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Raging Bull

Raging Bull

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Rating: 4 stars
Summary: Give me a stage¿..
Review: Raging Bull is at times disturbing, depressing, charming, comical, and intriguing. For all of its different aspects, Raging Bull remains a classic picture and an intense character study.

DeNiro turns in quite a performance as the troubled boxer, Jake LaMotta. Jake has his vices like anyone else but he is driven to drink in an effort to combat the rage welling up inside him. One of the toughest scenes to watch was where LeMotta takes out his rage on his wife and hits her repeatedly. I had to turn away at this point, but I guess this was typical for a boxer who is an alcoholic.

The movie becomes depressing when LaMotta withdraws further from society and stops boxing all together. He becomes a study in excess and dependency and even tries his hand at stand up comedy.

For all of his emotional ups and downs, Jake LaMotta is an interesting and compelling character and DeNiro does an amazing job in portraying him. If you like a dark movie that explores every facet of the human dimension, this movie is for you.

Rating: 5 stars
Summary: Excellent Movie
Review: This is De Niro at his best. You're following Jake La Motta through thick and thin. What made this movie something unique were the shots in the ring. You feel like you're right there taking and giving punches. Does it get any better with De Niro and Pesci teaming up. Wow, what a film. You see these new blockbuster films and you realize that this is better than them. What a challenge gaing all of that weight too. The only thing that I don't care for are the lack of features on this DVD. I don't feel cheated or anything, but I feel that there could have been some kind of featurete or interviews. The sermon is over.

Rating: 5 stars
Summary: The best film of the decade
Review: Raging Bull is Martin Scorsese's best film. Robert de Niro gives the best performance ever by any actor. It was robbed of the best picture and Best director academy awards because the academy awards is a popularity contest and they gave it to the so called famous Robert Redford's Ordinary people. Raging bull is about boxer Jake la Motta and his disputes in and out of the ring. Joe Pesci gives the best supporting role of 1980. My 2nd favorite film of all time, falling short to Schindlers List. Watch how De Niro acts in the famous "Steak Scene", you will be amazed.
I remember those cheers
They still ring in my ears
And for years they'll remain in my thoughts
Cuz one night I took off my robe and what I do
I forgot to wear shorts
I recall every fall, every hook, every jab
the worst way a guy could get rid of his flab
As you know my life was a jab
And though I'd much rather hear you cheer
When I delve into Shakespeare
A horse, a horse,my kingdom for a horse, I haven't had a winner in six months
(Lights cigar)
Though I'm no olivier
if he fought Sugar Ray
He would say that the thing ain't the ring
it's the play.
So give me a stage where this bull here can rage
And though I can fight I'd much rather recite
That's enertainment.
(He takes a drag from his cigar)

Rating: 5 stars
Summary: Two-Hour Opera About Testosterone
Review: The Raging Bull is the boxer Jake La Motta, a man whose brain is distingetrating from the vat of boiling testerone that exudes from him so much that he is a prisoner of his own machismo. Jealous, ambitious, full of violent paroxisms, Jack is obsessed with proving himself and achieving the American Dream by being a champion boxer, but his problems with getting fighters courageous enough to fight him and his problems with the mob trying to fix games eventually end his career and he spends his time languishing as a fat man in a night club where, as the owner, he tells crass jokes and lives as a vulgar, divorced, lonely man, rotting in his illusions. Like a miracle, Scorsese the director has taken this beast and put him in a majestic opera, with ballet-like grace, about hypermasculinity and the American Dream.

Rating: 5 stars
Summary: Boxing Boxing Boxing = Good Good Good!
Review: I love this movie. Robert De Niro is spectaculer. This is the best Boxing movie of all time.

Rating: 5 stars
Summary: Black and White Masterpiece
Review: Meticulous attention to detail and proper use of black and white photography gives this story of the self-destructive life of pro-boxer Jake LaMotta extra-added emphasis.

Footnote: When interviewed, the real Jake LaMotta said the movies's depiction of his life was inaccurate - the movie wasn't violent enough!!!!

He did not elaborate, and no one wanted him too.

Can you blame them?

Rating: 5 stars
Summary: Mean Streets and a Character Study
Review: Director Martin Scorsese was born and raised in New York City. It was fitting that the film that launched him as a director, "Mean Streets," was about the tough side of the tough, competitive city where he grew up, in which the title said it all. Scorses moves back into that same familiar territory in his 1980 jackpot triumph, "Raging Bull." The black and white photography is perfect for the subject matter, a tough, mob-dominated atmosphere and the engrossing character study of a neighborhood product who fights his way to the middleweight championship of the world.

