Taxi Driver
(1976)
Starring: Robert
DeNiro, Jodie Foster, Harvey Keitel, Cybil Shepard.
Director: Martin
Scorsese
Written by :Paul
Schrader
Taxi Driver brought
three of the most precious gems of cinema into prominence, namely Robert
DeNiro, Martin Scorsese and the then 13 year old Jodie Foster who would go on
to become one of the finest ever actresses.
This 1976 Martin
Scorsese psychological thriller takes the viewer into a very different world,
away from the candyfloss romances, away from the opulent surroundings, from the
big dialogue mouthing mobsters or high school cheerleaders. It takes them into
the mind of a frustrated and an unstable person who is becoming dangerously
psychotic due to the filth that he sees around him.
Travis Bickle
(Robert DeNiro) is the unlikely protagonist of the film who also serves as the
film’s narrator. A discharged Vietnam
Vet with seemingly no professional or social skills, the 26 year old (the age
he gives his employer) finds it almost impossible to adapt back into the
society. He takes a job to drive a taxi in New York at night for 12 hour shifts
both as a means to combat his insomnia and to give some direction to his empty
and lonely life (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.) . His only activities other than driving the taxi are maintaining a diary
(which is the narration of the film), watching pornographic films in seedy
theatres and writing letters to his parents in which he blatantly lies about
working with the secret service and being on important missions all the time.
He gets
infatuated with a campaign volunteer Betsy (Cybil Shepard) and asks her out. He
later takes her on a date and being socially inept, takes her to one of his
frequented seedy theatres. She leaves offended and breaks off all contact with
him. His attempts to reconcile with her end in his humiliation at her office
which make him further shun himself from society.
Meanwhile, instead
of calming him down, driving the taxi at late nights makes his mental condition
worse as, owing to the odd hours , he sees the worst elements of the society at
work. Most of his fares during that time too are from the underbelly of the
society (Each night when I return the cab to the garage, I have to clean the
cum off the back seat. Some nights, I clean off the blood). His mental
instability makes him want to lash out at the decadence that he sees around
him. He buys guns and starts intense physical training for someday that he
perceives that he might have to fight the evil that he hates so much. One
night, a twelve year old prostitute Iris (Jodie Foster) gets into his cab and
pleads him to help her get away, only to have her pimp Sport (Harvey Keitel)
pull her out and throw a crumpled note on the backseat. Travis tracks Iris down
by posing as her client only to discover to his dismay that she is very content
with her life as a prostitute and has no intent of returning to her family. She
says that she was stoned on the day when she tried to escape her pimp/lover.
This breaks down
any remaining sanity in Travis and saving Iris from this wretched life becomes
his sole obsession. He loses all sanity, even trying to make a ridiculous
attempt on the life of the presidential candidate (from which he barely
escapes) for whom his former love interest Betsy is campaigning. Finally, he decides
in the end to save Iris at any cost, paving way for a devastating climax.
Even after more
than three decades of being made, this film remains the most harrowing
portrayal of an unstable mind. Martin Scorsese pours his brilliance into the
script in which the dialogues are the farthest thing from eloquent or flowery
yet hard hitting. The film is painfully real and not for a moment is the viewer
given any false hopes that things are going to get better and something good
will surely come out in the end. The viewer knows the end cannot be any better
and sadly goes with this unlikely protagonist on his march to the abyss. This
film is rated highly by any director today worth his salt and remains an
inspiration for any film student today who wants to make it big. One of them
used to be Anurag Kashyap.
Robert DeNiro’s
portrayal of Travis Bickle is superlatively brilliant. Much has been written
about it and all I can add is that it’s a privilege to watch him live this
role. He makes you feel disgusted, afraid, sympathetic and sorry for Travis all
at the same time, because the viewer realizes that he too unknowingly wants to
lash out at the evil all around him. Being a method actor, DeNiro drove a taxi
in New York for a month for long hours in order to become Travis Bickle, instead
of merely playing the role. The result is for all of us to see. Jodie Foster’s
portrayal of the twelve year old drug addict hooker Iris is disturbingly
awesome. The scene of her first meeting with Travis where she tells him that
he’s got only fifteen minutes to do his thing is definitely not for someone
raised on goody goody cinema.The rest of the supporting cast is effective as
well.
The fact that
Robert de Niro, Jodie Foster and Martin Scorsese did not win the Oscar for
their performance or Taxi Driver didn’t win the best picture again proves that
awards don’t go to the best films most of the times.
Rarely does a
film come which takes the viewers out of their comfort zone and make them see
cinema for what it is, a fulfilling art and science instead of merely being a
medium of entertainment. But when it does, you should not miss it. This
timeless classic is applicable today as much as it was in the 70s, simply for
the fact as its caption states that in every street in every city in the world,
there is a nobody waiting to be a somebody.
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