“Muhammad and Larry,” directed by Albert Maysles and Bradley Kaplan, will premiere this evening on ESPN’s “30 for 30” at 8 pm eastern. The ESPN copy follows the video:

“In October of 1980 Muhammad Ali was preparing to fight for an unprecedented fourth heavyweight title against his friend and former sparring partner Larry Holmes. To say that the great Ali was in the twilight of his career would be generous; most of his admiring fans, friends and fight scribes considered his bravado delusional. What was left for him to prove?

“In the weeks of training before the fight, documentarians Albert and David Maysles took an intimate look at Ali trying to convince the world and perhaps himself, that he was still ‘The Greatest.’ At the same time, they documented the mild-mannered and undervalued champion Holmes as he confidently prepared to put an end to the career of a man for whom he had an abiding and deep affection.

“In the raw moments after Ali’s humbling in this one-sided fight, it was not fully comprehended what the Maysles brothers had actually captured on film and, due to unexpected circumstances, the Maysles footage never received a public screening or airing. However, in the intervening years, the magnitude of this footage is now clear. An era ended when the braggadocio and confidence were stripped away in the ring, and the world’s greatest hero was revealed to be a man.

“Here for the first time is the unseen filmed build up to that fight, accompanied by freshly shot interviews by Albert Maysles with members from both the Ali and Holmes camps, as well as others who were prime witnesses to this poignant foolhardy attempt at courage.”

Why did Universal bump Paul Greengrass‘s Green Zone into March 2010? Oh, that’s right, I forgot — they figured the Academy would never nominate two Iraq War movies for Best Picture, and that The Hurt Locker was too well dug in in this respect (i.e., as one to nominate) so the hell with opening it during the ultra-expensive awards season, etc. Right? Seriously, I haven’t a clue. Has anyone posted hard facts about their decision, or at least a better theory? It opens on 3.12.

“Trailblazers,” a booklet essay by Todd McCarthy inside the forthcoming Downhill Racer DVD, explains the curious mystique of Robert Redford‘s David Chappellet, “a determined loner from Colorado who…singlemindedly pursues the goal of winning with a total disregard for protocols and personal niceties. He’s a heel, a good-looking backwoods hick who hides his ignorance and social unease with a defiant impenetrability.

Opening page of Todd McCarthy’s essay about lingering impact and making of Michael Ritchie and Robert Redford’s Downhill Racer, contained in a booklet inside the just-arrived Criterion DVD.

“In real life, Chappellet would just be a prick; he joins the plentiful ranks of antiheroes who helped define American movies from roughly 1967 to 1975. Even forty years ago, Chappellet seemed like an icy, recalcitrant character, and his clamped down, emotionally inacessible nature no doubt played a part in the film’s commercial failure.

“But his stubborn anti-authoritarianism was standard-issue equipment at the time — think Warren Beatty in Arthur Penn‘s Bonnie and Clyde, Dustin Hoffman in Mike Nichols‘ The Graduate, Jack Nicholson in Bob Rafelson‘s Five Easy Pieces, Elliott Gould and Donald Sutherland in Robert Altman‘s MASH — so while his attitudes were purely selfish rather than intellectually worked out, his instinct to buck the system andf go his own way did not seem as extreme as it does today.”

These last two graphs pretty much, sum up what I love about Downhill Racer. which is to say that I’ve always felt a kind of intuitive affinity for Chappellet. It’s clear who and what he is (i.e., a guy who could stand a lot less narcissim in his personality, a lot more in the way of manners and a liberal-arts education) but I’ve always gotten the guy. I understand how he got there, and why he’s not inclined to open up or reconsider his attitude or game plan. I get him all the way down to the marrow.

This prompted me to consider a list of the cinema’s Great Solitary Men. Not lonely guys (which automatically implies a distant angsty condition that a character probably wants to heal with a hug or a girlfriend of a mom or best friend) as much as guys who are more or less content with their aloneness. Guys who seemingly are ready to be and stay that way — unpartnered, uncomforted, self-sufficient, untethered — for the rest of their lives if need be. Not a state of happiness by any stretch of the concept, but at the very least a state of cool comfort that says, “Whatever happens and whatever comes, I’m sticking to me and I’ll be just fine that way because I know and trust myself like no other person on the planet.”

Lee Marvin‘s Walker in Point Blank is one of these guys. Clint Eastwood‘s tough-guy persona of the ’60s, ’70s and ’80s is pretty much built upon the solitary man mystique. Marlon Brando‘s “Johnny” character in The Wild One, I suppose. Montgomery Clift‘s Robert E. Lee Prewitt almost measures up except he’s looking for love from whore-girl Donna Reed so I guess not. Several Steve McQueen characters (i.e., in Hell Is For Heroes, Bullitt, The Sand Pebbles) fit the mold. We’re talking about an awfully long list here.

