Grade: C
Release Date: April 24, 2009
Tyson is a documentary about boxing champion, Mike Tyson’s life. It is told by Tyson himself as he takes us from his days on the streets as a thief to him rising to fame to his fateful fall that turned him in to more of a family man. Hearing him talk about his past is interesting and tragic in many ways. He talks about being detained in juvenile hall several times when he was very young and seeing so many of his friends there, essentially his home at that time. Tyson shares his very troubled youth with us. He is wiser now, but he doesn’t share this in a regretful way, but often in a comedic way. The struggle, everything he accomplished, and where it all led him is an interesting aspect to this documentary, but the most amusing side is just the slightly slanted way of thinking that he lives by. Tyson is blunt even when it makes him look unappealing. The way he comes out and says certain things is both entertaining and honest whether you like the guy or not.
Tyson is a documentary about boxing champion, Mike Tyson’s life. It is told by Tyson himself as he takes us from his days on the streets as a thief to him rising to fame to his fateful fall that turned him in to more of a family man. Hearing him talk about his past is interesting and tragic in many ways. He talks about being detained in juvenile hall several times when he was very young and seeing so many of his friends there, essentially his home at that time. Tyson shares his very troubled youth with us. He is wiser now, but he doesn’t share this in a regretful way, but often in a comedic way. The struggle, everything he accomplished, and where it all led him is an interesting aspect to this documentary, but the most amusing side is just the slightly slanted way of thinking that he lives by. Tyson is blunt even when it makes him look unappealing. The way he comes out and says certain things is both entertaining and honest whether you like the guy or not.
The film uses a combination of current interviews with Tyson, archived footage of Tyson, and older interviews with him and his trainer, Cus D’Amato. There are moments where we feel a bit of sympathy for Tyson such as when his trainer died who he immensely looked up to, his ghonerreah outbreak before his first big title fight, and having his pride taken away from him. Tyson even turns a shameful and animalistic action of biting the opponent’s ear in the ring to something we can understand. He says he knew he wasn’t going to be able to win that championship belt. Tyson says this hurt him so badly, he just wanted to hurt him back. This gives us a better insight beyond the more common notion this triggers the image of a crazed man. Another insight we get about Tyson is his fear and distrust of people. This seemed to heighten when D’Amato died as he was the only one who was able to get past the wall he puts up.
Although the film shows Tyson’s point of view, it is really the only point of view that we get. Tyson is at times an engaging and enjoyable documentary, but it is a very unbalanced one, simply made to make us feel sympathetic towards Tyson through hearing his struggles. The only other person who is interviewed aside from Tyson, is D’Amato and even then it happens to be a joint interview with Tyson by his side. While some major moments of Tyson’s life are discussed many are mentioned and brushed under the rug such as his domestic affairs with his first wife and his rape conviction. Tyson claims he didn’t do it and that is pretty much it on the subject. We don’t get any other point of views on many controversial moments in his life, not even to those who were perhaps close to it. Director, James Toback, has responded to this by claiming that other people such as some of Tyson’s ex-wives weren’t interviewed since he expected them to lie. This seems to be a faulty excuse and as if Toback just wanted to show the more positive outlook on Tyson’s life, not giving any chance to disturb this upbeat view. To support this even further, James Toback, has been a long time friend of Mike Tyson and really just created a puff piece for him to describe his life as he would like it to be viewed.
Tyson is biased, but it could have been much more so. Tyson could have just talked about his glory days. He talks about it all though, even if some of the most pressing issues are dropped as soon as they are brought up. Still, everything is at least touched upon. There are moments such as when he talks about how he has messed up particularly with women in the past. He acknowledges mistakes he has made in his troubled youth growing up in Brooklyn as well as during certain fights when he got too big of a head and set himself up for his own downfall. Tyson is Mike Tyson’s monologue, his chance to tell us the events on his life as he saw them, giving us an interesting and slightly entertaining film just because of the bizarre insights of Tyson. It is very one-sided and not really a good documentary, even bland at times. Anyone who is interested in the man that is Mike Tyson will probably enjoy the film, as long as you can take the good with the bad.
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