If You Wanna Get Funked Up, Check Out The Film 'Soul Power'

[Disco Funk]

I checked out the film 'Soul Power' recently after seeing reviews for it and checking out the trailer. It featured musical outtakes from the film that eventually became When We Were Kings, which chronicled the lead up to the Foreman Ali fight in Zaire. 'Soul Power' is about the concert that preceded the fight. There is great footage from the Godfather of Soul James Brown doing his thang, plus other music by The Spinners (One of A Kind Love Affair), Bill Withers (I don't know what it was, but it was a solo acoustic ballad), Celia Cruz with the Fania All Stars, BB King (The Thrill Is Gone), The Crusaders, and a number of African music artists.

Unfortunately, while they show Sister Sledge preparing for the concert, they don't show them on stage. They also didn't show Manu Dibango performing on stage, even though they showed him playing his sax in the streets.

But it's the James Brown portion of the film that'll get your head nodding to the beat. I definitely couldn't keep still while the JBs chunked the funk. One of the coolest moments, though, happens earlier when we see a private party where the JBs are playing Hot Pants, while Philippe Wynne ad-libs a melodic song over the music! It was like some crazy mashup, like an artist today sampling an old track but putting a new melody over top.

I was hoping there would be an accompanying CD soundtrack for this film, but I can't find any information on one.

From what I've checked around the internet, there was some footage already out there on DVD from the concert in the form of Pointer Sisters and BB King DVDs from Pioneer. That's basically it for outtakes. Unless the DVD will have more footage that wasn't in the theatrical release.

It's a shame that this film had to wait 35 years to be made. They never really explain why the film was held up for so long because it's basically edited to look like it was from back in the day a la Woodstock.

Here's the film's trailer. I don't know how long it will stay in theatres. It's definitely worth checking out. If anyone finds out if there's an accompanying CD release, please post that as a reply in this thread!



Disco Funk

[Videoskooter]

Thanx DF for posting this. Although I have the "When We Were Kings" DVD, I'll definitely check this one out.

BTW, I clearly remember watching that fight on television BITD. That was an EVENT!

[Disco Funk]

The fight was before my time. But I did watch When We Were Kings when it was on TV, and it was a well made documentary. It definitely deserved to win the Oscar.

Soul Power is a wonderful music experience. It's not the best doc ever made, but the music is really great. Check it out soon, because it seems to only be playing in a select few theatres, and I imagine it won't run for much longer.

Another interesting scene from the film was Philippe Wynne donning boxing garb and getting into the ring to fight Ali. At first you think it's kind of funny, the way Wynne was goofing around with a fellow Spinner in his pre-fight warm-up, but then I started wondering if he was mocking it a bit too much. I mean, this is some serious stuff, like if someone was to play around like they were Bruce Lee just before taking on a Mixed Martial Artist. You don't do stuff like that. I was expecting Ali to beat the sh** out of Wynne, but in the end, it looked like a friendly little bout. But seriously, Ali didn't look like he was laughing during all the joking around.

Disco Funk

[Nano]

it's an excellent documentary of the era. I guess the music rights mumbo-jumbo is to blame for the years of oblivion (same thing happened to Murray Lerner with his 1970 Isle of Wight Festival documentary).

for me THE moment is when Ali comes to greet James Brown and the Godfather of Soul more or less sinks to his knees before the sight of the man. it had to take the great Muhammad Ali to make JB become humble :icon_biggrin: