Movie: Raging Bull (Martin Scorsese, 1980)
As Jake LaMotta (Robert De Niro) walks his date, soon-to-be-wife, Vicky (Cathy Moriarty) around his house, he notes the dining table and points out "that's the dining room". He then gestures towards a birdcage, stating "that's a bird, or was a bird, it's dead now, I think." It's hard to conceive a better line that would more effectively show how completely devoid of an inner life Jake LaMotta is, and it's of course delivered perfectly by De Niro, presenting it with a complete lack of irony, passsion or interest, as if he is doing this because he knows that sex needs to be preceded by some sort of perfunctory conversation and this is his best attempt at it. It makes it a little hard to buy the film's final act when we see Jake LaMotta as a downtrodden stage actor entertaining bar patons by reciting works from Shakespeare, Budd Schulberg and Tennessee Williams. My bigger problem is that I also don't buy the final fight scene. The suggestion that LaMotta lets himself get beaten up by Sugar Ray as punishment for his sins, implies a thoughtfullness that he seems to completely lack, and feels like Scorsese projecting his own thoughts on the boxer.
I am a big fan of Scorsese and I would agree that he is the most important living American filmmaker. I also think that one of the most controversial decisions in Oscar history, Ordinary People winning over Raging Bull, is the correct one, though it speaks for Scorsese that Raging Bull manages to be both more grandiosely tragic, and funnier. But I just can't quite get into it; there is only so much you can do when you don't accept the core idea of the film - I simply find it hard to believe that the LaMotta we see here is capable of thinking about sin and his own immorality, let alone understanding that he may have to be punished for it. Scorsese and De Niro may be too good at showcasing how far ahead a completely hollow man, unable to communicate any complicated thought or emotions, can get through sheer power and violence, and his complete lack of tools to express himself when power and violence can't get the job done anymore. They did so similarly in The Irishman, with I think more interesting results. In both films there is one classic scene (the phone call in The Irishman, the television antenna in Raging Bull) where this inabiilty to adress one's fears, feelings and demons in a productive way becomes viscerrally uncomfortable. And in both films Robert De Niro has moments that are the absolute pinnacle of film acting.
Both films, though Raging Bull more than The Irishman, can also get a bit monotonous. The aforementioned dead bird scene is pretty much perfect and tells you everthing you need to know about LaMotta. Much of the rest of the film contains a lot of similarly well realised scenes that convey much of the same information about LaMotta and the relationships he has with his wife, his brother Joey (a thoroughly wonderful Joe Pesci) and the boxing establishment. It can get frustrating to watch a film built around such an empty void, and here again I prefer The Irishman; it takes a lot of panache to make a 3,5 hour epic about how American society is shaped by men who are completely indifferetn to their actions and lives. De Niro is great at playing such characters, and I very nuch like his portrayal of LaMotta as someone who is incapable of considering something beyond sex or violence, and even incapable of considering why he has sex or commits violence. The film shows that this gives him power, but whether he truly craves or realises that is questionable. Raging Bull is at its best when it suggests that we are pretty much seeing a full picture of LaMotta, that he is not capable of doing, or even thinking of doing, anything beyond what we see here.
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