Raging Bull (1980)

The review highlights the film’s resistance to personal arcs and redemption in its portrait of elemental brutality. The restored print allows the blood to still drip from the ropes in this savage Bronx middleweight story.

The review declares Raging Bull everything it is cracked up to be, a peerless imprint of what cinema can aspire to in art, truth and exhaustion. It singles out the contrasting docu-drab and dreamily inventive black-and-white cinematography, along with De Niro's performance, for particular praise.

The critic finds Scorsese’s 1980 biopic a brutally nihilist tale that remains full of despairing beauty and unforgettable performances. The sheer brio and kinetic energy of the nightmarish boxing scenes are singled out as utterly unique.

The review calls Raging Bull a potent tragedy of a brutal pugilist at war with himself and a truly extraordinary modern classic. It singles out Scorsese's tautly choreographed ring sequences and the performances of De Niro, Pesci and Moriarty.

The critic calls it the most unromanticized movie biography ever produced by Hollywood, praising De Niro's brilliant and transformative performance along with the intense, brutal fight sequences. However, the review faults the film for lacking dramatic structure, having a dull improvisational quality outside the fights, and overly stylized techniques that highlight the rest of the film's lack of energy.

The critic sees the film as an intense exploration of a man's brute force, anger, grief, and inability to view women beyond a madonna-whore complex, with De Niro and Scorsese fearlessly depicting the protagonist's limited emotional range. He praises the raw portrayal of jealousy, violence, and guilt channeled through boxing and personal relationships.

The review finds the protagonist one of the most repugnant in recent cinema but highlights the boxing sequences as possibly the best ever filmed and the film's capture of a boxer's intensity. It notes the visceral power of the fights alongside the offputting character that may limit broader appeal.