Recalling the sounds that preceded the fury

That didn’t sit well with Jeffrey Levy-Hinte, one of the editors of “When We Were Kings,’’ who for many years dreamed about combing through more than 120 hours of outtakes sent back to the vault and somehow bringing “Zaire ’74,’’ as the concert was known, to the public. His original intent was to create a series of concert DVDs, but the project morphed into a feature documentary. “Soul Power’’ is very much a companion piece to “When We Were Kings,’’ and Levy-Hinte sat down recently to talk about the film, which opens Friday.

Q. “When We Were Kings’’ came out 22 years after the fact, and “Soul Power’’ arrives 12 years later. Why the long wait? A. Originally, the whole film venture collapsed under its own financial weight. The production company went bankrupt, they owed a lot of people money, lawsuits went back and forth, and for 20 years everything was in a state of confusion. Leon [Gast, who directed “Kings’’ and produced “Soul Power’’] actually bought the rights to the footage in a sheriff’s auction in New York. Meanwhile, in the intervening years, I’ve been working on other projects. I needed the wherewithal to be able to make this movie. If I’d had my druthers there wouldn’t have been a wait but in fact it was very fortuitous. Q. The timing is serendipitous, with Obama’s presidency generating interest in African-American roots and culture. A. Yes, and it was completely by accident. I was a strong Obama supporter and I started seeing this convergence happening in 2008. There’s an opening toward the history and experience. I don’t know if it affected the movie but I’m very happy to swim into this current. Q. The film focuses on the music festival without offering much in the way of political context or reflection. Did you consider adding additional material or interviews to flesh out the story? A. I did contemplate it, and there are a few reasons why I didn’t. One is that I love the verité form. It forces you to be acutely aware of what you have. You can’t paper it over. The real conundrum, though, is once you start doing that where does the process end? There’s been a tremendous amount of intervening history. There’s so much more to know, but I felt it was more about coming back to the experience, the meaning of the event for the people, and I felt I could convey that with just their voices and images. Then there’s the lowbrow answer. I didn’t have the money to interview anybody. Q. How did you begin sifting through the hours and hours of footage? What were you looking for? A. I had something like a set of rules I wanted to follow. I wanted it to be about half concert footage, but I was also fascinated with the logistics of setting up the concert. I wanted every piece to be beautifully photographed as well as beautifully performed and recorded. Watching the footage was like being in a lake and the water is going out. You start to see little islands emerging, and they start to connect. It took a good two years. Q. Tell me about those connections. Did some sort of narrative emerge? A. I’m not so fascinated with narrative in the story-driven sense. There isn’t a message, per se. It’s more themes and textures, and I guess you could say there are small stories within it. Muhammad Ali was compelled to speak in this incredibly powerful way about his views on race relations and all the rest. There’s an interesting dynamic between the overblown and egotistical and the serious and passionate. It’s not explicit but I try to weave ideas about the black experience and black power into every element. Q. What do you hope audiences take away from the film? A. Not to be superficial, but first and foremost to engage with the celebration and enjoy the performances. On a deeper level, to become sensitive to the history unfolding in the film, which Muhammad Ali speaks about. It’s vivid today, but I think it was so much more present for people then. This was just 10 years after the Voting Rights Act [which outlawed discriminatory voting practices based on race or color]. It was etched into people’s minds. Q. Have any of the performers seen “Soul Power’’? A. They have, although I don’t really know what they think. I haven’t heard, and I’m a little bit anxious about it. Q. Did the inevitable comparisons to “When We Were Kings’’ weigh heavily while you were making the film? A. Certainly in the first year that was very much on my mind but as “Soul Power’’ developed its own identity I became more at ease. They’re really siblings. They deal with the two parts of what transpired there. The breakthrough with “Kings’’ was when Leon said, “OK, it can’t be the fight and the concert in one film,’ and the choice was made to go for the fight. Now there’s a whole other film that spells it out. Joan Anderman can be reached at anderman@globe.com.