Raging Bull

Raging Bull is the nick name of Jake La Motta, the famous middleweight boxing champion during 1949 to 1951. Also it’s the name of the famous 1980 American biopic film directed by 馬丁 Scorsese. Unlike the positive view of other biopic movies, Raging Bull takes a dark view to portray the self-destructive, family broken, raging champion.

The director picked a dark view to characterize the middleweight champion emphasizing his self-destruction. In his first fight, La Motta meant not to fight back at first and to let the opponent hit him. Finally he lost his first fight. And the last fight was extremely typical. He automatically lost by not fighting back. Moreover, he thought it was remarkable that Sugar Ray never knock him down. All he did was on purpose, because of his self-destructive personality. These self-abandoning actions finally led to his self-destruction.

Another aspect that shows his self-destructive personality is his relations with his family members. At the beginning, he asked his brother to hit him on his face, and he asked Joy to do it harder. That clearly shows his self-destructive personality. Later on, he was being oversensitive. That made him start to suspect his wife. And finally, his oversensitivity tore apart his family. This perfected his self-destruction.

Before directing this movie, 馬丁 went through an awful time. He overdosed on drugs and was almost killed. His career was at a dead end. When he found this screenplay, he thought this movie would be his last one. His own experience made 馬丁 Scorsese understand what Jake felt after all that success. And that same experience also helped 馬丁 Scorsese to build this character. Certainly, there is a self reflection of 馬丁 Scorsese himself in this movie. The scene that best supports this claim must be their self-abandonment. Jake gave up his champion and went to work at a small bar. 馬丁 Scorsese abused drugs. However, the difference between them is that Jake La Motta destroyed himself and 馬丁 Scorsese was rescued.

This movie was released in 1980. Just like the champion, this country once was unbeatable, but at that time the whole country was in a down time. People of this country were abandoned by themselves. In this background, we can understand the self-abandonment of the director and the character. To be destroyed or reborn become the question that the movie left to us.

In this movie, the fight scenes are extremely real. Sound effects made every punch sound like real fist hits on the human body. The use of slow motion reinforced this feeling. At the last fight, the use of slow motion sent messages. One was that to characterize his nature of self-destruction. We can see his anger through his eyes. Another message is how merciless his opponent was.

This movie built an impressive self-destructive champion, and left a good question for every audience. With entertaining fighting scenes and a refreshing theme, 馬丁 Scorsese made a brilliant movie.