The next movie on my list is one that shows up on most, if not all Top 100 lists.  Usually it’s a lot higher than it is here, but again it’s my list and I call them how I see them.  Without question Raging Bull is an all time classic, directed by an all time great with one of the all time performances.  What De Niro did in this movie is amazing; gaining and losing weight like that. 

 

You all know what the movie is about so I’ll make this quick.  De Niro plays boxer Jake La Motta.  He was a Middle Weight champion in the 40’s.  He’s best known for being the first guy to ever beat the legendary Sugar Ray Robinson.  Aside from being about his boxing career, the film is about Jake’s relationship with his wife and the rage that consumed him. These sort of end up being one in the same.  The film takes us through his boxing career and post boxing career as a hack stand up comedian.  I think the most interesting part of this movie is the relationship he has with his wife Vickie played by Cathy Moriarty.  He never trusts that she is being faithful and this usually causes him to blow up and beat the hell out of someone.  What ever happened to Cathy Moriarty by the way?  This was her first movie and if you look her up on IMDB.com she has done nothing but absolute crap since.  She was nominated for an Oscar and usually after that you get some sort of big time follow up.  Instead she got Neighbors which was the Belushi/ Aykroyd movie that wasn’t funny.  She was 21, hot and coming out the best movie of 1980.  She was last seen in a 2005 episode Law & Order: Special Victims Unit.  She couldn’t even get on the original and more popular version of Law & Order.  Oh well, such is life in Hollywood I guess. 

 

This is considered by many to be Martin Scorsese’s masterpiece.  It’s not my favorite from him, but it’s hard to argue.  He got so much out of his actors.  Thematically and style wise it really capped off the 1970’s for him.  He started diving in to some new territories after this.  In fact his next two films King of Comedy and After Hours are different, but great.  You want to see a whacked out movie, definitely check out After Hours.  None the less Raging Bull is one of the all time greats and deserves all of the accolades it gets.