Taxi Driver

In 1972, destitute critic-turned-screenwriter Paul Schrader was down and out on his luck, living in his car. In these conditions he wrote the first draft of "Taxi Driver," finishing the script in just seven days. The script was optioned by producers Julia and Michael Phillips, who recruited Martin Scorsese, fresh from directing the gritty "Mean Streets," to helm the picture. Robert De Niro, star of "Mean Streets," and "The Godfather Part II," was selected by Scorsese to play the lead role of cab-driver Travis Bickle.
The story of Travis Bickle revolves around his disgust with the underbelly of New York City. Each night as he drives his cab, Travis witnesses prostitution and other vices that make him hate his surroundings. He feels that the city should be cleansed. Through narrated passages, we learn that Travis is a loner. He doesn't have any friends, except for a few cabbie aquaintances. He cannot sleep, and spends his time off in porno theaters, surrounded by the smut that he claims to despise. Travis's lonliness becomes the subject matter of the first half of the film, as he descends into madness trying to cope with it.
Writer Paul Schrader: "'Taxi Driver' dramatizes the all too human condition of lonliness, a human being who moves through the maddening crowd, jostled, brushed, ignored or abused, hassled or pandered, but who is somehow untouched by any of it because of his own secret world of fantasy and his inability to communicate with his fellow humans. In short, a lonely man, aching to recognized and loved, but unable to attain it."
When "Taxi Driver" was released in 1976, it garnered praise for De Niro's performance, as well as the performance of Jodie Foster, who was just 12 when she appeared in the movie as an underage prostitute. The movie also made headlines because of its edgy, ultra-violent climax. The film was considered Scorsese's first true masterpiece, earning him the Golden Palm award at the Cannes Film Festival.
Stylistically, the film has the grittiness typical of '70's New York films, such as "The French Connection" and "Mean Streets," but this is inherant of the setting. It is given a surreal quality by the cinematography and editing, however. Rain glistens on the street and on the cab, street lights cast their glow on the nightlife, while the huge, glistening facades of porno theaters loom above the vile characters beneath them. Travis is the focus of almost every single scene in the film. The monotony of his life is reflected in the tempo of the cab sequences. Oftentimes the same shots will be seen over and over again, then again in slow-motion, emphasing the rhythm his life. In "Taxi Driver," time seems endless. Day and night are cut together as though the editors has little regard for chronology, but this effectively illustrates Travis's state of being.
As the plot unfolds, we learn that Travis has fallen in love with a woman who works for the presidential campaign of Senator Charles Palentine. The sequences showing the woman, named Betsy, viewed from afar by Travis, are seductive slow-motion studies that are long in duration. Travis's narration reveals that he thinks Betsy is an angel, and Scorsese relates this onscreen by filming her like one, dressed in white and photographed indulgently.
Scorsese presents most of the action through Travis's eyes, giving us close-ups of Travis's chilling gaze in the cab's rear-view mirror.
The film's climax, in which Travis finally lashes out at the scum he despises, is so surreally violent that the film was given an X-rating. To get an R-rating, the cinematographer agreed to de-saturate the film stock so that the blood, which was dark red, would appear pink. This change, although not made with artistic intention, actually hightens the intensity of the sequence. With its strange color, and its mix of quick cutting and slow-motion, the climax is an explosion of violent fantasy.