- A fictional account of one incredible night where icons Muhammad Ali, Malcolm X, Sam Cooke, and Jim Brown gathered discussing their roles in the Civil Rights Movement and cultural upheaval of the 60s.
- Set on the night of February 25, 1964, "One Night in Miami" follows a young, brash Cassius Clay as he emerges from the Miami Beach Convention Center the new Heavyweight Boxing Champion of the World. Against all odds, he defeated Sonny Liston and shocked the sports world. While crowds of people swarm Miami Beach to celebrate the match, Clay - unable to stay on the island because of Jim Crow-era segregation laws - spends the evening at the Hampton House Motel in Miami's African American Overtown neighborhood celebrating with three of his closest friends: Malcolm X, Sam Cooke, and Jim Brown. During this historic evening, these icons, who each were the very representation of the Pre-Black Power Movement and felt the social pressure their cross-over celebrity brought, shared their thoughts with each other about their responsibilities as influencers, standing up, defending their rights and moving the country forward to equality and empowerment for all black people. The next morning, the four men emerge determined to define a new world for themselves and their community.
- The film opens with a title card telling us that this film was inspired by true events.
It's 1963 and the film shows us four different things going on at about the same time. First, Cassius Clay (Eli Goree) nearly loses a boxing match to Henry Cooper at Wembley Stadium in London because he spends so much time taunting Cooper that he opens himself up to a direct punch. Meanwhile, at the Copacabana in New York City, soul singer Sam Cooke (Leslie Odom Jr.) makes his debut at that club in front of an indifferent, all-white audience. Then we see NFL player Jim Brown (Aldis Hodge) making his return home to Georgia, where he is received by family friend Mr. Carlton (Beau Bridges) on a huge plantation. Carlton heaps all kinds of praise on "the great Jim Brown," but when Brown offers to help Carlton move some furniture, Carlton uses a racial slur and informs Brown that he is not welcome inside the home due to Brown's race. And finally, we see Malcolm X (Kingsley Ben-Adir) return home and discuss his plans to leave the Nation of Islam with his wife, Betty.
We move forward in time. A graphic tells us that it's February 25, 1964. The men are all gathering in Miami for Clay's title bout against Sonny Liston. Malcolm meets with Clay in a motel room before the fight, and the two pray in a traditional Islamic fashion. That night, Brown is a ringside commentator and Cooke and Malcolm X are in the crowd as Clay upsets Liston, making him the world heavyweight champion.
Afterward, Malcolm invites the other three men to his motel room. Cooke arrives first and, sitting alone in this rather rundown space, picks out a song on his guitar. The other three arrive together, and it's clear that the three guests are expecting a party, but that's dispersed when Malcolm makes it clear they are the only ones he invited. Malcolm wants to spend some time reflecting on their accomplishments, but tension between him and Sam arises. Malcolm accuses Sam of disloyalty to the black community by pandering to white audiences, and Sam argues that his method produces greater economic empowerment for black artists. Cassius informs the men of his plans to announce his conversion to the Nation of Islam, causing more tension. Malcolm steps out of the room, saying he'd left his camera in the car. His assistant-slash-bodyguard Kareem (Lance Reddick) accompanies him. Malcolm goes to a phone booth, telling Kareem he's going to call his wife. He explains that he wanted privacy to do that but didn't want to put the men out of the room. His young daughter answers the phone and he directs her to a note he'd stashed in the bookcase. Back in the motel room, the three men sip from a flask and discuss whether Malcolm is being a little too insistent about things. At one point another Nation of Islam member named Jamaal (Christian Magby) pops into the room, ostensibly to see if they need anything, but he's really looking for autographs. They ask him about the Nation of Islam life and whether he has any regrets. Jamaal says his one regret is that he didn't join up sooner.
Back outside, Malcolm is still on the phone with Betty (Joaquina Kalakongo). He tells her that Cassius is going to announce his new religion, but he doesn't know whether Cassius will go along with his plans. From the phone booth, Malcolm spots a couple of white men at the edge of the parking lot and ends the call.