Jake La Motta succeeded to a champonship with his successful in the ring fighting, but this film reveals that there was a whole lot more fighting within his psyche and with those with whom he interacted outside the boxing ring, and those experiences were anything but successful. Robert De Niro gives a masterful performance as the troubled fighter who is riddled by paranoia, especially regarding his beautiful wife. After an unsuccessful marriage La Motta is in heaven initially when he marries Vicky, the beautiful blonde from the neighborhood and the object of the fantasies of the area's men. Cathy Moriarity does an excellent job as the tormented wife who refuses to let her paranoiac husband walk over her.

La Motta is driven by an irrational jealousy concerning the beautiful Vicky. When she merely mentions that Tony Janiro, an upcoming La Motta opponent, is a "good looking kid," the paranoiac fighter accuses her of romantic designs on his future opponent, and wonders aloud if she has been sexually involved with him. At another point he accuses his brother, played capably by Joe Pesci, of having sex with his wife. When Pesci tells him that the question is too sick and disgusting to answer, De Niro angrily attacks his brother. When Vicky seeks to intervene, Vicky, along with Pesci's wife, played by Theresa Saldana, seek to pull De Niro off Pesci, he strikes his wife.

One of the interesting aspects of De Niro's Oscar-winning performance is the way he actually packed on the pounds to play the overeating, boozing La Motta in his post-boxing career days. La Motta looms as every bit the tragic figure he was in his fighting days, but in a different respect. Now he is a bloated, frustrated nightclub owner in Miami seeking to entertain boozed patrons in 1957 with lines that fall well short of the standards of Miami's most famous comedian, Jackie Gleason. He is finally revealed in New York in 1964 delivering the same tired, unfunny lines while introducing the busty stripper with whom he is romantically involved long after Vicky has left him. He has a teary-eyed reunion with Pesci, whom he sees walking out of a New York City liquor store.

This hard-nosed film packs a solid punch. Scorsese stages the fight scenes with a lyrical, poetic style rather than aiming for the kind of gripping realism which prevailed in fight films such as "The Setup" and "Somebody Up There Likes Me," solid hits, both of which were directed by Robert Wise, and that also merit attention.

Rating: 4 stars
Summary: Touted as a classic
Review: Don't get me wrong, this is a GREAT movie, but not a classic. I am really not sure why it won the awards it did other than it was very different than the other movie in 1980. Filmed in black and white, this is the story of boxer Jake La Motta, played by Oscar-winner De Niro. It's other Oscar went for film editing. Joe Pesci puts in a typical performance as a foul-mouthed east coaster.
The film is very good, however, it became a cookie cutter for Joe Pesci roles. De Niro was FAR better in the Deer Hunter, admittedly a very different kind of movie, but the film is very typical of the De Niro/Pesci movies. If you have seen these two work together before, you are really not in for much new. If you haven't, please, watch this, but avoid any other De Niro/Pesci movie, as the plot changes, but the men remain the same. This film is these two actors working together at their best, but Scorsese himself has beat these two into the ground.

Rating: 1 stars
Summary: Ragin Bull Rating
Review: I love De Niro movies typically.....that smile of his, his acting potential, which cann go from extreme insanity to totally hilarious actor but this movie, De Niro or not De Niro, my son and I rated a "negative one-halve".
Every movie my son and I watch, we rate them after as a family thing, if you will, from 1 to 10...............we rated this movie negative one-halve. The acting was when they were young and little was demanded from him nor demonstrated. Everyone in the show talked and walked the IQ of about 65. I guess what I am trying to say is it was very very shallow storyline and the actors showed little to no depth.
Bob :o)

Rating: 4 stars
Summary: Raging De Niro
Review: When I first saw this movie years ago, I hated it. I didn't like any of the characters, I couldn't follow the plot, and the language was excessively bad. "If you removed the f-words from the dialogue, you have a 20 minute movie," I told a few friends of mine.

I recently found this DVD for a really low price, so I decided to give it another shot. I still don't like the characters, but the language didn't bother me so much now that I'm older. In fact, the language tells you about how these characters think and feel. And the movie really is a character-driven film, so the plot is secondary.

I loved the opening of the film. The music is just beautiful, and the slow motion dancing of a lone, robed and hooded boxer in the ring is an image that stays with you. The black and white cinematography is glorious throughout this film. The costumes, sets, and automobiles give the film a very authentic 1940's and '50's feel. The boxing scenes are beautiful and brutal at the same time. Technically, this film is a masterpiece.

The greatest thing about "Raging Bull" is the performance of Robert De Niro. Much has been made about his weight gain during the course of this film (and it is amazing), but the intense anger, sadness, and loneliness of Jake La Motta comes through brilliantly due to De Niro's acting.


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