4:04PM, Nov 10, 2008
In 1975, legendary boxers Muhammad Ali and Joe Frazier fought their third and final contest in the Philippines.
The bout is now considered the greatest ever boxing match in history, with an ending so dramatic it continues to provoke controversy.
Featuring archive footage and exclusive interviews with Frazier, his son Marvin and Muhammed Ali, True Stories documents a bitter and intense rivalry, fuelled by race and religion.
Muhammad Ali's life has been well documented, but this is the story of the other man in Manila. A man unable to let go of the most bitter and intense sporting rivalry the world has ever seen.
It's quite a shock to see a 70-year-old Joe Frazier, still living above his Philadelphia gym, bitterly explaining how he feels Ali's health problems are payment for his past behaviour, cruelly saying: "I'm talking, I'm walking and still having fun."
But it's even more of a shock to see that sporting hero Ali wasn't an innocent party in the conflict between the two men.
Eight years previously, Ali and Frazier had been friends. Frazier publicly and personally supported Ali when he had been stripped of his boxing licence for refusing to fight in the Vietnam War, going so far as to lend his competitor money.
But once Ali was back in the ring, their friendship turned into a vicious feud, entwined with the racial politics of America in the 1970s. Ali became involved in the black militant organisation Nation Of Islam and portrayed Frazier as a traitor to the black community.
Ali saw Frazier as inferior in every way, and used his relationship with the press to taunt his opponent: "It will be a killa and a chilla and a thrilla, when I get the gorilla in Manila."
By the time the men met in the ring for their third bout, the feud had reached boiling point and their extraordinary personal battle led to a fight that was a near-death experience for both of them.
With this documentary, True Stories provides an interesting insight into one of boxing's most iconic fights from a previously unexplored perspective.
Find out when Thriller In Manila is showing on TV.
