It's been almost an entire month since our last post and a 2 full months since our first review. I'm pleased to report that we've finally completed our second movie date. This time it was the #52 movie on AFI's list - - Taxi Driver.
This 1976 classic directed by Martin Scorsese and starring a very young Robert De Niro is at its simplest a story about a NYC cabbie who's ready to snap. Yet, like the main character there's so much more going un beneath the surface. Watch Trailer.
WIFEY'S REVIEW
Ok, second movie date and I got to choose this one. I was thinking a nice movie with some action seeing it was about driving in a taxi. Boy was I wrong!!!
We started the movie around 8:30pm and ended at 11pm. I had to stop at points to collect myself. This was a very hard movie to sit through. Now that I'm thinking about it, I think I would watch Citizen Kane 10 more times before I watch this one again.
This is how it went down...
In the beginning, there was lots of music and hardly any talking (BORING) and then Robert De Niro as the main actor (he was a VERY negative man). Not only was he a pill popper and a drinker, but he was also addicted to porn movie theaters (not someone I want driving me around). But I can say that when it came to asking a lady out he was very confident. He marched right into her office and asked her right out. His only downfall was that on the first date he took her to a movie. A porn movie!
One thing that really bothered me was that this guy Travis only slept once during the whole 2.5 hours we watched this movie. This was a very slow movie until we got to the very last half hour where it quickly became a violent movie.
Travis flipped out and wanted to kill all the pimps in the movie. Oh, did I forget to mention Jodi Foster (all of 13) was the main prostitute in the movie? Nice. So, the ending consisted of a major bloodbath. Sooooo not a chick flick!
I would rate this movie 1 out of 5 Ben & Jerry's Ice Creams. Next movie, I promise, will be a chick flick in some way!
HUBBY'S REVIEW
I guess it's fitting that waiting for this movie date was like waiting for a taxi in a major city.
I had seen this movie just once before and that was back in 1998 so this was like a new one to me. I knew from one of the opening lines ("Thank God for the rain that washed the garbage and the trash off the sidewalks...") that this was going to be a positive and uplifting film.
On a side note before I get started, what was America's fascination with taxi's in the '70s? Wasn't there a TV show - - a comedy - - about taxi drivers? Was that the glamorous profession of choice back then? But I digress.
Only 20 minutes into the movie I wrote down that Lindsay's face looked "priceless" so we were off to another great start.
I really like Wifey's point about De Niro's character Travis. This guy was a pretty shadey character himself. Ironic, because he hates everyone he deems "immoral" on the city streets ("This city is like an open sewer..."). Perhaps he hates them because they remind him of the things he hates about himself.
Movie Date Tip #1: On a first date, never, ever take her to a porno!
Movie Date Tip #2: The next day when you call to make nice, never, ever suggest that maybe the reason why she reacted the way she did is because she had "a virus" and is sick!
How twisted is that? This guy labels everyone who's not like him as being the problem. CLICHE ALERT: Now that's the pot calling the kettle black.
I did note how it was interesting to me that the same things that the public debates today (i.e. social issues/causes) were being debated by cabbies on their break back in the mid-'70s.
The gratuitous violence aside (nothing compared to today's standards, but at the time considered so), a couple of my major complaints involve stereotypes. First, why is it that Hollywood portrayed EVERY Vietnam Veteran as a social outcast who was a mass murderer in waiting? Remember Rambo? Second, why is it that Hollywood portrayed (and continues to potray) Christians as wackos ready to kill?
I can't remember the last time I heard about a war veteran or a Christian going on a killing spree. Quite the contrary! Just bothers me every time.
Wifey also mentioned the Jodi Foster character. If I remember correctly, Scorsese took a lot of heat for allowing an underage Foster to potray a prostitute in this film and there were allegations of subjecting her to a form of child abuse through this role.
It's frightening to think that there are people like this guy walking around every day and that these ticking time bombs are just waiting to explode.
It's fascinating that if Travis would've killed the Senator and Presidential candidate he would've been a villain. He kills a member of the mafia and a pimp (and saves a young runaway prostitute in the process) and he's instead a hero.
In the end, the entire movie is a prime example of what the world and society is like once God is removed. When people's hearts and minds are constantly focused on things like sin, the result is unfortunately a world that resembles the evil that exists in those innermost hidden parts. Only by changing hearts and minds to meditate on good, pure things will the world finally change for the better.
