The best sports stories are boxing stories. Fait accompoli. End of discussion.
In the ring you are entirely alone, with one punch capable of making or breaking your career and, of course, it is so punishing that only those in society with little to lose are prepared to make it their livelihood.
It is no surprise that boxing has always led the way in pay-per-view sporting events on television.
NFL, NBA or football supporters know their team’s fate will be sealed over a series of games but, for fight fans, this could be the moment their boxer reaches previously unreachable heights or suffers a fall from which their career and their life never truly recovers.
Their tales are the closest thing in sports to a movie plot. We even denote their stories the same way – Rocky 2, Tyson-Holyfield 2 etc.
So here are my best boxing movies, including documentaries, since the 1980s. Plus a few contenders at the end.
When We Were Kings (1996) IMDB rating 8.0
Perhaps the best sports documentary of all time, let alone boxing movie. Leon Gast’s epic film remembers the Rumble in the Jungle, Muhammad Ali’s stunning reclamation of the world heavyweight title from the seemingly unbeatable George Foreman in Kinshasa, then Zaire, in 1974.
This story has so many facets. Cerebral boxing writers like Norman Mailer and George Plimpton serve to put the fight in context while ‘Godfather of Soul’ James Brown is funking it up as part of the music festival that accompanied the fight.
And of course, the entire event was bankrolled and rather overshadowed by murderous dictator Mobutu Sese Seko, who was trying to buy his country some international recognition.
The fight was delayed after Foreman sustained a cut but both fighters stayed out there while he recovered.
This gave Gast ample opportunity to explore their wildly different characters – Ali, the braggadocio with the lippy entourage who charmed the locals but seemed to be risking his life against Foreman, a monosyllabic, brutish individual whose wreaking-ball fists had cut a swathe through the division.
A legal wrangle over footage meant this film was 23 years in the making. It won an Oscar in 1996 for best documentary feature. At the ceremony, Foreman helped an ailing Ali up the stairs to receive the statuette.
Raging Bull (1980) IMDB rating: 8.2
Martin Scorsese and Robert de Niro combined at the height of their powers for this savage, unrelenting biopic of Jake La Motta, a middleweight from the 1940s.
This was a time when the mafia ran boxing and, with Scorsese’s hand on the tiller, you can almost smell the sweat, cigarette smoke and corruption as the brawler from the Bronx climbs the rankings to take on Sugar Ray Robinson in an epic series of fights.
La Motta may have had the best chin boxing has ever seen and was capable of absorbing incredible punishment to triumph in the ring. But he also metes it out to opponents and family alike thanks to his insecurity, ego and violent tendencies.
Famously, De Niro gained 60 pounds to play La Motta in his latter years while Scorsese’s decision to shoot in monochrome and employ orchestral strings on the soundtrack not only evokes the age but portrays the beast and beauty inherent within boxing.
This is not a movie, this is high art. De Niro won an Oscar but, incredibly, it failed to take the prize for Best Picture and Best Director.
Rocky (1976) IMDB rating: 8.1
So the disputed story goes, shortly after watching Muhammad Ali beat Chuck Wepner for the world heavyweight title in 1975, Sylvester Stallone started writing.
He had been inspired, not by ‘The Greatest’ but his opponent that night, aka The Bayonne Bleeder, who twice fought a seven-foot bear as part of his long, colourful and mostly unsuccessful career.
Less than four days later, Stallone had a script about a boxing nobody who was given one last chance to be somebody.
Most of Rocky’s rags-to-riches story is so familiar it is now almost parody. We all know the ending, the theme music, how we should shout his wife’s name and what we should do after running up stairs of landmarks when out training.
Still, this is a robust story that has withstood seven sequels, including a well-received re-invention in recent years.
It should never be forgotten that Rocky was both a box office smash, making 225 times its $1m budget, and a critical success winning Oscars for Best Picture and Best Director.
Creed (2015) IMDB: 7.6
This was that recent Rocky re-invention that found success with fans and critics alike.
The great man reluctantly comes out of retirement to coach the son of his late friend and greatest adversary.
To his credit, Stallone went from centre stage to supporting actor with alacrity, winning an Oscar nomination en route.
Meanwhile, Michael B Jordan was superb as the hungry, up-and-coming Adonis Creed.
The fight scenes are excellent thanks, in part, to the decision to cast Tony Bellew, the reigning cruiserweight world champion, as Creed’s title opponent.
Tyson (2008) IMDB: 7.5
Mike Tyson is the most enthralling boxing tale of the last 40 years and this remains the film that has best captured his chaotic career.
It is just ‘Iron Mike’ from start to finish, almost a monologue from the youngest ever heavyweight champion on his rampage through the division in the 1980s and 1990 then the turmoil that followed.
Director James Tobock, a friend of the fighter who financed the picture himself, uses splits-screen to show footage while Tyson talks, so you really take your eyes off his face.
To test the emotion of the story, Tobock invited a number of white, elderly women to watch a rough cut, figuring that they would be the demographic least likely to enjoy a Tyson movie.
The director offered them $100 if they left after five minutes but, if they did not, they had to stay until the end.
Every single one remained and many were in tears as the credits rolled. Only one distributor was interested in taking the movie but, upon release at the Cannes Film Festival, it received a 10-minute standing ovation.
Other contenders: Million Dollar Baby, Cinderella Man, Rocky Balboa, Sons of Cuba, The Hurricane, Jawbone, Journeyman, The Fighter.