So here is yet another movie review and yet again this one harks back from the 80s once more as I will cover Raging Bull, Martin Scorsese's critically acclaimed biopic based on the real life events of the former middleweight boxing champion Jake LaMotta. So let's put on the boxing gloves, step in the ring and get ready for the bell...
So the story begins in 1941 with Jake LaMotta, nicknamed "The Bronx Bull" or "Raging Bull" who loses a fight against another boxer named Jimmy Reeves. Jake's brother and manager, Joey (Joe Pesci) afterwards discusses with Jake the possibility of him getting a shot at the championship title with the help of one of his mob connections, Salvy Batts (Frank Vincent). Jake's home life however is turbulent as he often rows with his wife, Irma (Lori Anne Flax) and he soon becomes attracted to a 15 year old girl named Vickie (Cathy Moriarty) whom he persues and eventually later marries a few years later. As the story moves to 1947, with Jake now married and Vickie having had a baby, he now grows paranoid about the possibility of Vickie having feelings for other men, as she makes a comment about upcoming fighter Tony Janiro (Kevin Mahon) being good looking. When Jake fights Janiro in the ring his feelings paranoid jealousy lead him to brutally beat Janiro senseless as he defeats him in front of Vickie and local mob boss, Tommy Como (Nicholas Colasanto) in the audience.
After the fight, Joey talks with journalists at a nightclub, the Copacabana, where he spots Vickie having a drink with Salvy and his men. Joey is outraged at Vickie for doing so and tells her to go home but she returns to the table where Joey angrily argues with Salvy and attacks him, with their fight continuing outside on the street. Como later on orders them both to apologise and he tells Joey that LaMotta will get his shot at the title but he must take a dive first. At the next fight, Jake is up against Bud Fox, whom after he punches and stuns the fighter with just one punch, doesn't put up a fight and leaves the ring, and later sobs in tears as he regrets his decision. As a result Jake is suspended by the board as they percevied him as throwing the fight, but Jake is later re-instated and is giving another shot at the title. On the evening of the title fight, Jake has become increasingly paranoid over Vickie and as he is paid a visit by Tommy (who kisses Vickie on the lips) he is seething with jealousy and he slaps Vickie and angrily tells Tommy to butt out when he tries to interject. Regardless of that Jake goes on to win his fight against Marcel Cerdan and he finally claims the middleweight championship belt.
The story then moves on to 1950 where Jake is now the defending champion, with his new fame and success he has a new house. Jake however still can't let go of his obssession with Vickie as he probes Joey for more information about the incident at the Copa club when Joey assaulted Salvy as he asks if it had to with Vickie, which Joey denies. Jake further goes on to press Joey and asks if he had an affair with Vickie, however Joey refuses to answers and walks out. After Vickie returns home, Jake questions her and asks her if she slept with Joey, which she angrily denies and she goes off to lock herself in the bathroom. Jake however breaks down the door and roughly grabs and slaps Vickie, who finally admits that she slept with Joey, Salvy and Tommy, leaving Jake enraged, who storms off to Joey's house, where he assaults him infront of his wife and children. Later Vickie returns home and packs to leave but Jake pleads with her not to go, and she finally relents. After this Jake continues his title defence, however from here he starts his downward spiral and he starts a self destructive cycle which sees him throw his career away and struggle later in life.....
Raging Bull is undoubtedly one of Martin Scorsese's finest films and remains one of the crowning moments in the director's career. The story itself is gripping and at times unsettling to watch where we see at first hand, LaMotta's violent streak both in and outside the ring. And for the most part of the film LaMotta really is a pretty loathsome character, who's jealousy and extreme paranoia do threaten to alienate him from the audience. However later on in the film you do recognise that LaMotta does slowly redeem himself toward the end when he makes up with his brother Joey. And given how good the film is, it was a bit of a disgrace in how it was overlooked at the Academy Awards with Scorsese once again missing out on Best director and Picture, although De Niro won the academy award for best actor. The film also wasn't well received on its release due to its violent content, however since then it has become widely regarded as one of the greatest films of all time.