I gave Taxi Driver 3 Ben & Jerry's Ice Creams out of 5. Under our rating system that means that this movie earns 2 Ben & Jerry's Ice Creams from OMD.
This 1976 classic directed by Martin Scorsese and starring a very young Robert De Niro is at its simplest a story about a NYC cabbie who's ready to snap. Yet, like the main character there's so much more going un beneath the surface. Watch Trailer.
WIFEY'S REVIEW
Ok, second movie date and I got to choose this one. I was thinking a nice movie with some action seeing it was about driving in a taxi. Boy was I wrong!!!
We started the movie around 8:30pm and ended at 11pm. I had to stop at points to collect myself. This was a very hard movie to sit through. Now that I'm thinking about it, I think I would watch Citizen Kane 10 more times before I watch this one again.
This is how it went down...
In the beginning, there was lots of music and hardly any talking (BORING) and then Robert De Niro as the main actor (he was a VERY negative man). Not only was he a pill popper and a drinker, but he was also addicted to porn movie theaters (not someone I want driving me around). But I can say that when it came to asking a lady out he was very confident. He marched right into her office and asked her right out. His only downfall was that on the first date he took her to a movie. A porn movie!
One thing that really bothered me was that this guy Travis only slept once during the whole 2.5 hours we watched this movie. This was a very slow movie until we got to the very last half hour where it quickly became a violent movie.
Travis flipped out and wanted to kill all the pimps in the movie. Oh, did I forget to mention Jodi Foster (all of 13) was the main prostitute in the movie? Nice. So, the ending consisted of a major bloodbath. Sooooo not a chick flick!
I would rate this movie 1 out of 5 Ben & Jerry's Ice Creams. Next movie, I promise, will be a chick flick in some way!
HUBBY'S REVIEW
I guess it's fitting that waiting for this movie date was like waiting for a taxi in a major city.
I had seen this movie just once before and that was back in 1998 so this was like a new one to me. I knew from one of the opening lines ("Thank God for the rain that washed the garbage and the trash off the sidewalks...") that this was going to be a positive and uplifting film.
On a side note before I get started, what was America's fascination with taxi's in the '70s? Wasn't there a TV show - - a comedy - - about taxi drivers? Was that the glamorous profession of choice back then? But I digress.
Only 20 minutes into the movie I wrote down that Lindsay's face looked "priceless" so we were off to another great start.
I really like Wifey's point about De Niro's character Travis. This guy was a pretty shadey character himself. Ironic, because he hates everyone he deems "immoral" on the city streets ("This city is like an open sewer..."). Perhaps he hates them because they remind him of the things he hates about himself.
Movie Date Tip #1: On a first date, never, ever take her to a porno!
Movie Date Tip #2: The next day when you call to make nice, never, ever suggest that maybe the reason why she reacted the way she did is because she had "a virus" and is sick!
How twisted is that? This guy labels everyone who's not like him as being the problem. CLICHE ALERT: Now that's the pot calling the kettle black.
I did note how it was interesting to me that the same things that the public debates today (i.e. social issues/causes) were being debated by cabbies on their break back in the mid-'70s.
The gratuitous violence aside (nothing compared to today's standards, but at the time considered so), a couple of my major complaints involve stereotypes. First, why is it that Hollywood portrayed EVERY Vietnam Veteran as a social outcast who was a mass murderer in waiting? Remember Rambo? Second, why is it that Hollywood portrayed (and continues to potray) Christians as wackos ready to kill?
I can't remember the last time I heard about a war veteran or a Christian going on a killing spree. Quite the contrary! Just bothers me every time.
Wifey also mentioned the Jodi Foster character. If I remember correctly, Scorsese took a lot of heat for allowing an underage Foster to potray a prostitute in this film and there were allegations of subjecting her to a form of child abuse through this role.
It's frightening to think that there are people like this guy walking around every day and that these ticking time bombs are just waiting to explode.
It's fascinating that if Travis would've killed the Senator and Presidential candidate he would've been a villain. He kills a member of the mafia and a pimp (and saves a young runaway prostitute in the process) and he's instead a hero.
In the end, the entire movie is a prime example of what the world and society is like once God is removed. When people's hearts and minds are constantly focused on things like sin, the result is unfortunately a world that resembles the evil that exists in those innermost hidden parts. Only by changing hearts and minds to meditate on good, pure things will the world finally change for the better.
I gave Taxi Driver 3 Ben & Jerry's Ice Creams out of 5. Under our rating system that means that this movie earns 2 Ben & Jerry's Ice Creams from OMD.