It’s not that I’ve chilled on Avatar anticipation. I was rocked by the special 3D ComicCon presentation, but the Avatar Day reel, as I wrote on 8,.22, left me “feeling a little Avatar-ed out…no bump-up…like before only less so…doesn’t play as well the second time.” I only know that every time I run Avatar in my head, I still see a flash of Bruno Ganz’s Hitler. Intriguing as the latest trailer is, I can’t expunge what’s been, for me, the funniest fan-rant of the year. Sorry…it’ll pass.

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“When you first start out you’re always striving for greatness and perfection and then after some years reality sets in and you realize that you’re not going to get it.” — Woody Allen between shots of his latest London-based film (allegedly titled You Will Meet A Tall Dark Stranger), talking to the Telegraph‘s John Hiscock in a piece than ran ages ago (i.e., 9.29).

Maybe you’re “not going to get it” just so, but urgent creative strivings of talented young (or younger) directors looking to mark their mark tend to produce their best films. Allen seems to be saying he’ll never make a film like Manhattan or Annie Hall or even Stardust Memories ever again, and that he’s more or less content with that. That’s a rather grim attitude. I’ll take the young Scorsese (Mean Streets to Raging Bull) over the latter-day version any day of the week. Ditto young Coppola vs. old Coppola. Or young Bertolucci (Before The Revolution, The Conformist, Last Tango in Paris). Or young DePalma (The Phantom of the Paradise, Sisters, Greetings). Or young Jim Cameron (Piranha, Terminator, T2, Aliens) over the silver-haired Avatar techno-maestro he’s since become.

The Guardian‘s Daniel Nasaw reported today that Los Angeles authorities seeking to imprison fugitive film director Roman Polanski may face a new obstacle in the 32-year-old case — the victim wants no part in it.

“Samantha Geimer, who was 13 years old when Polanski gave her drugs and had sex with her, today asked a Los Angeles court to drop the charges against the Chinatown director. Polanski fled the US in 1978 after pleading guilty to illegal sex. He was arrested in Zurich last month and is fighting extradition to the US.

“In a court filing today, Geimer said she has been besieged by nearly 500 calls from news media since Polanski’s arrest. She lives in Hawaii and long ago publicly identified herself as the victim and forgave Polanski, but said she and her family have to contend with pressure when he is in the news. She said she is being stalked by journalists from international news organizations and has received interview requests from Oprah Winfrey and CNN’s Larry King.

“The pursuit has caused her to have health-related issues,” the filing states. “The pursuit has caused her performance at her job to be interfered with and has caused the understandable displeasure of her employer and the real possibility that Samantha could lose her job.” I presume that “health-related issues” is a reference to anxiety and other nervous afflictions.

I’m tapping the iPhone while waiting for my number to appear at the Cole Avenue DMV, but the key casting decision for the Coen Bros.‘s True Grit is the young-girl narrator (i.e., the Kim Darby role in the Henry Hathaway/John Wayne version). Not that the hiring of Matt Damon for the Glenn Campbell role and Josh Brolin as the baddy is inconsequential news.

I’ve reviewed Michael Moran‘s 50 Biggest Movies of 2010 piece in the London Times. The biggest money-makers, he means, which in itself implies a kind of synthetic Eloi quality. Because if these 50 were 2010’s absolute best there would be cause to seriously think about calling off the 2011 Oscars.

But forget awards. All I want to see just to see ’em are (1) Tim Burton‘s Alice in Wonderland, (2) Hot Tub Time Machine, (3) Paul Greengrass‘s The Green Zone, (4) Phillip Noyce‘s Salt, (5) The Rum Diary, (6) Ridley Scott‘s Robin Hood (but only somewhat), (7) Eat Pray Love, (8) Oliver Stone‘s Wall Street 2, (9) Unstoppable and (10) London Boulevard.

It certainly is wonderful news about Ricky Gervais having signed to host next year’s Golden Globe Award telecast. Okay, I was being facetious. It may be a good thing now that I’m actually thinking about it. Gervais can be agreeably blunt and cutting, and if he’s really and truly been given free reign, this could be good. Golden Globe nommies will be announced on 12.15. The show will air live on 1.17.10 from 5 to 8 pm Pacific, 8 to 11 p.m. Eastern.

In Contention‘s Kris Tapley said this morning that Lee Daniels‘ Precious is “the frontrunner of this year’s Oscar race.” Reading this prompted an involuntary leg-muscle spasm so sudden and fierce that it tipped over my black office chair and sent me crashing to the floor.

Precious is a film to sincerely admire and respect as far as it goes. It moved me more than I suspected it would (based on the first half hour, I mean), but Mo’Nique‘s mom-from-hell performance almost makes it into a kind of grotesque horror film. What she does is a bit like Mary Tyler Moore‘s emotionally frigid mom in Ordinary People not just withholding affection from her sad-sack son (i.e., Timothy Hutton) but talking like Lawrence Tierney and spewing pea soup out of her mouth.

Precious touches bottom and exudes compassion, but it’s nothing close to a masterwork…please. It’s a very good film fortified by strong discussable performances. It’s a contender, sure, but no way in hell is it any kind of front-runner. Not now, not next month or next year…forget it.