Taxi Driver (Collector's Edition)

This is not a film for the weak-of-heart! Robert DeNiro plays the role of the “crazy cabbie”, Travis Bickle, to a T. His psychological deterioration into a primitive, paranoid personality is, to say the least, unsettling. The finale seems inevitable and unavoidable. Not necessarily an “enjoyable” film (no happy-endings-for-all here) but still it does force one to explore a “darkness” which seems uniquely human. Worth the watch; but, perhaps, not TOO often…

Martin Scorsese points out in the documentary on the 1999 "Collector's Edition" DVD of 1976's "Taxi Driver" that he didn't feel the movie would necessarily speak to a large audience, and yet that it was a film that he really had to do, and I say more power to him. "Taxi Driver" is more than just a great movie, it's frighteningly real and incredibly powerful. Anyone who tells you that this movie is boring or that it meanders is horrendously missing the point. This is an incredibly well-realized movie, masterfully paced, and evocative. There is some great black humor in "Taxi Driver", but its primary impact is psychological, and in turn, emotional. The movie tends to be very low-key, but in a continuously arrestingly and usually creepy way. A ton of the credit for this of course goes to Robert De Niro for his incredible lead performance as the crippingly lonely cabbie Travis Bickle, a man of contrasts who's disturbed to the very core of his being. Seeing Iris, a 12-year-old prostitute remarkably portrayed by Jodie Foster, ultimately pushes Bickle to the very brink. The movie's post-shootout finale, which I agree is clearly a fantasy from Bickle's mind, is a hauntingly powerful stroke of genius. The casting is amazing all around. Harvey Keitel is right in his element, with a terrific performance as Sport, aka "the pimp". Peter Boyle is great as the so-called "Wizard", Albert Brooks adds some lighthearted humor to the proceedings where appropriate, and the wonderful Cybill Shepherd is as mesmerizing as ever. Even Martin Scorsese is absolutely brilliant filling in a bit part as a homicidal passenger in Travis' cab. "Taxi Driver" additionally hints at Scorsese's excellent musical taste by using Jackson Browne's "Late For The Sky" in the soundtrack. The song's appearance in the film is a little jarring, but quite fitting, and it IS one of the best songs ever written. The making-of documentary featured in the 1999 "Collector's Edition" is highly worthwhile, containing interview segments from Scorsese, De Niro, Shepherd, Boyle, Foster, Keitel, Brooks, Schrader, etc., providing fascinating insight. It becomes apparent that the essence of Paul Schrader's screenplay was at once captured while also being appropriately flashed out thanks to Scorsese and the incredibly talented actors. The movie itself has been remastered, and the sound and picture quality are pristine. If you don't have it already, this "Collector's Edition" is the way to go. "Taxi Driver" deserves to be hailed as one of the very best movies ever, and any serious viewer should appreciate it.

Great movie. No problems with the DVD.

Great movie.

Great movie

Watching Scorsese's unfailingly great "Taxi Driver" this weekend, I saw it as a haunting portrayal of a misled psychotic, who goes on a killing spree not to free the 12-year-old hooker from pimps but because he has his own misguided view of everything that's wrong with the world's morality. That he's seen as a hero at the end of the film is a joke, a mistake made by people who think he did what he did to save Iris. Travis wasn't interested, I think, in saving Iris. He was just insane and didn't see Iris as one of the filth of humanity. He saw her as salvageable. He didn't go on the killing spree for her benefit, but her freedom was a lucky byproduct to Travis' madness. This isn't "Death Wish"-type vengeance. Travis is insane, a villain who doesn't understand the depths of his own madness. While dating political volunteer Betsy, he's so unclear on how to go about it that he takes her to a dirty movie, buys her an album she already owns, then stalks her. He writes a manifesto about the evils of society. He's a war veteran, living an isolated life away from his parents. He's unable to sleep. He sees the world as a sick place, where he's the only normal man left. He's not a hero. He's not a tough guy. He's a basket case. Notice how little dialogue he actually has with Iris, played incredibly by Jodie Foster, before deciding to "save" her from Sport. Iris doesn't even want him to do it. Who she is doesn't matter to Travis. What she represents matters more to Travis. He's embarking on a rampage, intending to kill lots of people (including the presidential candidate in a thwarted attempt), yet he only succeeds in killing the pimps. He's not a hero, but society, in one of the film's best twists, makes him a little girl's savior. Betsy, at the end, forgives him without knowing the extent of his madness, and he smiles at her. Then, he keeps driving, thinking, plotting. This is a great, extremely bleak movie. And DeNiro's performance is pitch perfect.

It's a good movie. I've been wanting to see it for many years. I'm glad I added it to my collection.

As I watched Taxi Driver for the first time in twenty-odd years, I was reminded of M. Night Shyamalan's Unbreakable. Not because Unbreakable comes anywhere close to Taxi Driver in terms of cinematic merit, but because Taxi Driver seemed to be aiming at the same broad theme--a comic book-style hero in a gritty, adult world. Because, if anything, Travis Bickle seems to fit quite closely a real world Batman, enraged by the injustices of the world, unable to fit in, and ultimately taking the law into his own hands. He has a raw honesty--in sizing up people, in not being offended by a porn movie--and an uncontrollable urge to act on a primal sense of right and wrong. Clearly, Travis is also more complex--and more disturbed--than the average comic book hero. After all, Scorcese is aiming for real life (as to which Unbreakable is a pale, upper-middle-class imitation), and Travis' own, flat reaction to his apparent "psychosis" (his lamentations about having "these thoughts" was particularly impressive) betray a condition that at least fits our preconceived notions of what it means to be mentally "ill." But, unlike so many "sane" people, Travis does the unthinkable--he speaks to people honestly and openly, he gets enraged by injustice and immorality (no one else in the movie seems to care very much about 12 year old prostitutes), he has a nobility about himself (not giving in to sexual temptation from Jodie Foster's character). And his apparent planning to attack a presidential candidate (the movie is never really clear as to whether he intends to harm the man, or even scare him) seems driven by the falsity of the candidate's message--his "we are the people" mantra echoing in a world where the common people (at least those encountered by Travis) are the last ones you'd want running things. The ending is fascinating. Is it real or a fantasy? The clippings of newspaper articles, as the camera scans across the board, say Travis is dead, and then later that he is comatose, but recovering. I suspect that the ending is a dream, the hallucination of a dying man who has his nobility vindicated in the end by appreciative parents and a city that needs more men like him.