By Erin Free

Any doubts as to Will Smith’s acting prowess (he had only tested the waters with serious drama once in Fred Schepisi’s Six Degrees Of Separation) were quashed with his towering performance as Muhammad Ali. His performance at his early morning press conference in Sydney was equally impressive, as the sharp-suited Smith entertained the assembled press, and even recovered with good humour when he actually fell off the stage while being photographed.

The role of Muhammad Ali obviously left its mark on Will Smith, who spoke in almost reverential terms of the character he had played. “I came to understand the footsteps to greatness,” Smith said at the press conference. “It’s not really a long, difficult process. Great people have one focus. Muhammad Ali said ‘No, I refuse to go 1,500 miles to kill strangers. I’m at war right here in America, and if I die, I’m going to die here right here fighting you.’ He didn’t believe in the war and he wasn’t going to go. We often put very complex precepts into our lives. God said ‘Though shalt not lie’. God did not say ‘Though shalt not lie, unless your wife asks ‘Do you like this dress?’”

Will Smith as Ali
Will Smith as Ali

The heaviness of Ali, however, didn’t prevent Smith from returning to the kind of films that have made him famous. “I actually started Men In Black 2 six days after we wrapped,” Smith explains. “When you’re making Ali, every second of the film is designed for total authenticity. We would sit down for three hours discussing the motivation for a scene where there’s no dialogue! But Men In Black is about having fun. But I’d say to the director, Barry Sonnenfeld, ‘Would J really say that to K? What is his emotional state at this moment?’ So I just had to back up for a minute, and say, ‘Right, let’s just have some fun with this.’”

Unlike the more stylised boxing fights seen in other classics of the genre like Raging Bull or Rocky, Michael Mann actually had his actors hit each other for real, which gives the film a striking authenticity. “We trained to punch for real,” Smith says emphatically. “There’s a really classic left-hook that Joe Frazier knocked Ali out with, and I just refused to have that shot look fake in the film. So I went up to James Tony who played Frazier, and I said, ‘Make it real.’ And then I said, ‘By the way…’ BOOM! I punched him, and I probably shouldn’t have done that. It’s really weird when you get hit. There’s a blue flash, and then a buzz, and then you start thinking about the most bizarre things. I was thinking about my car keys, and wondering about where they were. I guess in my mind, I was thinking, ‘Right, I’m leaving.’ But there’s something really primal about being able to get yourself together, and then to start fighting again. I loved it!”

Will Smith in the ring
Will Smith in the ring

Despite Ali not triumphing at the box office, Will Smith still sees the film as a major success, counting the quality over the cash, and not blaming anything on Ali’s position as a Muslim. “Anyone with half a brain does not lump Muhammad Ali in with the terrorists of September 11,” Smith said at the Sydney press conference with measured pointedness. “I don’t think people equate Ali to that at all. But I don’t understand what people are talking about with the box office. Ali is around $70 million, and is the biggest biopic in film history! It has an entirely black cast, and is about a black American who stood up and fought against America. This type of movie is not even supposed to get made! In my mind, it is a huge, astronomical success! The market in America says you’re supposed to feel successful when your film hits $100 million, but this just isn’t that type of movie. This film is in there with Gandhi and JFK, and films like that.”

Ali is available now on Blu-ray and DVD.

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