Reviewed by Elliot V. Kotek
(from 2008 AFI Fest)

Director: Kief Davidson
Starring: Kassim Ouma, family and friends

Many documentaries aim to educate and inspire and, if successful, earn our admiration and affect our spirit. Far fewer docs deliver their effect in a cinematic fashion for which film represents the most effective medium. Kief Davidson's Kassim the Dream is an utterly engaging thrill ride into one of boxing's most heartbreaking stories - the tale of a true champion who has overcome tremendous adversity to achieve a dream.

Boxing, the art of pugilism, has often been a provider to those from broken homes, broken streets and broken systems. The sport has provided us with a disproportionate number of movies because it can bring about great rewards to the best of those brave souls who risk it all to pull on a pair of gloves and bare their chests to duke it out in that square-shaped ring. The boxing gym has represented a sanctuary to many troubled souls over its history, and has served as savior to some who've persevered through penitentiary systems, who've jostled their way through juvenile detention centers and who've narily escaped neighborhoods burdened by bullets. In the case of Kassim "The Dream" Ouma, boxing marks his route to rehabilitation after being abducted as a six-year-old child and forced to serve as a child soldier in Uganda's rebel forces. That the rebel forces eventually rose to power, and that Ouma's new title as an army soldier offered him the opportunity to box (and to eventually defect to the U.S. and "desert" his fellow soldiers), is both fortuitous and ironic, and the mental chess required to reconcile his role as both a victim and perpetrator would be painful for even the most privileged person. As if the abductee-turned-fighter had not suffered enough, however, Ouma's defection was not to go unpunished, instigating a violent payback that strikes another key emotional blow for the film's star.

Ouma's ability to laugh, to smile, to dance and to fight in a new world and a new home must be given its due measure against this weighty past, and his abilities and achievements must be held out as examples to others whose spirits have been broken. Ouma's ascent against all odds is a story that needed to be told, and it is indeed told beautifully - and with a subtle respect for its subject's circumstances - in Davidson's documentary. That the film has received a number of accolades (including the Best Documentary Award at this year's AFI Fest) since its debut at the 2008 Tribeca Film Festival is thoroughly deserved, and one can only hope that Ouma's success continues, and continues to deny any rise of the obvious demons that dwell behind the fighter's façade. -MPM

Photo courtesy of Urban Landscape Productions.