A Change Is Gonna Come

The night before the Oscars, I watched "One Night In Miami" on Amazon Prime.  While it was not nominated for Best Picture, it was nominated for multiple awards, and it had been on my watch list for a while.

• Interesting that these 4 men were friends, and I wish I could have seen an actual account of their meetings, not just this really cool imagining of one night.
• Great performances all around by all four gentlemen.  I wish I could have seen more of their individual lives, too, but then the movie would have been really long. Also, it's called "One Night in Miami After Lots of Other Separate Nights".
• I don't know much about Malcolm X, but Kingsley Ben Adir played him the way I thought that he might have been: strong, quiet until he needed to be heard, and driven.  He wanted the men to be leaders of his cause because of their popularity, and he seemed pretty convincing to me.  I can't believe I still haven't watched the Denzel depiction yet.  Must remedy soon.
• I smiled whenever Eli Goree talked and sounded like the Cassius Clay / Muhammad Ali I grew up watching.  Some people exaggerate the way he spoke, but not Goree.  It was subtle, if you can say that Ali was subtle at anything at all.
• I'm not much of a football fan, so I'm not familiar with Jim Brown.  I sure as heck don't blame him for wanting to act in movies instead of getting more injuries. 
• Leslie Odom is the biggest reason that I wanted to watch the film.  I don't know anything about Sam Cooke's personality, but I liked Odom's portrayal as he felt like he needed to defend the fame he acquired with music that might not have been black enough for his community.
• I'm glad that Odom got to sing a few times!  It would have been a waste of a movie without it, and he sang everything beautifully.
• I don't understand the scene when Cooke sings at the Copacabana.  Wouldn't the audience be there for the biggest act?  Why would they act like they don't know who he is?  Wouldn't he have had top billing?
• I would like to see more of Malcolm X's photographs.
• "Everybody talks about they wantin' a piece of the pie, well I don't. I want the goddamn recipe."

Great movie, should have been nominated for Best Picture.  I'm glad that Odom was nominated for Best Supporting Actor, and I would have been happy for any and all of them had they been nominated, too.