Review of Raging Bull (1980) by Bryan C — 29 Oct 2011

First off, I didn't quite love Raging Bull. It's a great film indeed, but I feel that certain sequences of the story was familiar territory covered in other Scorsese films, therefore not always grabbing my uppermost interest.

It may be my fault though, this came before Goodfellas and Casino, but because I seen those before this it may explain why I didn't get into the story and DeNiro relationships as much as they felt repeated.

Otherwise, DeNiro makes a stunning performance as always, but where Raging Bull really stands up is with the boxing sequences... they are so brilliantly filmed and intensely edited, they may very well be the best boxing sequences I've seen.

Otherwise, the impact of the film is affected by the passing of time for some viewers, as Scorsese's later films as I've mentioned reuse similar plot devices and other films have borrowed from Raging Bull since.

For me, these factors did affect my perception of the film, but it is still a grand achievement of filmmaking from Scorsese .