Raging Bull (1980)

Martin Scorsese has done a fair number of biopics—The Last Temptation of Christ, The Aviator, Kundun, even Goodfellas—but Raging Bull is the pinnacle. A sumptuous black-and white-ode to violence, Bull follows the career of Jake LaMotta, a midcentury New York boxer. LaMotta, a beast in the ring and a beast to his friends and family, is played by an uber-committed Robert De Niro, who learned to box, gained and lost dozens of pounds for the role. His remains one of the most regularly lauded Method-acting performances on celluloid.

See Richard Corliss' 1980 review of Raging Bull