The film needed a broader scope, and a much, much bigger vision.

Rating: 4/10 (25 November 2005)

Mann's film was respectful to the champion, nothing more. Most all of the mainstream critics got it right, the film was much more like a funeral procession than the encapsulation of the life of the most dynamic sports figure in history.
Michael Man's film falls short in many respects. I remember the meeting between Bundini Brown and Ali as it was orchestrated in the film as something primary in Ali's story, since its placement so early on in the film and just the importance that the director chose to give that event...nothing could be further from the truth.
Thomas Hauser's biography would not have been a bad template for this film. Where was Ali throwing his Olympic gold medal into a flowing river? Renting a bus and driving to Florida in order to torment Sunny Liston in the middle of the night before he became champion? At one time at the height of his popularity, Ali said of himself, "More people know me than Jesus Christ." He may have been right. As a reviewer noted, Mann succeeded in making Ali smaller than life.
Spike Lee has stated that When Will Smith came to him and asked, "Spike, I need you to expand your vision for this film," Lee knew he wasn't going to get the job. Interestingly, Man's film does play in a similar tone to Malcolm X. It was said by Lee also that Man's people scouted all of the same locations that he used in X. I'm not sure that Lee would have brought anything earthshaking to the film, but he would have spiced it up.
The film needed a broader scope, and a much, much bigger vision. And if the budget for some reason couldn't contain the scope, than the correct vision could have been enough to propel the film into the stratosphere to which it naturally belonged.