Raging Bull

Pros: DeNiro gained weight and got an Oscar
Cons: Not very interesting

Raging Bull (1980) A movie in search of a screenplay is how I best can describe Raging Bull. There are plenty of reviews out there to tell you this is the best film of the 80s, if not all time, but I've watched it a number of times, including ...

Pros: From a technical and narrative standpoint, almost everything
Cons: Didn't connect with every punch, like its hype would indicate

"Raging Bull" has been called "The Best Film of the 1980s" so many times, that classification should be included as part of its title. Released in December of 1980 [author's tangent: Almost a year to the day after The Clash's similarly-designated...

Pros: direction and acting. Honest.
Cons: too honest?

“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'd I do, I forgot to wear shorts. I recall every fall, every hook, every jab, the worst way a guy could...

Pros: De Niro in an incredible performance, Scorsese at his best.
Cons: Brutal in its portrayal of characters

Martin Scorsese's 1980 film RAGING BULL is probably one of the most realistic and throughly depressing movies I've had the experience of viewing. The film follows the true story of '40's boxer Jake LaMotta, but more than the boxing story, it is a...

Pros: DE NIRO WAS AMAZING!!!
Cons: This film did not win Best Picture.

As much as I like sports, I do not like sports movies. You might ask why. First of all, I have always disliked the way every sports movie always has a soppy, happy ending. I also dislike the way that sports films have become an excuse for directors to...

Pros: hypnotic, sharp authentic dialogue, sensual
Cons: slow, morbid and repetitive

This is Martin Scorsese's masterpiece telling of the true story of the rise and fall of boxer Jake LaMotta throughout the 1940's. In the 70's, Martin Scorsese had been the king of indie cinema with his films of violent, depraved and detrimental ...

Pros: Scorsese's Direction, Script, Chapman's Cinematography, Schoonmaker's Editing, Everything, & De Niro.
Cons: Nada.

With the recent Oscar win of Clint Eastwood's 2004 boxing drama Million Dollar Baby, boxing movies have always been a powerful statement whether its for entertainment or for very personal drama. In and out of the ring, especially in its ...

Pros: Robert De Niro, Joe Pesci, Cathy Moriarty; stunning fight sequences and powerful subject matter
Cons: Such an unsympathetic character may ward off some; very violent and ghastly bleak

In one of the many illuminating extras on the newly released 25th Anniversary Special Edition of Martin Scorsese's classic RAGING BULL, the real, former middleweight champion Jake La Motta reflects on the first time he had the opportunity to view the ...

Pros: Direction, cast, style, editing, story
Cons: None.

The following review should also be appearing in next Wednesday's (University of Illinois newspaper) The Daily Illini. If one of you should happen to pick that up, know that I'm not plagiarizing anyone but myself. Since the review is my intellectual ...

Pros: Cinematography, great vehicle/subject for De Niro, Joe Pesci
Cons: None

Shortly after his musical endeavors with the Band movie, The Last Waltz, and the epic (yet mediocre) New York, New York with Liza Minnelli and Robert De Niro, Scorsese became clean of his cocaine addiction and began working on an adaptation ...

Pros: Performances by DeNiro and Pesci
Cons: Brutality , tale of boxer who had been hit in the face too many times

Can you believe I waited all these years to see this movie? I had caught bits in passing channel surfing, but had never wanted to see another boxer flick, since you could not EVER convince me that there was something heroic in men beating the snot out of...

Pros: Grows with every viewing
Cons: Violent

I’m not an animal. That’s the sentence repeated by Robert De Niro’s character Jake La Motta while he is breaking down emotionally near the end of Raging Bull. There’s a small hint of irony in the scene because La Motta has spent the first two ...

Pros: Refreshingly realistic, cinematography, uncomfortable situations, Scorcese, DeNiro, Pesci
Cons: Brutal scenes and language

Raging Bull is the shockingly realistic film depicting the slow rise and quick descent of boxer Jake LaMotta. The story follows the aspiring LaMotta throughout his life in the Bronx and in his boxing career spanning the 1940's. His assent to middle ...

Pros: Brilliant acting, plot and director
Cons: None

This is not infact the best film of the 80s or indeed the 70s, it is just simply the greatest film ever made. I am not writing that on a whim, I have not just seen it and got carried away, I have seen this movie on a number of separate occasions over the...

Pros: Intense performances all around. De Niro is amazing and Scorsese comes into his own as a director.
Cons: T'ain't a pretty picture and it's not 'Rocky' either. Graphic and unsettling, it's not for sensitive viewers.

Images frozen for posterity are many in the history of motion pictures, but only a few encompass the film's meaning in that image. Rocky Balboa's running up the Philadelphia stairs is one such example. Then there is Jake La Motta (Robert De Niro)...