Thriller in Manilla: Muhammad Ali vs Frazier Doc / Fest opener

The Greatest Boxing Match ever? John Dower’s legendary fight night doc opens Sheffield Doc/Fest 2008

Thriller in Manilla will be the opening film of the 2008 festival in Sheffield on Wednesday, 5 November.

Thriller in Manilla is directed by John Dower (Live Forever, Once in a Lifetime, The Last 48 Hours of Kurt Cobain), who will be attending the festival.

For the first time Joe Frazier and his corner, including his trainer and his son, recount their version of his 1975 fight with Muhammad Ali – now considered to be the greatest boxing match in history.

The 15th Sheffield Doc/Fest will screen its highest number of films ever with over 140 feature and short documentaries during the five days, which will follow last year’s pattern of several themed strands highlighting the current trends in documentary filmmaking.

This year the strands will be Regime Change, Green Docs, Bent Docs, The Return of the Anti-Doc, Sports Docs and Music Docs, with the addition of two new strands, Arts Docs and Kinky Docs: a celebration of sex and its representation in documentary.

The full line up of films is now available online at www.sheffdocfest.com.