Martin Scorsese
Toro Scatenato

"Jake did it his way, I did it my way, you do it your way. " Martin Scorsese.

Scripted by Paul Schrader and Mardik Martin and inspired by his autobiography, it is the story of the middleweight world champion Jake La Motta, known as the "Bronx Bull" for his furious punching ability, but more importantly for his endurance. He won the world title in 1949 against Marcel Cerdan and ceded it to Ray Sugar Robinson on February 14, 1951. It's surprising to find, in the retreating Hollywood of the early eighties, a film made with such passion, with the enthusiasm of someone who has something definitive to express, as if it were the last possible film or the last story to be told. The stylistic commitment finds its counterpoint in the existential moment lived by the director, and the film becomes a very personal parable.

Not a hagiographic reconstruction of La Motta's life, but the description of how a man can manage to survive in a world felt as hostile, rising above all others through his work and faith in his abilities. It's still a claustrophobic world that revolves around Jake. Less solipsistic than Travis Bickle, Jake's moral journey is also a frontal clash with his own ghost, a deeply self-punitive journey that wants to raise its protagonist to a martyr of a life trapped within the unlivable walls of Little Italy, in the unruly, respectable-looking appearance of an environment populated by large and small "affiliates" of the Mafia, always ready to show themselves affable and caring, and not to take seriously the outbursts of verbal and physical wrath to which brothers Jake and Joe are subject. The underlying Christian-Catholic tone finds its way into the folds of the story, showing the fundamental principles around which the protagonist's ambition revolves. Extremely expressive, in this perspective, is the whole part in which Jake, just after meeting Vickie, shows her the house where he lives with his father.

The bare environment, immersed in the whiteness of the aseptic walls, almost seems like a large solitary confinement cell; crucifixes stand out, along with the double bed, the souvenir photos, the fridge full of food—traits of a habitual life sealed by tradition. Scorsese continues his journey into the heart of wild animosity. Trapped in his obsessions, Jake relies on what he sees as the only lifeline, the obsession-aspiration to which he entrusts the role of healing his moral and existential wounds: to become the most renowned and upright boxer in the world. The only path that can lift him from this world and deliver him into the arms of immortality is the fame of a boxer that no one has ever managed to knock down in the ring. And so it will be... "YOU DIDN'T KNOCK ME DOWN... DID YOU HEAR, RAY!?!?… YOU DIDN'T KNOCK ME DOWN". Here truly, the Scorsese character becomes a God, absolves himself from defeat as he is (self-)crucified on the podium but not truly beaten. The narrative structure of this compact, energetic, and unsettling film continually breaks the dramatic progression, and also destabilizes the causal links.

Stylistically, 'Raging Bull' is an excellent film. Its sound is by turns grave, hard, violent, dry. The editing, frenetic and casual, takes into account the element of surprise and is extremely controlled, enveloped in a narrative structure where every blow, every click of a camera, every noise is different from the last; one can almost speak of a sonic montage, sculpted with punches and gongs, shouts and applause, close-ups of aggressive or bruised faces, but also of undisturbed or anguished silences. The black-and-white photography, thanks to a Michael Chapman in a state of grace, perfectly evokes the realistic and ashen atmosphere of some photographs (chosen by Scorsese and Chapman) of a 1940s photojournalist, Weegle. The perfect example of the extraordinary work done by Marty & co is during the scene in which Sugar Ray Robinson is "executing" Jake: the gaze of the latter is symptomatic, conveyed through a distressing subjective; Scorsese resorts to a perspective distortion, obtained through a cross effect: while the camera backs away, the zoom forward enlarges the arena of the clash along with the figure of the black boxer. Jake's field of view is then maniacally absorbed by the impressive angel of guilt.

'RAGING BULL' is certainly one of the most beautiful films of the '80s, winner of 2 OSCARS: BEST EDITING-THELMA SCHOONMAKER AND BEST LEAD ACTOR-ROBERT DE NIRO. The interpretation by "Bobby Milk" was probably the most complex and radical of his career; he put everything of himself into play, beyond the limits of perfectionism, until he appeared an obsessive of acting and certainly became ONE OF THE GREATEST ACTORS OF MODERN CINEMA.