Someday a real rain/reign will come down and wash away

Rating: 10/10 (6 December 2003)

Martin Scorese's 1976 direction of Paul Schraeder's script `Taxi Driver' depicts the decline of civilization in urban America and one man's driven obsession to clean up the defilement.
The protagonist of the film, Travis Bickle (Robert DeNiro) cannot sleep at night and begins working twelve hour and longer shifts driving a cab in New York City. Bickle is a Marine veteran from the Vietnam era (although it is unclear if he ever saw combat) who through his daily existence observes the filth, scum and urban decay of the modern metropolis. An interesting part of Travis's observations and life is that he does not seem to notice, or care that he is a part of the same hypocrisy. He is disgusted by the city and its urchins and yet he drinks and pops pills constantly, is racist and practically lives in porno theaters during his off hours. Through all of this he reaches to try and find a real human connections.
Travis is obviously lonely and seeks to find the company of a woman. A presidential campaign worker, Cybil Sheperd, infatuates him and he does well with her for one and a half dates until his moment of undoing when he takes her to the movies. Sadly for Travis, he only seems to know about porno movies and Cybil quickly leaves him. Bickle also tries to befriend the concession girl at the porno theater (Diahnne Abbot) only to have her quickly call management to remove the harassing patron. The true find and motivator to action for Travis is the twelve year old prostitute played by Jodie Foster (Iris.) He runs into her a few times early in the action and later decides that he wants to try and rescue her from the world of drugs and pimps, particularly her pimp, Sport (Harvey Keitel.)
Nobody understands what is bothering Travis; not Betsy (Shepherd) or his fellow cabby, Wizard, played by Peter Boyle. Wizard seems to simplify all of the problems of the world into categories that work for him, like the notion that a man becomes his job and that all problems can be resolved by getting `laid.' Travis needs more than this to correct his problems.
The acting in this film is superb all around. DeNiro, Foster and Keitel are all brilliant. Cybil Shepherd plays her role well; there is a lot of depth in the character even though she is not on screen for long. Her coworker, Tom (Albert Brooks) is so totally annoying you just kind of hope that he enters Bickle's rage. The fellow cabbies are portrayed so well and given such great dialogue I really think that they are cabbies and not actors. Like Hitchcock, Scorsese always puts himself in his own movies. In `Taxi Driver' he has more than a mere cameo as he portrays a passenger in Bickle's cab who is hell bent on setting his faltering marriage straight with the aid of a .44 magnum. Even Travis seems scared listening to his rants and raves. Scorsese should act more often.
The climax is near when Bickle decides to meet with one of his colleague's friends, Easy Andy (Steven Prince.) Andy is the type of person that Travis is reaching out to destroy in this movie and yet he has no problem dealing with Andy because he will help Travis obtain the means to his end. Travis ends up purchasing a large assortment of heavy-duty handguns from Andy that he will use to invoke is reign of terror on the pimp, Sport and his associates.
The ending of this movie seemed unbelievably gory and violent at the time of the movies release, and it still does to this day. The main difference is that now in the post-Bundy, Dahmer, Hinckley, Chapman, Columbine, Susan Smith, 9/11 world it is not as shocking. Post-modern society has bred a number of people who have murdered indiscriminately for no apparent reason except of their overwhelming hatred of society and their inability to fit in. I have always seen Bickle as something more than this; perhaps as the rescuer of a kid trapped in prostitution and a cleaner of street scum. But we cannot overlook Travis Bickle's flaws and contradictions. Isn't he a part of what he eradicates?