Which brings onto the performances section of the review and they are all superb, starting with Robert De Niro who is simply magnificent in his role as Jake LaMotta, the hot tempered and jealous boxer, who has a vicious streak both in the ring and out. De Niro of course also famously in the film gained 70 pounds in weight
for the role of Jake LaMotta for the latter scenes in the film after
Jake retires from boxing, however for the sake of De Niro's health,
these sequences were shot quickly so he could start to lose the weight
again. De Niro plays the part as about as well as you could possibly hope for and he has many highlights in the film. Such examples include the scene where he argues with Joey over Vickie and did he sleep with her and he later on goes on to assault Joey in his home. In fact one amusing aspect about that scene is the moment where Jake asks Joey "Did you fuck my wife?" Pesci's initial reaction wasn't strong enough for Scorsese, so he got De Niro to improvise another question which was "Did you fuck my mother??" and Pesci's reaction that we see in the film is in response to that question! Another scene is near the beginning where Jake tells Joey to hit him in the face and as Joey reluctantly starts punching him, Jake says "You throw a punch like you take it up the ass!". De Niro also has some emotionally powerful moments in the film with the main one being where he is thrown in the stockade county jail as he was arrested for introducing underaged girls into his club. And after Jake is thrown into his cell, he starts to relentlessly pound the walls with his fists, screaming and yelling "Why???! Why???!! Why???!!!" over and over until his gives in and sits down, sobbing say "They call me animal! I'm not an animal! Why do they treat me like this! I'm not that bad!". De Niro also has some funny moments in the film such as in the scene where he is invited over to meet Tommy Como and he tells him that he intends to really beat up on the good looking boxer Janrio. And Jake says "I'm gonna open up his hole like this! I'm gonna make him suffer. I'm gonna make him wish his mother never had him!" but then he jokes "But he's nice good, pretty kid too. I've got a problem, should I fuck him or fight him?!". And also later after his boxing career is over, he get's some low paid gigs as a stand-up comedian, and as he does his routine in a sleazy bar, he says "When I arrived here I asked the owner "where's the toilet?" and he said "You're in it!". And De Niro's last scene in the film is also worthy of mention where the story finished where it started in 1964, with Jake reminiscing and quoting Brando's lines from "On the Waterfront" and later shadowboxing and muttering to himself "I'm the boss! I'm the boss!!".
Joe Pesci is also superb in his role as Joey, Jake's brother, who is also a bit of a hothead as well and also has a bad habit of two-timing his wife with other women, and Pesci himself was a largely unknown and struggling actor at the time. Pesci has some great moments in the film as well, such as in the scene where he argues with Salvy in the Copa and he attacks him and later assaults him out on the street and slams Salvy's head into a taxi door. Pesci also get's some good dialogue as well such as in the scene where he is questioned by Jake as to whether he slept with Vickie or not. And in the scene Joey says "How can you ask me a question like that? Where do you get your balls big enough to ask me that!" and he later follows it by saying "Its a sick question and you're a sick fuck and I'm not that sick that I'm gonna answer it. You know what you should do is a little more fuckin and a little less eatin, that way you won't take it out on me and everybody else!". Another scene of interest is where near the beginning Jake and Joey spar with one another in the ring, and De Niro for real actually delivered a punch that broke one of Pesci's ribs, which we can hear as Joe groans out loud when it happens. And his last scene with De Niro is also quite a surprisingly moving one where Jake finally reconciles with Joey after so many years of not talking to one another, and they meet in an underground car park and share a long hug.
Cathy Moriarty is also excellent in her role as Vickie, Jake's long suffering wife (who of course later divorces him). Moriarty herself was only 18 or 19 at the time the film was made, yet her husky voice and her ability to look more mature than her years, helped her carry the role and she played it perfectly. Moriarty also has some good moments in the film, the best ones being where she argues with Joey in the Copa, and she says to Joey "Look I'm tired of turning and having both of you two up my ass all the time!". And the other is her best scene where Jake rows with her at home in the bathroom and angrily slaps her when she reveals that she slept with Joey and the others. "I fucked all of them! What do you want me to say??! I fucked Joey, Tommy, Salvy! I sucked your brother's cock! What do you want me to say?! You're nothin but a fat pig selfish fool!". And after Jake storms out of the bathroom she yells after him "His fucking cock is bigger than yours too!!!".
