interesting to include Martin Luther King Jr. in the discussion or maybe a black female perspective such as Angels Davis or Sherley Chisholm .