Raging Bull is the 1980 biopic drama adapted from Jake LaMotta’s memoir Raging Bull, directed by Martin Scorsese. It stars Robert De Niro as Jake LaMotta, an Italian American middleweight boxer whose jealousy, paranoia and rage make him into a ticking-time bomb, slowly destroying his relationships with his wife, and family while at the same time eating him up inside, leading his life in a slow but sure downward spiral. It is through the use of violence and jealousy, slow motion, and the idea of weight that we are able to understand the way, in which violence is glorified as entertainment, yet largely ignored in public and domestic situations in American society, as well ask how weight, both physically and mentally can destroy an individual. …show more content…
This leads Jake to irrationally accuse Joey of sleeping with Vickie, to which Joey refuses to respond and leaves, stating, “This is stupid. I’m not going to answer that.” After he leaves Jake begins to psychotically and obsessively ask Vickie about it, even though she denies it over and over, he pushes her (both literally and figuratively) until she mockingly says that she has been having affairs with “everyone,” including the mobsters and his brother. An enraged Jake starts running to Joey’s house where he barges in and begins to beat him, throwing him through a glass door. Their wives try to intervene and Jake knocks Vickie out with a blow to the head. Although Vickie begins to leave him, Jake is able to convince her to stay. Jake wins his next fight defending his title, and afterward Vickie tries to get him to call and make amends with Joey, when he answers, Jake says nothing. Eventually Jake loses to Sugar Ray in their last fight, getting pummeled but defiantly staying on his feet. At the end of the match he goes up to Ray and says, “Hey, Ray, I never went down, man! You never got me down, Ray! You hear me, you never got me down.” The following scene takes place a few years later. Jake and his family are having a photo shoot around their pool. Jake tells the journalist that he is retired from boxing and has …show more content…
In the literal sense it has everything to do with who Jake can and cannot fight. In the scene where he is talking to Joey about his small hands, the two have the following exchange: Jake: I got these small hands. I got a little girl's hands. Joey: I got 'em too. What's the difference? Jake: You know what that means? No matter how big I get, no matter who I fight, no matter what I do, I ain't never gonna fight Joe Louis. Joey: Yeah, that's right. He's a heavy weight. You're a middleweight. What of it? Jake: I ain't ever gonna get a chance to fight the best there is. And you know something. I'm better than him. I ain't never gonna get a chance. You're asking what's