Our friend James Toback (yes, really) has a new film out. Tyson will screen in the Premieres section of this year's Sundance Film Festival. Here's part of Filmmaker Magazine's story on the film which appears in the upcoming Winter issue.
-He was known as Kid Dynamite. A 5'11" fireplug of speed and power with a devastating uppercut, his ferocity and domination of the heavyweight boxing division is something that has never been seen before or since. He became a marvel to sports fans as he knocked out opponents before you could even make a dent in your seat, an idol to kids around the world as his in-ring mannerisms were imitated in school yards and immortalized in a legendary Nintendo video game.
But Mike Tyson was jolted back to reality when he hit the canvas for the first time in his pro career in Tokyo by Buster Douglas in 1990. By the time he finished crawling around on all fours to find his mouth guard he had lost the bout, was no longer the undisputed champion, and most damagingly, his aura of invincibility had been shattered. Things would only get worse as two years later Tyson would be charged with raping 18-year-old beauty-pageant contestant Desiree Washington, and was sentenced to three years in prison. When he got out Mike Tyson was far from Kid Dynamite. His life became a Greek tragedy highlighted by a drug arrest, biting a chunk out of Evander Holyfield's ear in their second fight and getting a tattoo on his face.
James Toback first met Tyson in 1986 on the set of his film The Pick-up Artist. Tyson hadn't yet become the champion, but Toback didn't care - he was simply intrigued by this megastar's darker side. The two formed a bond that has lasted more than 20 years with Tyson appearing in two of Toback's films, including a memorable cameo in 1999's Black and White. As legend has it, Toback developed a scene with Robert Downey Jr. where his character would hit on Tyson. Unfortunately for Downey, Toback never told Tyson what was going to happen. The scene ends with Downey on the floor as an enraged Tyson chokes him out.On the surface the Tyson-Toback bond couldn't be more unlikely. Tyson was born and raised on the streets of Brooklyn, taking occasional stints to juvenile prison until trainer Cus D'Amato took him in at age 15. Toback grew up in a life of privilege in New York City, graduating from Harvard magna cum laude and creating one of the seminal wiseguy films of the '70s, Fingers, followed 13 years later with an Oscar nomination for writing the screenplay for Bugsy. But, having insatiable appetites for a few of life's pleasures - women, booze and gambling - Toback understood Tyson's flaws.
Toback transfers his intimacy with Tyson to the screen for his latest film, Tyson. The documentary covers the boxer's rise-and-fall career with no buffer or talking heads, just archival footage and Tyson uncensored, unabashed and sometimes even poetic. Through the 90 minutes the "Baddest Man on the Planet" veneer we associate most with Tyson evaporates to expose a shy, insecure person who for most of his life was scared or taken advantage of. Toback uses split screen and overlapping dialogue to highlight Tyson's state of mind, which he himself admits in the film isn't normal: "Insanity is the only sanity I know."
Below is the fascinating interview:
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