for rape in 1992. Giler said they thought "it's amazing how no studio has made a film out of this basic situation of the heavyweight champion of the world going to prison, the toughest environment in the world," said Giler. Hill went and wrote some paragraphs about the idea then he and Giler wrote a full script. However Hill says while the Tyson case was the departure point, "There are a number of prize fighters who have been in trouble with the law. Our story looks at how a tough guy and celebrity would handle life in prison. The more we wrote, the more we wrote away from the Tyson story." Hill says he was really interested in what happened when "a heavyweight champion goes to the toughest environment possible in American culture, the American prison system." "What we tried to show is how, under odd circumstances, a convicted murderer and a convicted rapist are capable of a moment of grace," said Hill. "They're both heroic." The film refuses to say if the champion boxer was actually guilty. "It is absolutely ambiguous in this movie, ambiguous in the sense that it is very clear that he believes himself to be innocent. It is also absolutely clear that the woman involved believes herself to have been abused and raped... If you want to know what I suspect, I suspect they're both right. It has to do with different terms, different values and different understanding of the basic compact when men and women go to bed together." Casting Hill said the film needed to be cast with black actors to have "serious credibility," and that he "was determined not to have a movie where it looked like the actors couldn't box." He took the treatment to Wesley Snipes who was interested in the story even before the script had been written. "I told him it was conceivable that he could play either [lead] role, but what will not change is the fight and who wins in the end," Hill said. Hill then sent the script to Ving Rhames, who called back the next day, saying he wanted to play the Ice Man; Snipes was happy to play the other role. Rhames was in peak physical condition having been preparing for two years to star in a film about Sonny Liston, Night Train, that ultimately was never made. He said that Undisputed was