Untitled Bill Russell/Netflix Documentary

Bill Russell was definitely a Renaissance Man for his era. Certainly the greatest winner in the history of sports and because of this, arguably the greatest basketball player of all-time. I knew a bit about Russell's career and life, but this definitely helped fill in some of the blanks. So why did I give this just a "7" rating? Well, this documentary made the decision to have an actor read passages from some of the books and articles he wrote himself over the years. This technique was used many, many times, and after awhile, this made it very dry to watch. The other thing I didn't care for is that they glossed over some of the less flattering aspects of his life/career. Russell was married four times, but we were never told that. The documentary suggested that he was a successful coach with the Seattle Super Sonics. He was middling at best. He bombed as the coach of the Sacramento Kings, and quit without even finishing out the season. Finally, I noticed that one reviewer thought this documentary was too woke or progressive. As someone who is politically conservative on most issues, I didn't find that to be the case at all, so if you are politically conservative and hesitant to watch this documentary, I'd say you shouldn't be hesitant. During the era that Russell played, he had to deal with lots of overt racism, especially when they played Exhibition Games down south when there was still segregation. To not talk about that in this documentary would have glossed over a critical part of Russell's life, and the things he tried to do to help change this in American society during that period.

No review content available.

Being a Celtics fan I was naturally brought to this documentary and I also liked "The last dance" (that was on Netflix as well). First of all they are different things both in terms of length and of the overall structure. It is mainly based on Bill Russell the man, both on the court but especially off the court. After the watch you can tell the great leader he was, something that was the main reason for his unmatched basketball success, and how much he was ready to sacrifice in a difficult historic time. I've always known him for those things but discovering the actual facts raised my fascination for the man even more. As a basketball fan I was also fascinated by the representation of the 60's NBA. It is often referred as an era of "plumbers" but the documentary shows that in reality they were very skilled and they played a crucial role in the development of the game. In conclusion I think that this documentary is a great watch, especially for NBA fans. Suggested.

Jeffrey Wright, Lawrence O'Donnell, and a smattering of others brought into this that have hard and fast ignorance on full display at any given time, to discuss the late, great Bill Russell? And WHERE is Michael Jordan? Why is he nowhere in this? Michael is one of the GOATs that needs to be talking about THE GOAT, but he's nowhere to be seen. An otherwise good percentage of people talking about this great man who happened to be the cream of the crop, but you can't just not talk about him and not being Michael, David Robinson, etc into the arena to discuss him. I'm just exhausted by these filmmakers who (wrongfully) believe we will just pretend these nitwits who are here on my screen didn't just call me a (insert dog whistle names here), science-denying conspiracy theorist, because I may not care what their opinion of me happens to be, but I'll be damned if I'll give my hard-earned money and/or free time to them. What a shame- and I am proud to say I'm hardly the outlier here. I'm sure I'll be downvoted, but view numbers don't lie. There's a lot of us who happen to love Russell and watched him play, but we can live with the knowledge of knowing who he was/what he accomplished, and not bother watching things such as this that try to pander to us, as if the past seven years have just magically disappeared. These people who falsely believe that we're going to watch because of who he was, or some mystical 'privilege' forces us to, or guilt can be assuaged need to take a hard look at who they are and the disservice they do to a legacy such is this. See, Bill Russell may have had political views I may not have agreed with, but he, along with a handful of other intelligent people out there, knew what these people can't seem to grasp- even people who don't agree with everything you espouse can be fans, too. Why alienate people who are not your enemy? In years past many of us could set aside differences of opinions in order to view art/work, but we've come to an important crossroads here, and we are no longer willing to casually dismiss targets placed upon us in order to be entertained- I would rather watch paint dry while listening to the grass grow, and I have a feeling Mr. Russell would be okay with that.