Nicholas Colasanto is also very good in his role as the mob boss, Tommy Como, who backs Jake in his attempts to claim the middleweight title. Colasanto also has some good scenes in the film, although his main two are the scenes where he talks with Jake at the Copa and in the scene where he talks to Joey after Joey's row with Salvy. And Colasanto has some good lines in the scene where he tells Tommy that how is annoyed with Jake who is making him look an embarrassment and he says "I don't care how colourful he is or how great he is. He can take on all the Sugar Ray Robinsons and Tony Janrios in the world, but he ain't getting a shot at the title, not without us he ain't!". And lastly Frank Vincent, who would later become a regular Scorsese stalwart, is also very good in his role as the mobster, Salvy, and it would pretty soon become a common trend for Vincent to play mob guys, but then again he's so good at it. And Vincent has a good moment with Pesci during the scene where they call a truce in their meeting with Tommy and as Joey gives Salvy a hug and Salvy groans painfully as he has a bandage on his head and he says "What are you fuckin nuts??! You're killing me!". Also another is in the scene where Jake is invited over to Tommy's table at the Copa and he is rather hostile to Salvy and says regarding Janiro to Salvy "I could both gives you a ring and both give you a beating and you can go fuck each other!" and Salvy says "But I would be full of blood!" and Jake smiles and says "You get used to that".
As for Martin Scorsese, well he hardly puts a foot wrong here as his direction for the film is superb and he made the astute decision to shoot the film in black and white (and was beautifully shot by the DoP Michael Chapman) and it works incredibly well as a result, as the monochrome helps convey the stark and gritty qualities the film has. Scorsese also provides the film with some great visual moments and the fight sequences are superbly handled and they show the raw brutaltiy of the sport. And this is highlighted mainly in the scene where Jake fights Sugar Ray Robinson (played by Johnny Barnes) for the last time and he takes a brutal beating from Robinson, which leaves him barely standing, battered and bloody and looking like something out of a horror film. And in one of the film's most striking images after the fight is over we see the Jake's blood drip from the ropes. The film while it doesn't have an original music score, it makes a great use of the opera Cavalleria Rusticana composed by the Italian composer, Pietro Mascagni, particularly the most well known track "Intermezzo" from that opera, which is used in the film's opening titles where we see Jake slowly shadowbox in the ring.
So flaws..... Raging Bull have any??? Well yes and no, its a great film that get's most things just about spot on, it does have one or two niggles. The first one would be with the character of Jake himself, as he is largely a self-obssessed, bad tempered, mysoginistic asshole and while it undoubtedly is a warts and all depiction of the real LaMotta, its easy to see why viewers would feel alienated in watching him. The real LaMotta in an interview actually even said himself that when he first watched the film with the real life Vickie he became depressed and reportedly said to Vickie "Was I really that bad???" and Vickie turned and said "No, you were worse!". Joey isn't as bad a character but he does also share his contempt for women as he too treats his wife like crap as he cheats on her, as we see in one scene where he quietly says to Jake that he intends not taking her out on a date but another woman instead. Another slight issue is surprisingly with De Niro's performance as while he is superb in the role, one thing he doesn't do well as an actor is cry! And this is shown clear as day in the scene where he sobs on the shoulder of his trainer after he waked off from the his fight with Fox as his crying just isn't convincing at all and it just sounds put on.
But that aside Raging Bull is still remains one of Martin Scorsese's finest achievements and to this day it still warrants a repeated viewing, and while it doesn't paint a pretty picture and it sure isn't Rocky, it does succeed in telling an engrossing story of one man's battles inside and outside the ring.
And with that I shall leave you there. Ding Ding! (Sorry!).
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