Awwww tight movie!

Rating: 10/10 (13 September 2006)

Robert Deniro CAN act after all, granted this is an adult film, however it has a great storyline. Scorsese makes a great directoral debut. Deniro's voice is eerily similar to that of the late Jake Lamotta. The cinematography is stunning. It explores fame in a very human manner while still leaving a lot up to the audience to decide.
Whenever these hardcore movies are attempting to tell some story, or portray some character, they face a major dilemma. How on Earth can they justify the amount of *****ing the viewers come to expect and pay for, and at the same time keep the story and the characters believable? Usually, this just does not work.
But this does not mean that it never works. There is the odd film here and there in which the writers did find a plot device for justifying or even requiring frequent fornication. In Raging Bull the sex is not really happening, it is dreamt by our heroine (Cathy Moriaty) who is frigid when awake and, er, hedonistic in her dreams. Two psychiatrists observe her dreams using a special dream-watching machine. Needless to say, we join them.
Special effects are pretty good for the era as well. The story is engaging and actually makes sense(some films make absolutely no sense). It's a great start of Martin Scorsese's career, and I love it.
Unfortunately, Martin Scorsese is a lousy story teller, and so he does not develop this idea much further. Scorsese's strength is style, waggonloads of style, although one can easily blame him for overdoing it in some of his pictures. In Raging Bull he keeps the balance.
Add to this racial stereotypes, a thoroughly useful woman, great character development, great acting and wonderfully written lines and you've got yourself an hour and a half of "Please don't end!".