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What are you tryin' to prove?! What does it prove?
Brother Joey LaMotta (Joe Pesci) to aspiring boxer Jake (Robert DeNiro)—specifically about Jake insisting that his brother keep punching him in the face, but in the context of Martin Scorsese’s partially fictitious account of his life, Raging Bull, it is a general question as to the meaning of LaMotta’s life.
In particular Jake alienates everyone around him, including the only two people (his wife and brother) who have any interest in him as a person, as Jake struggles for success and upon attaining it loses everything.
The story of DeNiro gaining 50 pounds in order to play the retired boxer is by the legendary—so much so that the latest person to follow his example was Charlize Theron in her role in Monster
For me this is one of Scorsese’s finest films. Even for those who are alienated by the story, I consider it is still a must-see film, if only for the technical prowess of the camera work and the acting of Pesci and DeNiro.
¡Time is not my master!
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