Relentlessly bleak and intense, Taxi Driver is one of the most important movies ever made.

Rating: 10/10 (31 July 2014)

'You talking' to me?' With these four words, Robert De Niro and Martin Scorcese entered the Hollywood hall of fame, and with good reason. For, even if you have not yet seen Taxi Driver, you will most certainly have heard of it and possibly even watched its most famous scene. If you fall into this category, it is time to sit down and appreciate Martin Scorcese's 1976 masterpiece.
The plot centres on Travis Bickle, a 20 something loner who works the nighttime taxi shift on the streets of New York. We follow Travis as he becomes increasingly disillusioned at the sleaziness and decadence which he is subjected to on a nightly basis. Robert De Niro gives one of his finest performances as Bickle - a morally ambiguous Vietnam war veteran who may, or may not, be losing his mind. With the movie focused almost solely on Travis, there is a lot of pressure on De Niro's performance, and he delivers in spades. It is a cinematic tour de force and must surely rank as one of the best performances in modern movies. In lesser hands, Travis may have come off as completely crazy, but De Niro's subtle performance makes the viewer question his motives, and his sanity, at every turn.
Scorcese chooses to shoot New York City as a sleazy playground filled with criminals, prostitutes and other undesirables. There are a number of dreamlike shots which echo Travis' fragile state of mind and Bernard Hermann's sinister score contributes to an underlying sense of danger which is prevalent throughout the movie. This is where the beauty of Taxi Driver lies; it is not a simple tale of good vs. evil, but rather an exploration of one man's loneliness and how it can lead to some truly devastating consequences.
An absolute masterpiece of modern cinema and arguably Scorcese's best film. Taxi Driver is one of the most engrossing, disturbing and endlessly watchable movies ever made. With De Niro and Scorcese on top form, you will be thinking and talking about this movie for many years to come.