Review of Raging Bull (1980) by Essay — 29 Jan 2019

Raging Bull is the story of an Italian-American Boxer, Jake LaMotta. This role is played by Robert De Niro. Jake LaMotta’s wife is played by Cathy Moriarty, Vicky and Joe Pesci who plays the role of De Niro’s brother, Joey. The director of that movie is Martin Sarcoses, producers Robert Chartoff and Irwin Winkler.

Raging Bull is the story of a boxer, Jake LaMotta, in the 1940s and 50s. After losing a fight for the first time in his career against his opponent, Jimmy Reeves, whose role is played by Floyd Anderson. His brother Joey (Joe Pesci), through one of his contact in the world of the mafia, Salvy (Frank Vincent), manages to make him participate in a fight for the title of champion of the middleweights. Jake is a jealous sickly, violent, unfaithful, especially narrow-minded, vulgar, who has no respect for his wife, Vickie, and is often in confrontation with his brother, often accusing him of sleeping with his wife. He only wreaks havoc everywhere he goes. At times, it seems that his brother is as wild as him, for example when his brother fought in a bar with men who accompanied the wife of Jake, Vickie.

I'm not a fan of boxing, but I really appreciate the character, Jake, who played his role so well by his gestures, his voice and especially his glare. Every single time that there was a boxing fight and Jake was facing his opponent it was an “inciting incident”. The major conflict in this movie was between Jake and himself, it looks like he still needed to prove himself something. The images of the film represented the time that the story was happening, especially the black and white. The images of the fights, the sound, making you feel that you were living the moment. Therefore, I find that there were far too much violence and too many vulgar words. In my opinion, the film tarnishes the image of women.

In conclusion, the lesson I learned in this film is that you have to balance your professional and personal life, unlike Jake, who made no difference between the stage fight and the world around him.