It's fun, it's light, [but] it has a hard time when its tries to get heavy.

Instead, you get a movie that's enjoyable enough, but leaves you feeling like it could have been much, much more.

This movie tries so hard to be funny, yet it falls flat every time. Just another example of recycled ideas repackaged with women in an attempt to appeal to a certain audience.

This is a dark and sometimes deeply uncomfortable drama

James Earl Jones steps into the metaphorical Hollywood ring playing the first African-American to break the colour barrier as Jack Jefferson (based on real life boxer Jack Johnson). Not only that but he also goes on to become the first African-American to win the World Heavyweight Champion. After winning the Championship, the boxing community was deeply outraged by such events, that Jefferson becomes an instant target of racism as scouts were splurging around looking for their next "White Hope". If that isn't enough, the outrage is turned up another notch in both the white and black community as Jefferson is currently in a relationship with a Caucasian woman Eleanor Bachman (Jane Alexander). And while Jefferson keeps knocking down all these tough guys to their feet, these detractors use underhanded tactics to finally bring him down.Under the direction of Martin Ritt (who directed such classics as "Hud" and "The Spy Who Came in From the Cold"), and based on a play by Howard Sackler (who also wrote two "Jaws" scripts), the movie is one to likely hold one's interest but it doesn't measure up the long-running very successful play. The primary struggle this movie has is the standard clichéd look at the world of boxing during that time period (early 1910's) and the somewhat theatrical performance by James Earl Jones. The story feels too narrow thin and Jones' performance is way too powerful (I'll give him a break it was his first starring role), but the film is very lopsided and awkward in its delivery.With that said, Jones gives an amazing performance and the powerful bass voice he possesses will deliver the message across from here to kingdom come. Is it possible that they refrained from a cool cat like Sidney Poitier character to a more loud, eternally defensive character to add more tension for the character and the predominately bigoted Caucasian characters? It also seems interesting that even through trials and tribulations, Jefferson still has a smile on his face, even though his smile is obviously superficial. Jones was excellent in his Oscar nominated role complete as a weighs in a grimaced expression faced with an angering interior.Aside from Jones' powerful performance, Jane Alexander was wonderful as she reprises her Broadway performance as the troubled caught-in-the-middle Caucasian love-interest to Jack. We feel her pain as bi-racial relationships was not tolerated in that time period, let alone when this film was released in 1970 for that matter. but her anguish will likely melt your heartstrings in the right place. It's too bad she never rose further in the film industry as other divas in the 1960's and 1970's.The film loses its panache once Jefferson is forced to leave the United States for (Cuba?)and issues start to drag on for too long making the movie not intended for cinema. It starts to become formulaic and predictable. But in all fairness "The Great White Hope" set the bar for other boxing movies of this calibre like "The Hurricane" and "Ali". The boxing scenes feel real and authentic, but the issues on racism in movies have been going on for years that it's something I've seen thousands of times. But at the end, the powerful message left me with a lump in my throat. It was that powerful.Even though this movie was lopsided and not very setting at times, it still grabs your attention and delivers a very powerful punch. I recommend this movie mostly to the performances and the characters especially from James Earl Jones and Jane Alexander and for the supporting stars as well like Hal Holbrook, Moses Gunn, Robert Webber, Beah Richards and R.G. Armstrong. If you ever have a chance please feel free to watch this movie and feel intrigued by it.

The main attraction of The Great White Hope is James Earl Jones at his peak. His performance as a thinly-disguised Jack Johnson is immediately magnetic, with Jones managing to express all the contradictions of the man himself, coming across as charming and threatening, righteous and vain, all at the same time.The rest of the film isn't half-bad either. It has the telltale signs of a theatrical adaptation, being heavy on the dialogue and light on the action, so those looking for a sports movie will be disappointed. But there's an undeniable pathos to the script and its story of pride and personal morals being worn down by social cynicism. It remains ambiguous what we should think of Johnson and his refusal to compromise with a racist society even as it hurts him and the ones he loves. He's clearly in the right, but -- and so few movies recognize this -- being right only takes you so far. It's a bit dated, but The Great White Hope still raises powerful questions that we're working through today, with an all-time great performance at its core.

The title is no misnomer:although the movie tells the story of a black champion,"they " get out of their way to thwart this living "threat " for the white race;as users noticed it ,do not watch it if you expect "rocky": it's its exact contrary ,a failure story.James Earl Jones portrays this fighter with a great dignity till the last pictures:he is bullied ,humiliated,persecuted;the best scene is for me that ridiculous performance of "Uncle Tom's cabin" on stage,with Jones and Alexander wearing wigs ,and playing the slave and Evangeline .If Jones is not Rocky,Jane Alexander is not Adrian either;first of all ,she is white and well meaning were not prepared to accept it at the time (we are far from "guess who's coming to dine" in which a white bubble head girl is to marry a black future Nobel Prize).Alexander's transformation is extraordinary: a shy elegant lady in the first sequence,then a defiant woman during her "questioning",a partner who accompanies the champion in all his sufferings and humiliations -she is sublime as Eva ,the part of a little girl- and finally a broken human being,living in poverty,beaten by the man she loves in spite of all.This is a movie for people with a strong heart ,and Martin Ritt was always an activist director ;I'd tone it a bit : he had always thought that France was the country where there was no racism (see also "Paris blues ,1961):it's wishful thinking.That said ,you should not miss this courageous work.

When I was a wee lad of 14 I saw this film and it blew me away. James earl Jones was by and large unknown and he was picked to do the role over Brock Peters who had done the role on Broadway. This was a film (and play) that was vastly ahead of its time as it dealt with an athlete of color (there may have been a film about Jackie Robinson but it didn't have much an impact because I don't remember it and I loved Burt Lancaster as the Native American Jim Thorpe but that rang no more true than Jeff Chandler playing Native Americans) and it dealt with the issue of miscegenation and inter-racial sexual and romantic relationships. Its clear the characters in the film (and play) are composites except for Jack Johnson because Ken Burns' 'Unofrgivable Blackness" of which I have only seen the first installment as of this writing goes into great detail on the dramatic personae of Johnson's stories including the real boxers Johnson fought and the real women he loved.