On this day in 1994, George Foreman, age 45, becomes boxing's oldest heavyweight champion when he defeats 26-year-old Michael Moorer in the 10th round of their WBA fight in Las Vegas. More than 12,000 spectators at the MGM Grand Hotel watched Foreman dethrone Moorer, who went into the fight with a 35-0 record. Foreman dedicated his upset win to "all my buddies in the nursing home and all the guys in jail." Born in 1949 in Marshal, Texas, Foreman had a troubled childhood and dropped out of high school. Eventually, he joined President Lyndon Johnson's Jobs Corps work program and discovered a talent for boxing. "Big George," as he was nicknamed, took home a gold medal for the U.S. at the 1968 Olympics in Mexico City. In 1973 in Kingston, Jamaica, after winning his first 37 professional matches, 34 by knockout, Foreman KO'd "Smokin'" Joe Frazier after two rounds and was crowned heavyweight champ. At 1974's "Rumble in the Jungle" in Kinshasha, Zaire, the younger, stronger Foreman suffered a surprising loss to unde

Champions Forever is filmmaker Dimitri Logothetis' bouquet to past boxing greats. Adopting a then and now approach, Logothetis alternates clips of these fighters in their prime with recently filmed interviews. The five boxers spotlighted herein are Muhammad Ali, Joe Frazier, Ken Norton, Larry Holmes, and George Foreman--whose prime, it would later turn out, hadn't quite passed yet. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide.

Ali the Fighter was made in 1975, when the Muhammad Ali-Joe Frazier fight was still fresh in everyone's memory banks. Thus, a generous portion of the documentary's running time is given over to graphic footage of that famous bout. Filmmaker William Greaves frames these scenes with a fine thumbnail sketch of Ali's rise to glory, beginning with his Cassius Clay days back in Louisville. Fortunately, the film was made long before Ali's profound physical and mental debilitations. Ali the Fighter contains little that is new, but serves as an acceptable introduction to those sports fans unfamiliar with its subject. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide.