Raging Bull (1980)

“You never got me down, Ray.” — Jake LaMotta

Robert DeNiro’s Jake LaMotta is a coiled animal, caged like a note on sheet music: fierce, balletic, and balanced to its function. The ropes of the ring are frames, like bars of music. Indeed, “give me a stage where this bull here can rage… that’s entertainment.” A row of people sit, silhouettes in judgement, while flashbulbs pop and die with the slow pace of the events about to unfold. What do those photos reveal?

The opening of Raging Bull bears something uneasy, yet refined and languorous, somewhat reminiscent of the quiet roll of the marble in the opening of To Kill A Mockingbird. Both opening sequences share the perfect music – here, it’s “Intermezzo” from the opera Cavalleria rusticana by Pietro Mascagni – as well as incredibly visualized soundscapes, beautiful black-and-white cinematography, and a sophisticated yet gritty production design.

Instead of moving in tandem with or in the same direction as the action, the music runs against the scene, playing in stark contrast. The Cavalleria rusticana makes the scene celestial, dreamy, elevating LaMotta’s furious display to the level of graceful performance. This technique of placing classical music against a scene of action – also slowed down, in black and white – is used to stunning effect in the opening of Tarsem’s The Fall.

Director Martin Scorsese speaks about Raging Bull, from the commentary track for Robert Wise’s 1949 film The Set-Up:

“I didn’t understand what the ring was. I couldn’t interpret it in my life… but I think at that time I was taking it too literally. Ultimately I came to understand that the ring is everywhere. It depends on how much of a fighter you are in life. The hardest opponent you have is yourself.”

The introduction to LaMotta is through movement, through extremities: his hands, his feet, bobbing and weaving through air and smoke. Faceless, nameless, alone, an instrument of choreography, De Niro’s LaMotta embodies both the star and the never-was. His slow hooded dance is a performance of masculinity, a show of strength and ambition, a threat of violence doused in elegance. His power as a man is the crux, the focal point from which the story pivots. We believe this scene, LaMotta shadowboxing in the fog, to be the beginning, but hindsight tells a different tale.

When the late movie critic Gene Siskel asked Scorsese what he believed to be the most emblematic image from his body of work, Scorsese’s answer was simple: the title sequence of Raging Bull.

A discussion with Title Designer DAN PERRI.

Raging Bull has such an iconic opening sequence. How did this come together? 

Dan: Marty was living in New York and I was still in Los Angeles, so I went to New York to meet with him. I bought him this little crystal glass bull and brought it to his apartment for a meeting. He was married to Isabella Rossellini at that time, who was this little 21-year-old waif of a girl and she answered the door. I came in, and I gave him the bull. I think I had seen the film…

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