The Great White Hype

A flamboyant boxing promoter manufactures racial animosity to sell a lucrative pay-per-view spectacle by pitting the dominant heavyweight champion against a washed-up, peace-loving rock singer who beat him a decade earlier.

Every now and then Hollywood studio executives realise that audiences get tired of old formulas and want something different. This is the conclusion drawn by one of the protagonists of THE GREAT WHITE HYPE, a 1996 satire directed by Reginald Hudlin.

Reverend Frank Sultan (played by Samuel L. Jackson) is a flamboyant promoter for James “The Grim Reaper” Roper (played by Damon Wayans), an unbeaten boxing champion. Roper was so effective in disposing of contenders that the audiences and television revenue began to vanish. Sultan concludes that the main reason is the public being bored with one black man knocking out another black man in twenty seconds. His solution to this problem is a contender who happens to be white.

The perfect candidate is Terry Conklin (played by Peter Berg), lead singer for an obscure Cleveland hard rock band. Ten years ago, Conklin managed to beat Roper in an amateur fight. Conklin has long forgotten boxing, but Sultan appeals to his idealism and care about the world’s homeless. In exchange for 10 million US$, Conklin agrees to become a contender and later watches as Sultan shamelessly panders to the lowest racist sentiments in order to attract crowds.

The plot of THE GREAT WHITE HYPE touches some potentially stingy issues like race relations in contemporary America, and some plot elements and characters have a striking resemblance to real-life personalities and situations. The movie therefore had the potential of being a serious exploration of the subject or truly devastating satire.

Unfortunately, the script doesn’t make the most of that potential. Not even charismatic actors like Samuel L. Jackson can rescue a film which is populated by unlikeable characters the audience couldn’t care less about. The promising premise is ruined by humour that panders to racist stereotypes.

Most of the jokes aren’t particularly funny, and the biggest one happens in the end. When the film abruptly ends, the audience would feel just like those boxing fans who had expected spectacle and saw twenty seconds of a one-sided “fight”. Then they would realise that the biggest joke in THE GREAT WHITE HYPE was on them.

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Flamboyant boxing promoter Reverend Frank Sultan runs the heavyweight division with an iron fist, orchestrating fights for his dominant champion, James “The Grim Reaper” Roper. However, Roper’s complete dominance inside the ring has caused audience intrigue and pay-per-view revenues to crater. Facing massive financial overhead at his Las Vegas headquarters, Sultan searches for a sensational narrative hook to get casual viewers to open their wallets, deciding that pitting Roper against a manufactured white contender will trigger massive racially driven media interest.

Digging through Roper’s amateur record, Sultan discovers that the only man ever to defeat him was Terry Conklin, who knocked him out in a Golden Gloves match ten years earlier. Conklin has long abandoned the sport to perform as the frontman of an obscure alternative rock band called “Massive Head Wound” while advocating for inner-city homeless relief. Sultan tracks Conklin down and lures him into accepting a title bout by offering a staggering $10 million purse, which Conklin pledges to donate entirely to charity.

Sultan launches a massive, shameless marketing campaign deliberately stoking racial divisions to drive ticket and broadcast sales. While an out-of-shape Roper descends into hedonism, partying, and excessive weight gain, Conklin throws himself into grueling, earnest training. Investigative sports journalist Mitchell Kane attempts to expose Sultan’s exploitative empire, only to be seduced by wealth and power into taking an executive position within Sultan’s inner circle as fight night in Las Vegas rapidly approaches.