The Great White Hope is a 1970 American biographical romantic drama film written and adapted from the 1967 Howard Sackler play of the same name.
The film was directed by Martin Ritt, starring James Earl Jones, Jane Alexander, Chester Morris, Hal Holbrook, Beah Richards and Moses Gunn. Jones and Alexander, who also appeared in the same roles in the stage versions, received Best Actor and Actress Academy Award nominations for their performances.
The film and play is based on the true story of boxer Jack Johnson and his first wife, Etta Terry Duryea; the controversy over their marriage; and Duryea's death by suicide in 1912.
Contents
Plot
Set between 1910 and 1915, the story follows Jack Jefferson, patterned after real-life boxer Jack Johnson, going on a hot streak of victories in the boxing ring as he defeats every white boxer around. Soon the press and others who want to see white people win at sports, announce the search for a "great white hope", a white boxer who will defeat Jefferson for the heavyweight title.
Jefferson, meanwhile, prepares for a few more matches, but he lets his guard down by courting the beautiful, and white, Eleanor Bachman, and when everyone, including Jack's black "wife", discover this, the tensions grow to fever pitch. Jack's close black friends become scared over his pushing the envelope of success and the white authorities conspire to frame him for unlawful sexual relations with Eleanor and thereby take away his title. It leads to jealousy, a run from the law, and finally, tragedy.
Cast
James Earl Jones as Jack Jefferson
Jane Alexander as Eleanor Bachman
Chester Morris as Pop Weaver
Hal Holbrook as Al Cameron
Beah Richards as Mama Tiny
Moses Gunn as Scipio
Lou Gilbert as "Goldie"
Robert Webber as Dixon
Marlene Warfield as Clara
Rockne Tarkington as Rudy
Jim Beattie as The Kid
Reception
The film opened to positive responses from both audiences and critics. They especially loved the performances of both James Earl Jones and Jane Alexander, who were both in the original stage play and won Tony Awards for their work. Jones would get bigger roles after this film, and Alexander, who earned three more Oscar nominations in succeeding years, made her debut here. Jones later contributed commentary to a documentary about Jack Johnson that would sum up this film, saying: "To know the story of Jack Johnson is to know that it is a study in hubris."
Critic Vincent Canby referred to the film as "One of those liberal, well-meaning, fervently uncontroversial works that pretend to tackle contemporary problems by finding analogies at a safe remove in history". Critic Emanuel Levy wrote called it a "well-acted drama". Variety said: "Jones' re-creation of his stage role is an eye-riveting experience. The towering rages and unrestrained joys of which his character was capable are portrayed larger than life."
On the review aggregator website Rotten Tomatoes, 43% of seven critics' reviews are positive. Metacritic, which uses a weighted average, assigned the film a score of 53 out of 100, based on seven critics, indicating "mixed or average" reviews.
Box office
According to Fox records, the film required $16,075,000 in rentals to break even. By December 11, 1970, it had earned $9,325,000 in rentals, thus the studio took a loss on the film.