Documentary review: Four Kings (2024)

If you ask any boxing fan who the four kings are, they'll rattle off the names Sugar Ray Leonard, Roberto Duran, Marvelous Marvin Hagler, and Tommy Hearns in quick succession. It's one of those terms that feels like it has been around forever but the moniker was coined by long-time sportswriter George Kimball in the title of his 2008 book 'Four Kings: Leonard, Hagler, Hearns, Duran and the Last Great Era of Boxing'.

I read it at my local library when I was 14 back when the only boxing books in stock were a few ghostwritten autobiographies, Four Kings, and Mark Kram's Ghosts of Manila. As far as I can remember, Kimball never really gave a reason for the name. It was just confidently and repeatedly used throughout the book and eventually you accept it as gospel. Before 2008 they were usually referred to as 'the Fab(ulous) Four', that name was used for a Top Rank VHS/DVD documentary about the four-way rivalry and the nine fights they had between them. Three of the four had fought the great Puerto Rican fighter Wilfred 'call me Wilfredo' Benitez too, whose name has been somewhat diminished by being frequently excluded. It's ironic that Benitez's status as boxing royalty is most likely repudiated because he was signed with Don King. But Amazon Prime's 2024 documentary Four Kings isn't about any of these kings (except Don does get a few cameos).

In the 1990s there was a four-way rivalry of sorts in Britain's boxing scene featuring Chris Eubank, Nigel Benn, Michael Watson, and Steve Collins. These kings had nine fights between them from 1990 to 1996 , but not all quartets are created equal. Most of these fights were for recently invented WBO titles and in the recently invented super-middleweight division. The question in boxing today remains; are you really a king if you only hold 1/4th of a crown? The documentary doesn't delve into this question or all four of these fighters either. It crowns Eubank and Benn (the best two of that rivalry) alongside two contemporary heavyweights, Lennox Lewis and Frank Bruno.

The connective tissue between these Forced Kings is that they're all black fighters who were born in London and the documentary heavily suggests they were the first black fighters to make it in the UK. A Grauniad review points out that this is John Conteh erasure. I'd add that it's another disservice to Randy Turpin too.

The filmmakers believed that discussions about race were crucial to this story. But their eye never looks any further than the boxers in question all relaying that they've been called racial slurs (what ethnic minority in a majority-white country hasn't?) and Frank Bruno being upset at people calling him an Uncle Tom. As unrest in 1980s Brixton and the murder of Stephen Lawrence are artlessly recalled to paint the picture of British racial strife in the late 1900s, Bruno was supposedly a one-man force for diversity and unity. I never thought I'd bring up the name here but you'd think that Lenny Henry was never on TV. All you need to know is that racism existed in the past too. As is the case in the present, some were earmarked as 'one of the good ones'.

Frank Bruno is your favourite boomer's favourite fighter. And so he should be, the man is a national treasure. There was once a time when Bruno and Harry Carpenter were as known for their double act in Britain as Ali and Howard Cosell were in America. He had all the personality and charisma that you want a boxer to have, and the Danny Devito to his Arnold Schwarzenegger was British-Jamaican-Canadian boxer; Lennox 'Big Len' Lewis. The question of nationality surrounding Lewis is seemingly never-ending. Maybe the best summary is to say that he epitomised the British Empire at a time when people felt the sun had already set on it, it's tough to convince people you're for Queen and Country when you represent a different country and fought under a different flag. Time heals all wounds though and Lewis has won Brits over through the years, documentaries like this help quite a bit. His questionable win over Riddick Bowe at the 1988 Olympics is barely discussed and his knockout loss to Oliver McCall is derided as a controversial referee stoppage.

This aversion to truth and any semblance of vulnerability hurts boxing more than it helps. After Bruno finally wins the WBC's portion of the heavyweight championship of the world in 1995, an intertitle tells us "over the next 14 months after suffering defeats Benn, Bruno & Eubank all retired". After Lewis defeats Holyfield, the yada yada yada is "after seven more fights, Lennox retires as the undisputed heavyweight championship of the world". You start to get the impression that nobody in these nostalgia love-ins has the cojones to admit that they had a good ride at the top while it lasted and then they lost because everyone loses. Hasim who? Why do a rise and fall story when you can instead save time and effort by skipping over the fall? Lewis claims he had nothing else to prove because he'd proven everything. Fight fans with long memories will remember he proved he did not give Vitali Klitschko the rematch he deserved but the capital-m Message is meant to be that he should be praised for the decision to retire.

What annoyed me most about this series though is the sound design. A radio producer once made the point to me that if you want to watch something and the picture is slightly crappy you'll put up with it, but if the sound is bad you probably won't bother. The audio in this iznogoud. The frequently recurring lowpoint is when they show old fight footage. I could put up with crystal-clear 1080p crowd shots being spliced into artifacted 480p footage but I can't put up with fake sound effects being added to missed and landed punches. The effects they use sound like pads being hit, which is a very different sound to a haymaker right hand landing on a human skull. I think some of the commentary also has a suspiciously 'dubbed in post' cadence and quality but there's a remote chance it could be radio or television commentary from a source not available online.