Back in the motel room. Brown discusses his plans to become a film actor, and wonders if it will go smoothly. Cassius thinks he's being hired as a token character.
Malcolm comes back into the motel room and says he might be being followed. He begins to check the room for bugs. They move to the roof and he talks about being harassed by the FBI, and a premonition he's having about conflict between himself and Elijah Muhammad. Then he tries to convince the others to join him on a pilgrimage to Mecca. Cassius appears to be in, but the other two decline because of their schedules.
The conflict between Malcolm and Sam escalates into a scuffle, and Kareem appears out of nowhere with Jamaal to break it up. Their mere presence is enough to end things, largely by changing the focus of their anger. The men return to the motel room.
As they argue, it becomes clear that Malcolm's antagonism of Sam is motivated, at least in part, by the activist's stress over his own life, especially his harassment by the FBI and fears about his schism with Elijah Muhammad. Malcolm is devastated to learn that Cassius is having second thoughts about his conversion, largely because of the heat that the Nation has been getting. The conflict between Malcolm and Sam begins to escalate. Malcolm ridicules the music Sam has produced since finding success. Sam insists his success and creative autonomy is itself an inspiration to the black community. What's more, he notes that the white co-opting of black-written songs works in the blacks' favor, because they wind up getting the lion's share of the royalties. Sam also points out the inherent hypocrisy in Elijah Muhammad living like a pharaoh but not doing much about the corruption in the city surrounding his huge house. And while he's sensitive to the struggles in the black community, protest songs aren't commercially viable. Malcolm counters by playing Bob Dylan's "Blowin' In the Wind." Sam angrily leaves the room.
Cassius tells Malcolm that he went too far, but Malcolm protests that the time has come to quit standing on the fence. Cassius goes out to get Sam. Jim notes to Malcolm that economic freedom is key to the whole thing. What's more, he's painfully aware that people still view him as a black man, not as an NFL hero.
Cut to Sam and Cassius coming out of a liquor store. They're confronted by a couple of youngsters asking them for spare change. They get in the car and discuss Cassius' impending conversion to the Muslim religion, and the need for them to stick together. Cassius defines "Power" as the freedom to be themselves without answering to anyone for it. Then he asks Sam point-blank, "What do you want?" Sam replies, "I want a damn party." They return to the motel room and announce that they're taking things to his room at the Fontainebleau. Malcolm asks him about the first time they met, then notes that he's been to five of Sam's shows, including one in Boston where he followed Jackie Wilson. Shortly after he started singing, the microphone cut out and apparently it was Jackie Wilson's doing. When the band abandoned him, he began to stomp the stage rhythmically and brought the crowd around to doing it with him. Then he started singing "Chain Gang" acapella. That's when he realized what a powerful future Sam had.
Malcolm tells Cassius that he is planning to leave the Nation of Islam to form his own organization and asks him to join. Cassius angrily refuses, feeling betrayed by his mentor, and wondering if his conversion has been a ploy by Malcolm to attract attention to his new project. There's a knock at the door and Jamaal informs them that the press has gotten wind of the meeting. As Cassius prepares to talk to the media, he asks Malcolm to come with him. When they leave, Sam tells Jim that he has had similar thoughts about "Blowin' in the Wind" and has already written a song, but not yet performed it.
After Cassius speaks with the press and announces his conversion, the men hit a nearby bar and genuinely celebrate. Malcolm participates but doesn't drink, and at one point he looks out the window, where he spots the same white men from earlier in the parking lot taking notes.
In the aftermath of the night, Sam debuts "A Change Is Gonna Come" on The Tonight Show. Clay officially changes his name to Muhammad Ali, while Malcolm's life is thrown into chaos as he suffers the consequences of his split with the Nation of Islam; his house is firebombed, but he completes his autobiography. Jim leaves the NFL to pursue his movie career. The film ends with a title card with a quote from Malcolm on February 19, 1965, about the inevitability of martyrs for the cause, and that he was assassinated two days later on February 21.
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