One Night In Miami Review

By Paul Anthony

It is hard for me to start this review off any other way but to say wow to this film. this could be a film of the year for me candidate. When you have a movie that the characters are Jim Brown, Sam Cooke, Malcom X and Muhammad Ali, then it better be a good film and sure enough it was. It is crazy already praise the film so early in this review but there is a lot to talk about. First I didn’t know this was an actually play and I didn’t even realize this was an fictionalized meeting of these legends. The film was directed by Regina King which marks her first feature film as an director, then the screenplay was written by Kemp Powers which he based it on his play. The film stars Kingsley Ben Adir as Malcolm X, Eli Goree, Aldis Hodges as the Great Jim Brown and Leslie Odem jr as Sam Cooke.

The film starts in 1963, here we see a young Muhammad Ali who was still going by Cassius Clay being over confident and getting knocked out, we then see Sam Cooke have an humiliating performance at the Copacabana in front of an all white crowd. Jim Brown returns home and see’s an old family friend who is white and embraces him kindly, though Brown offers to help move furniture but gets denied to come in the house because he black. We then move onto Malcolm who returns home and informs his wife that he wants to leave the nation of Islam. We then skip to 1964 where Clay wins the title and Malcolm plans a little get together with the four of them to celebrate the victory. But when the four of them get to the hotel Malcolm reveals that he only invited them so they could reflect on their accomplishments. Though as the night moves on Malcolm and Cooke begin to disagree with the way they see things in their success and add insult to injury in this feud Clay reveals he might have second thoughts about joining the nation but everything comes together and the group comes together and supports each other. Brown retires from football to become an actor, Cooke being inspired by the argument writes a great song that he performs on the Tonight show Clay joins the Nation of Islam and Malcolm completes his autobiography and leaves the nation though his life turns to worse because of it and the film ends.

First the acting was on point, I felt the emotions of the characters that I was watching, the dialogue went perfect with the scenes that we got to watch. This film told a powerful story and because of that story we didn’t need any special effects or graphics or even over the top action. Each scene left you waiting for the next one and each sentence did the same thing. In the end I have to give this film an A plus for a rating and label it as a must watch film!