"But at 26 he hit a rough patch and wrote Taxi Driver as a form of self-therapy. Speaking by phone from New York, the 79-year-old recalls: I lost my job, left my wife, left the girl I left my wife for, didn't have a place to live, was drinking considerably, was living in my car and had a gun in the car. This went on for a couple of weeks."
"The film, directed by Martin Scorsese and starring Robert De Niro, Jodie Foster, Harvey Keitel and Cybill Shepherd, is a masterpiece of urban alienation. It follows Bickle, a lonely, mentally unstable Vietnam war veteran working as a New York cab driver who, disturbed by the crime, corruption and moral decay he sees around him, develops a dangerous saviour complex. Bickle narrates: All the animals come out at night: whores, skunk pussies, buggers, queens, fairies, dopers, junkies sick, venal."
Taxi Driver was released fifty years ago and portrays intense urban alienation. Martin Scorsese directed and the film stars Robert De Niro as Travis Bickle, a lonely, mentally unstable Vietnam veteran who drives a New York taxi. The protagonist reacts to crime, corruption and moral decay with a dangerous saviour complex and violent fantasies. The screenplay links loneliness, misogyny and repressed anger with contemporary incel-like behavior. The protagonist’s narration uses dehumanizing language to describe nocturnal city life and imagines a cleansing through violent upheaval. The screenwriter wrote the screenplay during a personal crisis that included job loss, relationship breakdown, homelessness and heavy drinking.
Read at www.theguardian.com
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