Film Forum

U.S., 1980
Directed by Martin Scorsese
Starring Robert De Niro, Joe Pesci, Cathy Moriarty
Approx. 128 min. DCP.

Robert De Niro’s Jake La Motta never hits the canvas, but his out-of-the-ring battles with wife Cathy Moriarty and brother Joe Pesci are a war of attrition with no winners. Scorsese’s profanity-packed blowtorch boxing biopic of the middleweight legend has consistently topped critics’ Best of the Decade lists, while winning a Best Actor Oscar for De Niro’s tour de force (and the first of a record three for film editor Thelma Schoonmaker). De Niro trained with the real La Motta for a year (by the end, La Motta ranked him “in the first top twenty middleweights”), won two out of three actual matches, broke Pesci’s rib in their sparring scenes, then packed on fifty pounds during a four-month shooting hiatus to play the bloated years. (The vivid fight scenes, only minutes on screen, took six weeks to shoot, the sound of punches landing supplied by squashing melons and tomatoes, the blood by Hershey’s chocolate). Supporting nominee Pesci was managing a restaurant when De Niro suggested him for the role; then Pesci suggested teenage model/acting neophyte — and eventual fellow nominee — Moriarty as the wife. Michael Chapman’s shimmering b&w spotlights Scorsese’s seemingly effortless evocation of place and time — an era of flashbulbs, big cars, hats, and no air conditioning.

A PARK CIRCUS RELEASE

Reviews

“Lives up to the hype: Scorsese’s direction really is that kinetically brilliant. He shoots his antihero in truly gorgeous black-and-white, using a camera that seems, at times, to be remarkably lucid, as if on ecstasy.”
– Michael Friedson, Time Out

“A master class in pain inflicted on oneself and one’s loved ones, as well as one’s opponents. The use of pop and opera and the black-and-white photography are exemplary, the actual boxing a compulsive dance of death.”
– Ben Walters, Time Out (London)

“From the first shot of a nearly disembodied De Niro, alone in the ring, jogging in slow-mo, his face obscured by the hood of his robe, like a monk in Rossellini’s THE FLOWERS OF ST. FRANCIS, you know that for Scorsese, this is the big one, the title fight, and it’s only art that’s at stake. The sense of risk is palpable and the payoff is exhilarating… A fusion of Hollywood genre with personal vision couched in images and sounds that are kinetic and visceral, and closer to poetry than pulp. Its sculptural weight can only be appreciated on the big screen.”
– Amy Taubin, The Village Voice