A great character study and filmmaking knockout

Rating: 8/10 (17 February 2020)

Raging Bull is a great representation of the intense, character-driven dramas of De Niro and Scorsese. We see Lamotta's dreams and aggression in the ring, but also his ultimate failure to balance that aggression in day to day life. It masquerades as a more traditional sports movie, and deserves to be praised in those scenes, as the matches were extremely well edited. The real angle of the movie is revealed more gradually: it's really a film about jealousy and fear of sexual inadequacy, and how that self-doubt manifests into lashing out at others, particularly his wife. Moriarty is fantastic as a confident, poised young woman who grows to love and then fear her unstable husband. De Niro and Pesci are both fantastic, and their brotherly relationship is completely convincing. The ending is tragic, as it is painful but fitting to see him in the Florida jail asking why. It doesn't feel groundbreaking now, but that's because of the vast influence it had in the intensity of sports dramas and the classic rise and fall biopic story.