When We Were Kings

When We Were Kings
When We Were Kings
Directed by	Leon Gast
Produced by	Leon Gast; David Sonenberg; Taylor Hackford;
Starring	Muhammad Ali; George Foreman; James Brown; B.B. King; Norman Mailer; George Plimpton; Spike Lee; The Crusaders; The Spinners;
Cinematography	Maryse Alberti; Paul Goldsmith; Kevin Keating; Albert Maysles; Roderick Young
Edited by	Leon Gast; Taylor Hackford; Jeffrey Levy-Hinte; Keith Robinson
Production; company	PolyGram Filmed Entertainment
Distributed by	Gramercy Pictures
Release dates	January 1996 (Sundance); October 25, 1996
Running time	89 minutes
Country	United States
Language	English
Box office	$2,789,985

When We Were Kings is a 1996 American documentary film directed by Leon Gast about the "Rumble in the Jungle" heavyweight championship boxing match that was held on October 30, 1974, in Zaire (now the Democratic Republic of the Congo) between world heavyweight champion George Foreman and Muhammad Ali. It features archival footage of celebrities, including James Brown, B.B. King, and promoter Don King, in the lead-up to the fight and accompanying Zaire 74 music festival, alongside interview footage of Norman Mailer, George Plimpton, Spike Lee and Thomas Hauser from the 1990s.

The film took Gast 22 years to edit and finance,^[2] but it was finally released to strong reviews^[3] and won the Academy Award for Best Documentary Feature of 1996.^[4]