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Such a frustrating disappointment

One of my all time favorites.

This is a coming of age storyline that you've seen in one form or another for decades. It takes a truly unique voice to make yet another one worth watching.

The movie's neither hopeful in contrived ways, nor hopeless in different contrived ways. Somehow it manages to be wonderful

It's 1974 Kinshasa, Zaire. Promoters Hugh Masekela and Stewart Levine are organizing a companion music festival for the Ali-Foreman fight. It is to be the combination of African American music and musicians from mother Africa. James Brown is the headliner. A few days before the event, the fight is delayed due to Foreman's eye cut. The problem is that the music festival can not be delayed. The show must go on. This documentary starts like a freight train with James Brown and Soul Power. The main problem stems from the fact that it doesn't follow one person. It's a scattered way to tell a narrative. There is no structure. It's more like a series of behind-the-scenes snippets. There are amazing scenes of the stars talking, and some great musical performances. It's a nice series of vignettes that allows the audience to travel back in time to a specific place.

Basically a waste of time. Behind the scenes footage of (nothing really) people building a stage, native Africans being poor, Mohammed Ali bragging, and artists eating. ONE song each by every band. The Bill Withers and James Brown songs were great, but that doesn't warrant wasting 90 minutes of time. Just watch those videos on-line and go on with your day. I really was looking forward to see the performances of these artists in their prime. If you are looking for the same, you will be vastly let down. Just filler. I removed the paper cover and the disc itself, kept the plastic case for future use, and threw the rest in the garbage, I was so disappointed. Avoid like Ebola.

"When We Were Kings" was a great film with soul and spirit explaining how this music festival and a world boxing match with Ali wound up in Zaire in 1974. I was hungry for more.This short film just has 20 minutes of music and a lot of boring pointless dialog. Leon Gast had been hired to do the rockumentary of the festival so presumably the whole thing is on film. Most of the performances must still be on filmstock in Gast's apartment. This film is a disgrace and feels like the leftovers from "When We Were Kings"Pros: Anytime James Brown or Muhammad Ali is on screen the world lights up. Miriam Makeba is awesome!Cons: Only one song by Bill Withers. Only one song by BB King. Only one song by Miriam Makeba.

This movie is a selection from many hours of footage produced before and during the music festival that was to accompany "The Rumble in the Jungle" - the heavyweight championship fight between Ali and Foreman in '74. The festival was meant to bring the American soul/r&b/funk/blues musicians "back home" to Africa and give them the opportunity to perform alongside African stars, such as Miriam Makeba. The movie is centered on James Brown, the main star of the three-day festival. It is more about the event as such, its "technical" background, than about schoolbook history. Even then, it leaves a lot of ambiguities open for the viewers to see. We hear Ali comment on the peaceful life Zairians lead while American blacks are ever threatened by accidents or (white) hatred. But this peaceful life is controlled by the government that urges the people to love their dictator. Although this movie doesn't deal with the political tensions involved in this Zairian sojourn, the implications are there. One thing that some viewers might not like is that "Soul Power" leaves little room for the African artists, focusing instead on the American greats like Brown or B.B. King. Another is that it's so short - King has only one feature, Brown has no more than three. At the Berlin IFF (Berlinale), the director (or editor, as the movie is simply made up of footage produced over 30 years ago) explained that he couldn't afford more than he did; also, some of the performances at the festival were of lower quality. As it is, the songs that we hear in "Soul Power" are beautifully shot - and finely recorded. At any rate, this movie is worth watching. It's interesting and it's funny. Go see for yourself!