Classic 70s Movie: “Taxi Driver”
September is Classic 70s Movie month. Today’s guest post comes from Jason Cuthbert.
Movie Title: Taxi Driver
Year: 1976
Writer: Paul Schrader
Lead Actors: Robert De Niro, Jodie Foster, Cybill Shepherd, Harvey Keitel, Albert Brooks, Peter Boyle
Director: Martin Scorsese
IMDB Plot Summary: A mentally unstable Vietnam War veteran works as a nighttime taxi driver in New York City where the perceived decadence and sleaze feeds his urge for violent action, attempting to save a preadolescent prostitute in the process.
Why I Think This Is A Classic 70s Movie: After the killings of Martin Luther King and John F. Kennedy, the Watergate scandal and intense tensions that arose around the Vietnam War, movies in the 1970s reflected a more psychologically complex, emotionally broken, paranoid protagonist — the antihero. Taxi Driver stood next to The Godfather, The Exorcist, Apocalypse Now, Shaft and Dog Day Afternoon as a bold and morally ambiguous approach to examining the desire to belong in an environment that the character feels rejected by. Travis Bickle, the dishonorably discharged Marine turned socially unhinged New York City cab driver, is stuck in an anti-social rut, attempting to be “good” but doing it “bad” and embracing “bad” to do battle with “bad.”
We are chaperoned through Travis the traveler’s awkward and disturbing attempts at finding his purpose via: an unpredictably provocative screenplay from Paul Schrader (The Last Temptation of Christ), a transformative performance from Robert De Niro, fearless direction from Martin Scorsese, haunting time-capsule cinematography from Michael Chapman (Raging Bull), living/breathing secondary characters and the very last musical score from Alfred Hitchcock’s iconic composer Bernard Herrmann (Psycho).
My Favorite Moment In The Movie:
We’ve seen Travis Bickle bomb completely with that cute concession stand cashier at an after work pornographic emporium. We’ve also seen him drive campaign worker Betsy (Cybill Shepherd) 3000 miles past disgusted with the poor choice of doing a dirty movie date. But the insightful Alka-Seltzer diner scene projects Travis’ crippling disability in relating to his own gender as well.
He enters the late night eatery by silently pushing a delusional loiterer out of his path. He unsuccessfully attempts to make himself invisible at the end of a table occupied by co-workers Wizard, Charlie T and Doughboy. We hear Wizard refer to loner Travis as a “ladies man,” probably being totally sarcastic. Travis also seems oblivious to real life sexual exploits when Wizard spins the tale of a one-night stand in his taxicab.
Doughboy plants the seed in Travis’ distressed membrane that he should carry a gun on the job, which may have jolted Bickle back into reliving his problematic military life. We also see the brutally seething, bigotry performed by Travis’ invasive eyeballs as they glare at a pair of flashy dressed African American men. We even get a brief piece of comic relief when Doughboy tries to get Travis to sell a piece of Errol Flynn’s bathtub and Travis gives him the “You are a weirdo” eye roll.
But there is that fleeting moment where the camera mimics Travis’ dazed attention span, zooming into his violently fizzing Alka-Seltzer tablet drowning in his water cup. This is a formidable sign that Travis needs immediate pain relief: heart burn, headaches and hangovers. But it also symbolizes that his delicate sanity is disintegrating; Bickle’s primal urges are bubbling up to the surface. Travis’ racism, insomnia, vacant love life, chopped down family tree and fearful phobias are sizzling inside him — just like that water that was once completely still.
My Favorite Dialogue In the Movie:
TRAVIS BICKLE: Loneliness has followed me my whole life, everywhere. In bars, in cars, sidewalks, stores, everywhere. There’s no escape. I’m God’s lonely man.
There is almost a melancholy poetry to this Travis Bickle diary confession. We get the idea that there will be no tearful memorial service when he slips into the after life — just a neglected tombstone hidden by weeds. No one is listening to him. He is his only audience and reliable witness to his existence. This cry-for-help is a rare sympathetic statement when most of Travis’ observations & inclinations are buried six-feet beneath hatred.
TRAVIS BICKLE: The idea had been growing in my brain for some time: TRUE force. All the king’s men cannot put it back together again.
With no one to love, Bickle’s only human connections are passive ones: watching pornographic “intimacy,” jealously idolizing relationships on television, stalking reluctant ladies and their male father figures, and dreaming vicariously through the active lives of the customers in the back seat of his yellow cab. Like a dress sock with a gaping hole in the toe; Travis appears normal, like when that foot is tucked into a Sunday church shoe. But underneath, there is a cold, uncomfortable truth that he is morbidly ashamed of.
Key Things You Should Look For When Watching This Movie:
Throughout Taxi Driver, Martin Scorsese devises visuals that sting the human senses past their potential. He keeps us captive inside Bickle’s slow motion nightmare, almost against our will, until we are forced to fear for him and be afraid of him. The real New York City Times Square of 1975 during Taxi Driver’s production makes modern 42nd Street in Manhattan look like Sesame Street. The historic detail-delicious documentary approach gives us a glimpse into a global landmark city that didn’t sleep, didn’t say, “Excuse me” and wouldn’t apologize for it either.
Along with the brilliant reveal of Travis’ back-to-the-warzone Mohawk there is also Travis’ bloody red alert rampage, complete with a breathtaking GOD view tracking shot from above, made courtesy of a risky hole cut into the ceiling. But had Paul Schrader not poured his own personal alienation into that uncompromised screenplay that Scorsese and De Niro responded to so highly, Taxi Driver would have been scrap paper for the Garbage Truck Driver.
Thanks, Jason! To show our gratitude for your guest post, here’s a dash of creative juju for you. Whoosh!
You may follow Jason on Twitter: @A2Jason.
We already have a set of 80s Movies and 90s Movies. This month, we’re working on 70s Movies.
Thanks to all of you for your participation in this project, creating a resource for writers, movies we should all watch to help learn the craft of screenwriting!
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