Summary
Some words will most likely, nay surely, go here.
Regina King is on a career high right now. A presence on our screens since the 1980s sitcom 227 and Boyz in the Hood, her starring role in Watchmen made masks cool even before 2020 hit us.
For her feature directorial debut, King has turned to Kemp Powers’ 2013 play ONE NIGHT IN MIAMI. Retaining the playwright for the screenplay, the film is a fictional account of Malcolm X (Kingsley Ben-Adir), Muhammad Ali (Eli Goree), footballer Jim Brown (Aldis Lodge), and soul legend Sam Cooke (Leslie Odom Jr.) meeting in a Miami hotel room in February 1964, celebrating Ali’s surprise title win over Sonny Liston.
The film opens with a collection of vignettes, showcasing key events leading up to the fateful meeting: “American upstart” Cassius Clay winning in Wembley in 1963, Sam Cooke getting a poor response from an all-white crowd at the Copa, and Jim Brown being welcomed by an old friend – just not in the house, you understand.
The opening contains the most cinematic moments of the film, including slick shots of cars with suicide doors and punchy boxing matches. More than that, it’s also demonstrative of how prevalent casual racism was at all institutional levels. It’s an important establishing sequence, as the meat of the film takes place within the microcosm of the hotel room.
Like the similarly claustrophobic Ma Rainey’s Black Bottom, King’s film never quite overcomes its stage origins, but that also adds to the intensity of the emotion and performance in the room. The crux of the tension comes from Ali’s decision around joining the Nation of Islam on one hand, and Malcolm X’s anger with Cooke for not taking a firmer political stance.
So, naturally strength of the piece comes from the performances. The whole ensemble is excellent, but Odom Jr. – whose Hamilton performance has just had a second life through the Disney+ release – is inspired casting. Similarly, Goree is primarily known for his TV roles, and this is likely to be his breakout performance. Lodge and Ben-Adir are also terrific.
ONE NIGHT IN MIAMI is the kind of film that lingers, growing more powerful when it returns to you days or weeks later. The messaging is occasionally didactic, but never anything less than powerful. After all, if the last year has taught us anything, it’s message that’s as important in 2021 as it was in 1964.
2020 | US | DIRECTOR: Regina King | WRITERS: Kemp Powers| CAST: Kingsley Ben-Adir, Eli Goree, Aldis Hodge, Leslie Odom Jr., Joaquina Kalukango, Nicolette Robinson, Beau Bridges, Lance Reddick | DISTRIBUTOR: Amazon Studios| RUNNING TIME: 110 minutes | RELEASE DATE: 25 December 2020 (US), 15 January 2021 (Prime Video)
