Taxi Driver (1976) *****

Martin Scorsese's first masterpiece (and first screwjob at the Oscars) Taxi Driver represents what 1970's film making was all about. It was dark, it was gritty, it was sarcastic. The period from 1970-1977 was an era that produced the underbelly of cinema with A Clockwork orange, Straw Dogs, and Deliverance. Taxi Driver was the last of this era that abruptly ended with a little film known as Star Wars and it is probably the best (yes, better than A Clockwork Orange). Robert De Niro doesn't portray Travis Bickle- he becomes Travis Bickle in a legendary performance. De Niro's portrayal of a man that simply slips away from reality is one for the ages. You feel sorry for the character. Jodie Foster plays Iris, a 13 year old hooker that Travis becomes obsessed with, trying to save the child from the scum and the sewer that is New York City. Cybil Shepherd plays the campaign worker that Travis is initially obsessed, going so far as getting a date but blundering it because of his social ineptness. Albert Brooks, Peter Boyle, and Harvey Keitel round out the cast, but none of them is the real star. The real star of the film is New York City. This isn't the New York City of Woody Allen films. This is Scorsese's New York- a dirty, dark, immoral universe where a husband can casually plot his wifes murder in the back of a Taxi cab and a mentally ill young man can be a hero by accident. This is New York before it became Disneyland. This is probably one of the most important films of the 1970's.