I enjoyed Raging Bull, dubbed by many as "best of the 80s," but sorry Marty, this is the best. Creative and impressive in virtually every scene, capturing a time and a place as thoroughly as Kubrick could in ersatz documentary style. The film is simply huge (though not done on a huge budget) and I bemoan Philip Kaufman's film-making choices since. The only major flaw is Kaufman's obvious adoration of his temp (music) score. Bill Conti's heroic theme is virtually note-for-note from a Tchaikovsky violin concerto, but at least he was allowed to "try" a theme. There's also the over-used music from Holst's The Planets and Handel's Messiah (hey, Phil, it was funny the first 600 times someone used it back in the 30s).