1) Identify the film: Title, date, director, major stars.
Starring: Robert De Niro, Cybill Shepherd, Jodie Foster, Albert Brooks and Harvey Keitel.
Directed by: Martin Scorsese.
2) Summarize the plot.
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A Marine veteran turned taxi driver is fed up with society. In his nights behind the wheel of his cab, he surveys the filth in the streets and promises to make a difference, and to wash away the scum from the gutters. Finding a young woman in need, the twisted savior begins his downfall towards a murderous streak in an attempt to do his part in purifying the city. Ironically, in the end he is glamorized by the media and turned into a "hero.".
3) Theme or message, "what lies under the plot?".
What doesn't lie under the plot in this film? Scorsese does a great job of making a terrific film that also operates on several different levels: 1) It's an open critique of the perils and disdainful existence of cab drivers in what is so obviously New York City; 2) It's commentary on the state of safety in the city, New York, at that time in our history. Crime was rampant and Scorsese used Travis as his walking purifier; and 3) it mocks the undelivered and empty promises that politicians make to get elected and acts as a warning as to what dishonesty in a campaign could possibly lead to (botched assasination attempt).
4) Is there a relationship between the theme or message in the PF and that of the main film? Discuss.
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I think there's a very obvious connection between the two in the plight of the working man whose life goes nowhere. In "Blue Collar," we saw real people with real problems living real lives. They slaved for an auto maker and still struggled to provide their families or themselves with the things they needed in life. In "Taxi Driver," the employees of the cab companies don't own their own cabs; they work for "The Man." Their only source of respite is a shady coffee house where they go to make up stories about the things that happened in their days to compensate for the banality of their monotonous existences.