Good movie but grossly overrated

Admirable film.

The film's masterful storytelling did its job. The message was clear. No need to overdo.

Great story, amazing characters, superb action, enthralling cinematography. Yes, this is something I am glad I spent money on.

A documentary should be like a silent objective observer, that wants to let the bigger picture paint itself, by including a balanced amount of relevant sources. That is definitely not the case here.This "documentary" doesn't do it's job. It argues O.J. Simpson isn't black enough for there to be any possibility of racist motives about the trial and investigation around him.White old "expert" men tell the story to us viewers, of what the situation of black people in the US were prior to the case with O.J. Simpson. And how we viewers should interpret O.J. in particular. Many of the things these white old men say, are so out there, it's shocking this could even be considered for an Academy Award.It seems the only black people who get to speak, are ones who knew O.J. from his school days, and they barely comment on the case itself.This documentary is quite sloppy constructed from the start, by leaving out so much. We practically learn nothing about O.J.'s life prior to his breakthrough as an American football player. The footage used is very blurred, constantly repeated, and you almost get dizzy trying to keep up as they move back and forth in time. It seems like they had barely no access to footage about O.J., and no intention of telling a story. They rather paint their own story, which has no direct relevance to neither O.J. nor the trial.An agenda would had been perfectly fine though, if it didn't appear to have such obvious preconceived motives. Why didn't they describe Nicole more and her background? Why didn't they tell this story from a woman's perspective, who was beaten by her husband? It takes a long time before they even mention her at all.This entire "documentary" is highly embarrassing. It fails in editing, and even in building up sympathies for the agendas it has. It's rather a political statement that doesn't care for a second what O.J. did and did not do. Rather whether he is black enough to justify calling anyone a racist.

Glad ESPN (my favorite channel of all time) made OJ:MIA. Goes to show you prejudice pays (black and white) and Juice was a monster from the start. A cautionary tale about manipulation, discrimination, attention, selling out, etc. I also recommend June 17, 1994 (also made by ESPN), a collage full of news coverage of Juice, archival footage, audio of Simpson during car chase, coverage of other sporting events (Arnold Palmer's final competitive game, Ken Griffey Jr's home runs, NBA Finals between Rockets and Knicks) and the use of Talking Heads "Heaven".

This Oscar winning documentary is a gargantuan effort to watch clocking in at nearly 8 hours in length. I am not sure it should had been eligible for an Oscar given it really is a television documentary series albeit a comprehensive one.OJ Simpson was a black man in a poor neighbourhood who grew up to become a prominent footballer. He left behind his black roots to live a comfortable life in LA. Once his career finished he became a sports commentator and an actor. He also became wealthy. He then achieved notoriety when his ex wife and her boyfriend were found murdered and he stood trial for their murders and later acquitted.This documentary has footage of family, friends, foes to examine every facet of his life. OJ would get into trouble at high school but as his friends mentioned, he would always get away with it because of his prowess as an athlete.The most revealing think I learned about OJ as a youngster was that his father was bisexual/gay.The trial bit was the least interesting thing about it even though it attempts to juxtapose US race relations of that era such as the Rodney King beatings from a few years earlier. It is just that I have seen dramas and documentaries about this before as well the real life trial scenes being covered by television networks at the time.My own personal view of the trial was that the prosecution and the police forensics team did an inept job. Mark Fuhrman might be a racist but it seems he might had been the only competent cop on that crime scene. OJs defence team raised doubts on the forensic evidence, made the prosecution witnesses including police officers look bad and then there was the glove that was too tight to fit on Simpson. Just makes you think, if this was how poor the police and prosecution were for a high profile case, what are they like for everyday crimes?After the trial and we get to hear from Fred Goldman himself, the father of Ron Goldman. Now it is like a cat and mouse thriller. Fred angry with the travesty of the criminal verdict launches a civil suit against Simpson and wins damages. As Fred said, all he had was a piece of paper, the court order in itself was nothing.Fred Goldman relentlessly goes on to enforce the court order and doggedly goes after Simpson's assets to satisfy the claim for damages. It took some years but it led to Simpson being hit by a sucker punch as he broke into a Las Vegas casino hotel room to retrieve his memorabilia which landed him in jail for a very long time.A lot has been said of the OJ story being a Shakespearean tragedy. I just think he was a vain, shallow man, not too bright but cunning who did not realise what a good life he managed to achieve. Upon the time of his arrest for the murders, he had become a worldwide name because of The Naked Gun films. Now he is just a stupid crook in jail.

O.J. Simpson was born in unpromising circumstances, but blessed with good looks, charm, and an athletic talent, grew to become one of the most famous men in America: a genius footballer, and an African American who became popular amongst all races, though the latter in part was due to his own willingness to abandon his original racial identity. But his second marriage turned bad, his suave public image increasingly at odds with his brutal treatment of his wife; and eventually, she (and her friend, and probable lover) were murdered. O.J. was on the record as having threatened them, had no alibi, and forensic evidence pointed strongly to his guilt; when the police called him in, he went on the run in a near-suicidal state, and the police followed on the freeway, trying to talk him out of doing himself in. They succeeded in this, only for O.J. to mount an extraordinary defence, in which his lawyers effectively put the Los Angeles Police Department on trial for its long and despicable history of racism. After a trial of months, a mainly black jury took just a few hours to acquit.But ostracised by the white community in which he'd made his home, O.J. soon lost a civil suit (in a different court, with a lower standard of proof), and motivated (it seems) by his desire for adulation, he fell in with a bad crowd. The new gangsta-style O.J. was perhaps no more the real man than the all-round nice guy or the evil killer; eventually, he threatened (with menaces, and armed friends in tow) someone whom he suspected of stealing his stuff and was finally sentenced to a gaol sentence that was both excessive (in the context of his latest crime) and overdue. He remain in gaol today.The strength of 'O.J.: Made in America', a marathon documentary that retells this extraordinary story, is that it brings out every facet: his remarkable sporting talent, his plastic personality, the horror of the murders, the grim reality of being poor and black in L.A., the theatre of his arrest and trial, and the sordid nature of his eventual downfall. It's long - possibly overlong - but the title is apt: this is a story that could only have happened in the U.S.A., and it says more about the country than the lurid headlines might have suggested at the time. There's no happy ending for anyone here - but what once seemed like soap opera, now feels strangely like a portrait of a nation, and yes, a dark reflection on the American dream.