Starring: Robert De Niro, Jodie Foster, Cybill Shepherd
Rated: R
Released: 1976
What I “know”: Robert De Niro is a taxi driver. He has a mohawk and says “you talkin’ to me?” which I only know because it’s the basic DeNiro impersonation for anyone doing one. Also, Jodie Foster is a teenage prostitute. Super psyched for a lighthearted tale here.
What I know after reading the Netflix sleeve: “After a cute political campaign worker spurns him, an unhinged New York City cabbie decides to assassinate her candidate. Meanwhile, he tries to protect a child prostitute from a smooth-talking pimp in this gripping tale of urban decay and insanity.” Well, yeah, this is going to be a real joyride. Getting out my weighted blanket real quickly.
First up: TRAILER!
1:35: These opening credits feel like it should have been for a 1970s cop show on network TV. They’re oddly calming, though I know what’s coming now.
2:20: Oh THIS is Travis Bickle. I guess I’d heard the name come up in the past but didn’t know it was this movie.
4:57: Cool, a future taxi driver getting dusk drunk on pocket alcohol. Just what I’m sure they’re looking for.
6:27: You know, with that little monologue about the scum on the streets at night, he could earn a prime-time spot as a talking head on a national “news” network.
8:05: “Every night when I bring the cab back to the garage, I have to clean the cum off the backseat. Sometimes I clean the blood.” Well, I was eating dinner.
9:42: Four candy bars, popcorn, and a soda for $1.85 at the movies? Man.
9:55: Oh, it’s THAT kind of movie? This dude’s a real winner.
11:20: Albert Brooks having a phone conversation with the button providers about whether “We are the people” is the same as “We are the people” is my favorite part so far.
15:37: Holy cow, that’s Peter Boyle! Still horseshoe bald, but with more, darker hair around the bottom. I know most of my posts have some version of “holy cow, that’s so-and-so,” but I literally know nothing about most of these going in.
24:23: A) Cybill Shepherd was freaking stunning; B) don’t have coffee dates with people who use the term “my possessions.” I don’t know why it struck me weird; it just did.
31:35: Awwww, little Jodie Foster! Wow, she actually was 14 when she made this movie. That’s insane.
35:00: HE’S TAKING HER TO A PORN MOVIE FOR THEIR FIRST DATE? Heavens, Travis. Also, Betsy, if a dude defends taking you there by saying “I see couples here all the time,” he’s saying he goes to that theater all the time. That’s like 8 red flags at once.
39:52: Annnnnd Travis Bickle is the father of the incels. He stalks her, takes her to a porno theater, then blames her when she deuces out on him.
I realize now how she is just like the others: cold and distant.
Travis Bickle
47:24: If they ever do a remake of this, I need Milo Ventimiglia to play Travis. There have been several shots in here where I did a double take. I think he’d do a fine job.
1:01:00: Bickle doing all the work to plan his weapons and stuff is the most uncomfortable I’ve ever felt watching a movie. And I saw part of “Natural Born Killers.”
1:07:07: If I was of the age that I would have seen this version of De Niro, I would have a real hard time seeing him in like “Meet the Parents” or “Dirty Grandpa.” He is very frightening.
1:11:01: There’s only like 40 minutes left and he hasn’t even talked to Jodie Foster yet. Jodie, come save his soul!
1:15:53: OH MY GOD, THAT’S HARVEY KEITEL. IN HIGH-WAISTED SLACKS AND A WHITE TANK TOP. AS A PIMP.
1:30:55: Gross, Harvey Keitel. Gross to the max.
1:36:12: The mohawk means he’s serious, and he’s ready to die!
1:39:16: In the annals of shootings, I think “suck on this” might be the worst way to preface it.
1:40:02: This just got much bloodier than I expected it to. I mean, I guess I should have seen it coming, but yikes.
1:40:42: THAT DUDE’S CHEEK MOVED when he was shot. Gross, Scorsese. Side note, Jodie Foster was all legs.
1:44:11: I like three cops standing in front of three dead people with a distraught young girl and like not trying to help her in any way. Not calling her out of the room, not entering to assist. Nothing.
1:46:30: Wait, Travis lived??
I would have cut that last bit. Have him go out and be done. I didn’t need to see Betsy again. That was a creepy movie, like “Psycho”-level creepy. I’m glad I’ve seen it, I guess, but it’s not something I’d watch again.
ALSO, while I was looking for clips to put in this, I found out the guy in the back of Bickle’s cab who’s going to kill his wife for being with a black guy … was Martin Scorsese? Jeezo pete.