A masterpiece

Rating: 10/10 (26 July 2006)

This is one of those few films in which the word "masterpiece" can apply to. I read the screenplay and watched the film just last year and already it is my ultimate favorite. It's not just a landmark in filmdom, it's dark art that you can't help but marvel at. Martin Scorsese did a marvelous job. Ever since I watched this film, I completely idolized him.
You could say that it is one of a kind, or maybe first of a kind. It's not the typical drama, it's not a traditional film noir, nor an actual suspense, or even truly a crime drama. Yet it holds all those genres. It takes a bit of everything to create an existentialist themed genre of its own - it's the origin of its own kind.
About the plot, the situation in the beginning is quite simple but not bland. Travis Bickle (played by Robert De Niro) is a marine veteran who just came back from Vietnam and is dealing with insomnia. He takes the job as a cabbie to at least be doing something in the night, and eventually, that's what he becomes, an animal lurking in the dark. Other than his few cabbie friends, he grows lonely and finally gets a chance to have a real friendship with Betsy (Cybill Shephard), a campaign worker, but drives her away after taking her to a porn film. Once that happens, Travis becomes even more isolated and the mentality and restlessness of his mind starts and the intensity that makes this film a masterpiece begins. It ends with destruction and shots of the heroic turmoils of the great urban martyr.
It's a very hard film to understand. I admit, I was somewhat bewildered at the end, too, and I still am. Even so, I was left with great feeling for the film, that sense of shock mixed with awe and provocation. That's why I love this film - it makes you feel. If not enjoy or think like a movie is preferably "supposed to have," everything about it makes you feel something, whether it be amusement, bewilderment, anger, or shock. The lighting, the transitions, the quotes, the movements - the brilliant parts, like the acting and the music - they all make you feel. It's like a contemporary film noir, only in color.
Speaking of acting, Jodie Foster did so well playing the presumptuous but not yet grown up hooker Iris. She didn't go for the stereotype, like even adult actors tend to do. She didn't just choose the dirty, street-toughened whore type as one would see prostitutes like. She played what she was - a little girl. She visualized the purity and special quality that makes her character stand out to Travis from the gutter city she lives in. She did so well in achieving this that she not only got nominated an Oscar, but also captured the interest of a real life madman. You can't go much further than that.
And of course, Robert De Niro as Travis Bickle. I may idolize Martin Scorsese, but I absolutely worship this actor. All those critical praises about his performance in this film: the brilliance, the realism, the depth - they're not even close. The name "Travis Bickle," is like a second name for him because he portrays his nature so well. It fits with the isolationist mood of the film. It's so real that it seems like he's the only character there. Nobody can say "You talking' to me," in a righter way. In my mind, he is not just the legendary actor Robert De Niro - he is Travis.
And the music is absolutely brilliant. The last works of Bernard Hermann (God bless him) have mixed moods. The main theme is soothing and jazzy but also deep and full of character and the other title theme is so chilling and ominous, though not in a horror or suspenseful way. It doesn't just add beauty to the film, it rises its character and flows with the plot. The movie simply would not be itself without the music.
Also starring Harvey Keitel as Iris's pimp and Leonard Harris as senator Charles Palantine, the film just flows like one great wave; small at first, then ascends greater and greater, until the big splash of rash destruction at the end.