Taxi Driver

A film set in New York. Travis cannot sleep. He is a former soldier; he starts driving a taxi at night because he is awake anyway. The city disturbs him. He keeps a journal about the streets, the people and what happens in the back seat, and it hardens as it goes. He becomes interested in a woman. Betsy works on an election campaign; the first meeting goes well, on the second he takes her to an adult cinema, and that is the end of it. From there the film is a preparation. He buys guns, exercises, talks to himself in the mirror and cuts his hair. There is also a girl of twelve. Iris is working on the street and Travis decides to save her. What the narrative is interested in is not crime but loneliness: the film takes place inside Travis's head and the outside world only ever appears as much as he describes it. At one point the narrative could go two ways. Travis first aims at the candidate; when that fails the same preparation turns elsewhere, and the result gets him declared a hero. The ending is argued over for that reason. Newspaper cuttings and a grateful letter turn the same man from a killer into a rescuer. The screenplay is by Paul Schrader and was written quickly during a difficult period of his own. The music was Bernard Herrmann's last work; he died the day he finished recording it. Jodie Foster played the part at thirteen and her older sister doubled for her in some scenes; the actor was given a psychological assessment before shooting. The colours in the final sequence were desaturated in printing to lower the certificate. The film won the Palme d'Or at Cannes. Robert De Niro, Jodie Foster, Cybill Shepherd, Harvey Keitel and Peter Boyle are in the cast. Martin Scorsese directed. Who it is for: anyone who likes American cinema of the 1970s and unreliable narrators. Who it is not for: anyone looking for relief; the film explains nothing and its last scene is uncomfortable.