Lord of the Ring

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Mann got Smith on board by promising to guide him through the physical, emotional and spiritual training required. "Before that point, I couldn't see how I would become Muhammad Ali," says Smith. Mann kept Ali's story at manageable length by focusing only on the civil rights and Vietnam years, when Ali "occupied his most profound importance." Mann's final screenplay, written with Eric Roth, begins in 1964, when the young Cassius Clay beats Sonny Liston out of the world heavyweight championship. Fresh off his victory, he publicly and unapologetically announces his devotion to the Nation of Islam--a black Muslim group that white America at the time considered a serious, militant threat--and takes an Arabic name. He's stripped of his title by the boxing commission when he refuses the Vietnam draft ("No Viet Cong ever called me n_____"). Over the course of 2 1/2 hours, the film builds to its finale in 1974, when he takes the title back from George Foreman in Zaire's Rumble in the Jungle bout--a sequence that Mann shot in Mozambique with 2,000 paid extras and more than 20,000 volunteers. The cost of Mann's epic vision: at least $105 million.

Almost half an hour of the movie takes place in boxing rings. Mann, a famous perfectionist, has meticulously restaged the actual fights, and Smith goes toe to toe with real fighters. Smith says the knockdown of Foreman (boxer Charles Shufford) was the most "grueling" sequence: "We did it over five days. Michael wanted everything, the angle of the bend in my wrist and the angle of my ankle and toe, to be perfect."

Mann also made sure the supporting cast did its homework. Angelo Dundee, Ali's former trainer, was often on the set with Ron Silver, who plays him in the movie. Actor Jeffrey Wright closely observed Bingham, who was on hand to take pictures and help safeguard historical accuracy. Jamie Foxx studied tapes of Ali's late, drug-addled corner man Drew (Bundini) Brown. Jon Voight, who last summer hid himself under layers of prosthetics as Franklin Delano Roosevelt in Pearl Harbor, again endured hours each day in the makeup chair, this time disguising himself as Howard Cosell. The witty verbal sparring between Ali and Cosell provides some of the movie's most entertaining moments. "If you talk to Ali today," says Voight, "the first thing that will happen in response to the name Howard Cosell is a smile."

Moviegoers may want to do a little research themselves before seeing the film. "Michael Mann doesn't subscribe to the theory that the audience is not smart," says Smith. "People appreciate it when you're not spelling everything out." Still, it helps to know a few facts about Ali's initiation into the Nation of Islam and his complicated relationship with Malcolm X (Mario Van Peebles), which is already unfolding when the movie begins. Says Mann: "I wanted to insert you into the stream of this man's life, orient you without doing it in a blatant way with exposition." Ali is pleased with Mann's approach. "It was better than I thought it would be," he said after attending the movie's Hollywood premiere.

Weeks earlier, on the day we found him drawing in his office, Ali hadn't yet seen the entire movie. Concerned about the treatment of his rich sex life, he asks if the film is too racy, poking his right middle finger into his closed left fist to help communicate the question. Yes, Smith does have a love scene with his real-life wife, Jada Pinkett Smith, who plays Ali's spitfire bride Sonji Roi. Lonnie reassures the champ: "But they have their clothes on," she says, and she explains that "the last thing we wanted to do was whitewash Muhammad." Ali has no comment on this. He goes back to his boxing picture. Once it has been been filled with spectators, Ali rises, walks tentatively around the table and shows it off to his visitor. He's proud of the drawing. It's not the first time that he has created an audience all on his own.