The visual editing is sloppy too as nobody paid to care about this documentary noticed that episode 3's recap of Holyfield-Lewis 1 accidentally opens with the exact same clip looping twice, with the dubbed punch sound effects missing their mark each time to boot. And on the visual front you have to put up with ugly AI generations as well. The horrors won't end.

As for the meat and potatoes of the series, Bruno comes across as a darling and Benn has always been a fighter that fans have a lot of time and respect for. Lewis and Eubank still conduct themselves with more pomp and arrogance than the average boxer but I guess the act has always been that they aren't average boxers, though Benn makes the soul read that Eubank has long since forgotten it was an act. Johnny Nelson is here too as the narrator for some reason and I'd love to know how they settled on him. I get that he's an ex-boxer and works in boxing media now, but were there really no bigger name fighters? And if not, why did they limit themselves to boxers when any actor could do a much better job reading from a script?

Besides giving people a nostalgia fix that could just as easily be gotten from watching YouTube videos of '90s London and the entire fights themselves, there's not enough substance to recommend this series. Just some typical streamer 'second screen' content.

Final Review Scores
In a word: Maudlin
In a soccer chant: Sacked in the morning
In a number: 5.86
In an emoji: 🛄
In an internet speed: 3mbps

'Four Kings' is available on Prime Video (note: only available in UK... I think)
Narrated by Johnny Nelson, featuring Nigel Benn, Frank Bruno, Chris Eubank, and Lennox Lewis
Directed by Hassan Ghazi, Beya Kabelu, and Stewart Kyasimire
Production companies: Workerbee/Banijay
Runtime: 4-part series, ~42 minute episodes
Released on September 27th, 2024.

BONUS! - Petty nitpicks and pontifications

• George Kimball died in 2011, so we can never get a definitive answer on exactly why he went with the name Four Kings for his book. My guesses are that it was either a mix of the poker hand and boxing's obsession with monarchy, or it was subconsciously planted in his mind by the shortlived 2006 NBC sitcom Four Kings.
  • I feel like the modern parlance for describing the four best of something would be to refer to it as one's 'Mount Rushmore'
• At one point Benn says "This man that pretends that he's a gentleman? He ain't, mate. He's a cowboy." and my word what a huge missed opportunity to not cut to present-day Eubank sitting there with his sherrif's badge.
• The Voice describes itself as "Britain's Favourite Black Newspaper" which is odd for two reasons. One, I've never met another black person who has heard of it. And two, a lot of their writers are white. One of them is Rachel Rose, who repeats the misinformation that Frank Bruno received "love and encouragement on his journey to the top. Not something that had been previously experienced by Black men in boxing."
• It was grating to see war criminal Tony Blair being mentioned in glowing terms when discussing optimism for the 21st century but I was pleasantly surprised to see that Eubank's arrest for protesting the military occupation of Iraq got included. That's probably the most endearing thing he's ever done and it's rarely talked about.
• There's more one-sided sniping at Don King here. You'd think he'd respond to some of these claims or put forward his side of the story one of these days.
• By the standards this documentary sets, Lennox Lewis was never undisputed heavyweight champion because he never won the WBO heavyweight title.
• The legacy of these Forced Kings is shown to be that they inspired the next generation(s) of British boxers; Anthony Joshua, Ricky Hatton, Johnny Nelson, Chris Eubank Jr., and Connor Benn. No mention of Audley Harrison, Naseem Hamed, and Amir Khan.
  • It's painfully obvious that the footage of Eubank the Elder with Eubank the Younger is from the archives, as is the latter's soundbite narration. The two are still going through an acrimonious split at the time of recording and broadcast.
• Very poor of Lewis to ask Bruno if he's forgiven for the uncle tom insults without even being man enough to apologise. He didn't even ask for forgiveness, just straight up "do you forgive me?"
• I've seen some reviews mentioning that people were in tears at various parts. Sorry to say that I wasn't moved by the Eubank-Watson reunion because I'd already seen it before and Benn speaking at his brother's grave felt too intrusive. But the part where Bruno's daughter tells the story that she was the one who had her father sectioned (5150'd) and he was so upset he stopped speaking to her for a long time? Foulness.
  • Some really cheeky editing near the end as well when says "I feel now our relationship is now healthy" and it cuts directly to Frank letting out a signature big belly laugh.
• I didn't talk much about Eubank and Benn because there's not much to say. They didn't like each other. They had two fights. They're friends now and have been telling that story together for years.
  • Eubank's heel-pig turn is not being met with anywhere near enough ridicule.