Stream It Or Skip It: ‘Blood Brothers: Malcolm X & Muhammad Ali’ on Netflix, A Look Back on A Soured Friendship

No review can capture the essence of Netflix’s Blood Brothers: Malcolm X & Muhammad Ali as succinctly as the exact words of Ilyasha Al-Shabazz, the youngest daughter of the civil rights icon. She opens the film by saying “It was destiny that my father and Cassius Clay would meet. Three short years that they would spend in their lives, that destiny created for them. That was their blood brotherhood.”

BLOOD BROTHERS: STREAM IT OR SKIP IT?

The Gist: In the early part of the 1960s, Muhammad Ali, revered as “The Greatest” both in and out of the boxing ring, and Malcolm X, whose stirring rhetoric appeared to counter the nonviolent movement led by Martin Luther King Jr., took solace in one another as their common faith and charismatic personas made them seem like two peas in a pod. However, the still-young heavyweight champion of the world appeared to have been caught in the middle of the growing rift between Malcolm and Elijah Muhammad, the leader of the Nation of Islam (NOI). Upon Malcolm’s departure from the Nation, Muhammad chose his spiritual father over his spiritual brother. The end of the friendship became one of society’s greatest “what ifs” as Malcolm X was assassinated not too long afterwards in 1965.

Rooted in the book Blood Brothers: The Fatal Friendship between Muhammad Ali and Malcolm X, director Marcus Clarke brings in family members, friends, historians and activists to provide context around the kinship the two men had built in that short time. Though the children of both icons speak, what’s truly special is hearing from Muhammad’s only brother, the soft-spoken Rahman, who was often at the boxer’s side and witnessed the blossoming relationship up close.

What Movies Will It Remind You Of?: Of the seemingly infinite works about both men, it’s the recency of One Night in Miami from Amazon Prime Video that likely comes to mind first. The directorial debut of actress Regina King and based on the 2013 play, this acclaimed 2020 film is a fictionalized look into a chance meeting of four icons (Malcolm X, Ali, singer Sam Cooke and NFL legend Jim Brown) after Ali “shook up the world” after defeating Sonny Liston.

You may also be inspired to look back at Spike Lee’s 1992 biopic on Malcolm X (in one of Denzel Washington’s most iconic roles), or Michael Mann’s 2001 biopic on Muhammad Ali (starring Will Smith) with the idea of examining how both directors approached this fascinating three-year period.

Performance Worth Watching: The footage of speeches and interviews from both Muhammad and Malcolm are powerful on their own as they are no longer here to speak to us. Almost like a cold case, viewers will naturally draw the common threads between their parallel lives in their formative years, keep their ears attuned to their words as they became “brothers” and try to rebuild those threads again from the moment Malcolm X was expelled from the NOI.

You also can’t help but to be drawn to Rahman Ali, as the reverence for his older brother remains as deep as it was when they were young men growing up in Louisville, Kentucky.

Memorable Dialogue: When Rahman Ali talked about how strong the bond was between his older brother and Malcolm, he was then asked why the friendship ended. As Rahman begins to explain it (“well…), Clarke makes a wise decision to let past footage speak for itself as we look at a past interview from Muhammad where he talks about Malcolm’s split from the Nation of Islam. The fighter twice repeats some haunting words: “Destiny can take your best friend as an instrument to cause you harm and your worst enemy to do you good.” While it feels like foreshadowing to those unfamiliar with the relationship, it is also a clever callback to Ilyasha Al-Shabazz’s words moments before about “destiny.”

Yet, there’s a second moment that should leave a mark towards the end of the film. Ilyasha recalls some time after Muhammad left the NOI – he departed from the group in 1975 – when the retired fighter reached out to Malcolm’s widow, Betty Shabazz and their daughters. After she expressed her belief that Muhammad’s intention was to ensure that the family was taken care of after her father’s assassination, we see a photo of the Shabazz family. The camera zooms in towards the eldest daughter, Attallah, before playing her speech during Ali’s memorial in 2016. Attallah spoke of the reconnection and the grief Muhammad felt over not having spoken to Malcolm before his death. While the memorial clip is not original to the film, the sequence is punctuated beautifully by Attallah’s words and emotions, as a reminder that the two men weren’t just heroes to a people, but men with a deep love and admiration for one another. “Having Muhammad Ali in my life somehow sustained my dad’s breath for me for a little while longer,” she said. “51 years longer. Until now.”

Sex and Skin: None.

Our Take: The men born as Malcolm Little and Cassius Clay Jr. changed far more than just their own names, but left indelible marks on an American (and global) society long resistant to a serious penance on its racial injustices. Neither are no longer with us to speak on why their once-strong kinship flamed out, with Malcolm X’s life cut tragically short before he’d turn 40 and Muhammad Ali spending the much of his remaining days regretting not having reconciled with the slain leader.

Our Call: STREAM IT. While you should also buy the book Blood Brothers (something this scribe will do himself), Marcus Clarke and his team make a strong effort in weaving together archival footage and insightful commentary from those who knew these iconic figures. The wider biographies of both men are well-known to the public, yet the film sheds some light on the lesser-known, more intimate details of how their brotherhood began. The true success of Blood Brothers is how it leaves you wondering what might have been if tragedy hadn’t gotten in the way of a possible reconciliation.

Jason Clinkscales is the founder and editor-in-chief of The Whole Game, and his work has been featured at Awful Announcing, The Week and Dime Magazine. A New York City native, he is also a former media research analyst in both television networks and advertising agencies.