Emptiness and loneliness in a crowded, urban jungle

Rating: 8/10 (18 February 2006)

This 1970s classic starring Robert De Niro as Travis Bickle, a New York city cabbie, cuts a small snippet of his daily life and takes viewers on a bumpy ride along the back streets and dark alleys of the human mind.
Returning home from Vietnam, a young Bickle confronts the prospects of finding a civilian job, settling down in an unsettling and crime-ridden city, the longing to meet someone special, and a deep-seated desire to put the violence behind him and get on with a 'regular life'. It builds the tension like a coiled spring until final climax. De Niro delivers a brilliant performance, along with credible roles by Cybill Shepherd as the love interest, and Jodie Foster as a young hooker.
Martin Scorsese's Taxi Driver deals with a whole plethora of issues of great significance in a post-industrial world. The broken relationships of many millions, lost connections between friends and lovers, identity and self-expression, kinship and brotherhood -- all the fine sub-texts from just under the surface are brought to the fore-front, for everyone to take a look at, and perhaps examine.
This movie along with Mean Streets and Raging Bull marks the character arc of Scorsese as a director. Using a common template to paint in bold fresh strokes, Scorsese at once informs and imbibes the experiences of growing up in Little Italy, of family and relationships, of loving, and leaving and what it once meant to be 'just a kid'.
Thirty years later, it remains a 'must-see' for fans of good cinema and good performance both.