Taxi Driver (1976)
Directed by: Martin Scorsese
The metropolitan canvas paints the picture of disparity lingering in the air. Where the night as jubilant as it seems carries the weight of one's broken dreams and the cries from reality. The noir setting painted by Scorsese is genius. You sense it. You feel the tension of Travis battling insomnia and his bit of awkwardness among the cities inhabitants.
We follow the story of one cabbie, Travis Bickle who bears witness to all these things and more. He sees the city for what it is. A soulless existence teetering it's inhabitants back and forth. It infuriates him to the point of repulsion. He yearns to find some meaning in the midst of his surroundings. The night life is busy with noises and bright city lights that drape into the shadows of it's cityscape. He sees a woman who appears to him like a light in the middle of this metropolitan wasteland. Unfortunately for him, she doesn't take to kindly to his taste in films or to him really. This pushes him further into despair. He yearns to find meaning but where?
It should happen that one night a young woman get's into his cab and wants to escape. Something about this scenario just clicks internally for Travis. She is uprooted from his cab by a strange man who shoves barter money on his seat. A sad and deteriorated crumbled bill in exchange for him to look the other way. This further leaves the repulsive taste of the night life in his mouth. Something about this scenario just lingers in his mind so he sets to find some resolution.
The young woman happens to be a night walker. Who hails on the filth of the city to bring it's sad crumbled bills crushed into the hands of her "protectors". Travis hopes to save her from the fate that awaits her.
Additionally, sickened not only by the city itself but the very government that claims to care he hopes to make a statement. What's that statement? The statement of rebellion and everything this city stands for. It's city needs help yet nothing is being done to address the issue at hand. While the rich get rich, the night claims more souls to addictions. Travis is this cities observer. He hopes to save others from the cities cruel fate and it's merciless grasp.
Can Travis save Iris or will she be yet another number to be added to the neon lights. No, he sees the innocence that she hides and the pain she runs and burrows deep down in addictions. Can Travis save Iris? Can he save himself?
I think the big takeaway for me is the message in survival and rebellion. Rebellion to the system that routinely fails it's city. It spews countless hopes and dreams. It tells the city how it will be better. Can it be better? Like Travis, we either lean on the side where we see the government's address to these issues in the gutter lying next to the wrappers from sandwiches from the night before, and cigarette butts. It's phony and Travis sees through it and again it propels him to repulsion. He's a force to be reckoned with and how strange that at the end of the story should fate try to reward him slightly? Is fate as cruel as the city he inhabits? To taunt him once more with the very woman he saw as salvation from the monotony day in and out. No, he sees through her. That opportunity presents itself and he makes nothing of it. The reward he feels is the one knowing he helped save one life if not his own but that of Iris.
Beautiful cinematography. Excellent setting and mood with themes to create an iconic film. 10/10
Synopsis:
The haunting feeling and yearning to escape from the day to day grind of monotony creates tension in our protagonists mind. Don't let the green parka fool you with the yellow cab. It's true that you learn more from riding in a taxi than you do on the outside looking in. How true these words are as they create a subtle theme to tie in the story of Travis Bickle, Iris, and even Betsy alongside Palatine. Whos is the antagonist? Logically we can pinpoint it as Sport but perhaps Travis is on to something in setting up the frame in Palatine. The crooked politician promising the world to the city but like Travis and now the viewers you see the city for the soulless wasteland it is. It's all fine until you ride alongside Travis at night and see the reality that fogs the lenses of people like Betsy and Palatine. How will this story develop I guess you'll have to tune in and find out?
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