Raging Bull (1980) *****
A cinematic textbook of toxic masculinity, violence, volatility, jealousy, obsession, and self-loathing, Raging Bull (1980) is a perfect marriage of direction, acting, photography, editing, and sound. Martin Scorsese's masterpiece (one of them, anyway) is exhilarating but it is no joyride. No, it's a bummer for all concerned with only hints of humor. RB has almost none of the razzle-dazzle of 1990's GoodFellas (review) or 1995's Casino (review) or 2013's The Wolf Of Wall Street (review) to balance out the eventual downward spiral. Though it doesn't go to quite the same dark place that Taxi Driver (1976) (review) does, it plays in the same ballpark. I've been fascinated by this film since I first saw it when I was a tween and it continues to offer nuances discovered on each subsequent viewing.
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