Cherished Cinema

Taxi Driver (Martin Scorsese, 1976)

Hello all.

Although these films are in no particular order, I had to put Taxi Driver first as to the fact that it was the starting point for me. The film was assigned to me in a class I took in high school as make-up for a day that I missed. Immediately after watching this movie, I began exploring Scorsese’s filmography and then continued moving on (through various recommendations) and slowly became what I am today. This film was also the first time that I immediately re-watched a film after finishing it; for those who have seen it are aware that watching it twice is four hours of film greatness.

The viewer learns everything, absolutely everything they need to know about Travis Bickle. To this very day he is still in my top-three favorite film characters, such a bizarre and interesting character that Scorsese masterfully inserts into a New York backdrop. The city itself, the film’s atmosphere, is absolutely essential to this impressive feat of a film. Bickle is so blatantly out-of-place but at the same time indistinctly in-place, an idea that needs clarification. Bickle’s entire psyche is built around his hatred for the inhabitants of the city thus his existence (at least as the viewer sees him) is entirely dependent on the city.

I adore the use of Bickle’s journal as the narration of the film. It puts the viewer in his mindset through his slight grammatical errors and overall speech – an absolutely crucial facet of the film. As simple as this may sound, Travis Bickle is the film. He is the taxi driver that the film’s title is referring to, and even the crazy events that happen in the film are not important. Bickle’s involvement or reaction to these crazy events is what is important. You may notice (hopefully just notice not complain) that in this “review,” I did not discuss the film’s most known scenes. This project is intended to be a personal exploration through films that made me love film the way I do. If anyone has anything they would like to discuss about a particular film, then please feel free to contact me (comment/email); nothing would make me happier.

Thank you for reading!