There's nothing quite like browsing YouTube in this day and age. It's a byzantine and unpredictable service that always finds ways to redefine the boundaries of human depravity, one way or another. One of the most fascinating YouTube stars of the last decade was backyard brawler turned UFC fighter Kevin Ferguson, also known as Kimbo Slice. Well, thanks to Netflix and the guys who did the Cocaine Cowboys movies, I now know that Slice's rise to mainstream culture stardom engineered somewhat of a backyard fighting industry in the ghettos of Miami. The documentary DAWG FIGHT chronicles the culture behind this internet phenomenon and the predatory mixed martial arts promoters that use them for ticket sales. It didn't do a very good job at convincing me this was a positive thing for their community.
Dhafir Harris, also known on the street as Dada 5000, is a former security guard for Kimbo Slice who organizes bare knuckles fight in his backyard involving young men of his neighborhood. Dada is somewhat of a legend out there, the biggest, toughest kid on the block, so a lot of young, dispossessed men line up for a chance to fight in his backyard, hoping something will come of it. Dada sells the idea that it's their opportunity to prove their worth, get signed by a local MMA promotion and go on to become the spiritual heir to Kimbo, an idea that he also aspires to. There is a little bit of interest from the promoters, a lot of disinterest from the local authorities because there hasn't been a casualty yet, a lot of fists flying and pretty much everybody except Dada and some other dudes stay in the street. That pretty much sums up DAWG FIGHT.
I love a good street fight as much as the next guy. Looping haymakers, heads bouncing on the concrete and sleepy stares of unconscious idiots appeal to the neanderthal in me. I'm aware that they are not a good thing, though and that whether fights happen outside of a bar on in somebody's backyard for a hundred dollars purse, they're not legal either. It bugged me out DAWG FIGHT tried to portray backyard bare knuckles fights as a positive thing, as dispossessed America trying to fight its way to respectability. Dada, who no one wants to fight in the backyard because he once disfigured fan favorite Chauncy, eventually gets booked for an MMA fight and despite that the movie tries to downplay this with a heavily edited montage, he has no fucking idea what he's doing. MMA is not the next logical stage for street fighting, it's en entirely different thing. Kimbo Slice himself has moderate succes in MMA against limited opposition because he had so much to catch up on.
The worst thing a movie can to do me is to think I'm stupid. DAWG FIGHT tries to capitalize on the mixed martial arts that swept through America over the last decade by showing something more brutal and more real and building the same type of redemption narrative around it. DAWG FIGHT is a movie for white people to marvel at black people punching one another in the face for survival. Maybe it's a tiny step better than marveling at black people shooting one another in the street, but not by much. There is still no economy for these guys to be a part of, still problems of employability and most important, poverty, education and criminality. DAWG FIGHT is blankly staring at the rugged life of the ghetto while telling itself a romantic story about it and I don't need a fucking documentary to do this.
Dhafir Harris, also known on the street as Dada 5000, is a former security guard for Kimbo Slice who organizes bare knuckles fight in his backyard involving young men of his neighborhood. Dada is somewhat of a legend out there, the biggest, toughest kid on the block, so a lot of young, dispossessed men line up for a chance to fight in his backyard, hoping something will come of it. Dada sells the idea that it's their opportunity to prove their worth, get signed by a local MMA promotion and go on to become the spiritual heir to Kimbo, an idea that he also aspires to. There is a little bit of interest from the promoters, a lot of disinterest from the local authorities because there hasn't been a casualty yet, a lot of fists flying and pretty much everybody except Dada and some other dudes stay in the street. That pretty much sums up DAWG FIGHT.
I love a good street fight as much as the next guy. Looping haymakers, heads bouncing on the concrete and sleepy stares of unconscious idiots appeal to the neanderthal in me. I'm aware that they are not a good thing, though and that whether fights happen outside of a bar on in somebody's backyard for a hundred dollars purse, they're not legal either. It bugged me out DAWG FIGHT tried to portray backyard bare knuckles fights as a positive thing, as dispossessed America trying to fight its way to respectability. Dada, who no one wants to fight in the backyard because he once disfigured fan favorite Chauncy, eventually gets booked for an MMA fight and despite that the movie tries to downplay this with a heavily edited montage, he has no fucking idea what he's doing. MMA is not the next logical stage for street fighting, it's en entirely different thing. Kimbo Slice himself has moderate succes in MMA against limited opposition because he had so much to catch up on.
It's as brutal as it looks, but Dada didn't knock that guy out. The bare chested guy in the background did.
That leads me to my biggest problem with the movie: the manipulation of information. The backyard bare knuckles fights are not a stepping stone to MMA success. Dada 5000 and Mike Trujilo didn't work their way up to local MMA promotions. A simple timeline check allowed me to find out that Dada's fight happened almost a year before Mike make his debut in the cage. DAWG FIGHT portrays Dada's fight at the very end of the movie, where he promises the commissioner to stop organizing backyard fights in exchange for a license. So basically, what happened is that Dada fought twice in MMA and THEN RETURNS to promoting backyard bare knuckles fights. DAWG FIGHT took about six years to film, so I guess the production ran into a lot of issues, but it doesn't change the fact that it's dishonest. It doesn't portray the bare knuckle fights for what they really are.
The worst thing a movie can to do me is to think I'm stupid. DAWG FIGHT tries to capitalize on the mixed martial arts that swept through America over the last decade by showing something more brutal and more real and building the same type of redemption narrative around it. DAWG FIGHT is a movie for white people to marvel at black people punching one another in the face for survival. Maybe it's a tiny step better than marveling at black people shooting one another in the street, but not by much. There is still no economy for these guys to be a part of, still problems of employability and most important, poverty, education and criminality. DAWG FIGHT is blankly staring at the rugged life of the ghetto while telling itself a romantic story about it and I don't need a fucking documentary to do this.