How accurate was De Niro's portrayal of LaMotta in Raging Bull?

What always amazed me was that LaMotta was credited as a consultant on the film and apparently sanctioned its release.

So he looked at the final cut and said, presumably without too much protest, "Yeah that's pretty much what I was like."?

 

The movie is the rated G version of Lamotta's actual life.

 

Yes, the consensus of opinion coming from those who knew him (or knew people who knew him) is that the film was a grossly santized version of him. Even compared to his own autobiographies, the film is a toned down version.

I read somwhere he raped a woman who was the wife of one of his "friends" ! And, of course, he was pimping out young girls, which the film does cover but perhaps skirts around his guilt a bit.

I thought the film was brilliant though.

 

Jake admitted to raping two women in his book.

Joey, who had no reason to lie about it because he and Jake were at odds at the time, said the prostitution charge against Jake in Miami was a frame up. He said that Jakes bar was in a really seedy area rife with prostitution but that jake actually ran a classy establishment that catered to celebrities and high class clientele. Jake didnt allow prostitution there because he wanted to keep the reputation of his place up. But in that area you were expected to pay protection money to the vice squad to keep your doors open. Jake being jake refused and was set up by the vice squad. This is Joeys story anyway. You can take it for what its worth but it certainly runs with Jakes MO similar to his refusal to give a percentage to a connected manager or even sign a contract with MSG and Mike Jacobs that would have propelled him into a title shot. The guy just did not want to play ball and it cost him over and over. So I can at least see it going down like this. Whether it actually did is another story.

 

Yeah, that's possible. He was stubborn. Just an awkward, anti-social personality, I guess. It worked out for him somehow though.

 

I used to have a copy of the first autobiography and I am sure Joey didn't actually feature in it. Another guy, a freind called Peter savage/Frank Petrella is substituted in place of Joey. The film prominently features Joey. The second one, Raging Bull II is dark and Joey is in that one.

 

Thats because Pete Savage, who had been a boyhood friend of Jake and Joeys had reconnected with Jake in the 1960s and when Jake was working on the book Pete who was helping out had Joey written and himself written despite having played a minor roll in Jakes life during the time wrtten about. Pete was a self serving braggert with minimal accomplishments who was looking to become a star the back of Jakes story. When Deniro started researching the film he realised how unimportant Pete was and how the true story of brotherly discord was much more compelling so he had a much truer version of events written into the final script.

 

Jake was a nutter the film was brilliant .if jake was worse than portrayed then he must of been a complete headcase.Monzon and Duran were similar characters .

 

raging bull is a good film if it was not a true story about a real guy with the same title as a champions autobiography. If Lamotta was happy with the film it is because the film made him cash but it is not the same as the book.


The film was art but it was not real or true to the book.


The hairstyles were wrong and so were the suits. I dont remember lamotta with a Afro and I never saw a photo of of a boxer wearing a shirt with colars bigger than the tie.


I know it was voted best film of the 1980s but have never understood its apeal to people outside boxing.


scorsese had a heart problem and decided to use a darker element to the story ...so he chose black and white film!


the fight scenes were intrestingly shot - smoky atmosphere elephant trumpiting etc.. but still as silly as a rocky film IMO.



even his book was given some extra pep from his freind. Without the book there isstill a lot of articles about what kind of guy lamotta is and was as a fighter and it is not that much like the film. go on youtube, watch lamotta on a chat show, he is not like dinero in ragiing bull. Its about as close as goodfellas was to the real henry hill. And if you have not checked already what the real Henry Hill was like let me tell you he's so far away from the Henry Hill in the film. Just like always, Hollywood liked the idea and did their own thing with it.

Jake was a difficult person. He had his faults, did bad things but Jake lamotta supported his mother and siblings when his father walked out on them, there was none of that in the movie. There was a whole lot of domestic violence and Deniro showing that he could act well as both a fat man and a fit man though.

 

The real Pete Savage still managed to get himself a minor speaking role in the film. I think he played a reporter or something.

Do you know much else about Savage? He seems like a shady kind of dude.

 

I know a little. He was a punk and a wanna be hood who boxed briefly but embellished both his amateur and pro career in addition to his relationship with and influence on LaMottas career. In the early 40s he was sent to prison for armed robbery (if I recall) and when he got out he went to California to try to break into Hollywood without success. It wasnt until he reconnected with Jake in the 60s and like a true sycophant attached himself to Jake and leached off his notariety that he had any measure of success whether it be acting, writing, etc.

 

Youre wrong on a lot of points. Jakes hair was big and curly in his youth, just like Joeys. The clothes were authentic the era. Scorsese used black and white to mimic the old b/w boxing films and chose color for the home movie shots to contrast. You may think that his story was embellished but if anything it was sanitized. Jake was arrested several times in youth and thats just the times he was caught. He spent time in a reformatory and a month in a psychiatric institute for antisocial tendencies (his brother Joey was discharged from the army fir mental instability that resulted in shock treatment). By his own admission he raped two women (both of his brothers were also arrested for **** at different times) went years thinking he had murdered a man who survived jakes attack, was well known for his horribly abusive relations with women, and even people who knew him well and liked him admitted he was a brooding, angry man who could be dangerous when riled even into his old age.

In regards to supporting his mother. Yes thats true, for a time, but then Jake turned around and sold her home out from under her when he moved to Florida in the mid fifties and left Joey and Al to pick up the pieces without any explanation.

Jake was a dangerous antisocial ******* AND a great fighter.

 

Duran is/was a wild, crazy character, prone to fighting and partying, but I haven't heard anything about him close to the sociopathic behavior of Monzon and LaMotta.

Those two were just awful, awful human beings.

 

Yes, I've heard of Duran being a crude and vulgar character, lacking in class. And maybe he had a darker side than that too.
But I can't recall anything that hints towards the "evil" (for want of a better word).

 

Thanks for the info. Seems like a typical parasite. Was he also the guy who made porn films who Lamotta was connected to?