When tasked with writing a contextual study, I came across many challenges. The first problem i came across was simply where to start once I had viewed all of the potential films to study and collected my research. Not being an expert on the American new wave alongside having no first-hand experience of the movement meant that everything I could write about the context would hence be from the perspective of my references. In order to add my own insight on the films context, I tried to relate psychological elements I had picked up during analysis of the films.
Things I did well:
thorough research
concise wording; to the point
detailed analyses
Things I could've done better:
More books/print sources
organisation of information: should've placed them into related sections.
organised the study chronologically to give a better understanding of the time period - despite this idea, I think that perhaps separating the study onto singular focus on the separate films was the better idea as it meant i could properly flesh out my thoughts and not have to keep swapping which film I talked about.
Should've started writing the study sooner as I ran out of time to add all of my research.
Showing posts with label Unit 1 - Contextual Study. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Unit 1 - Contextual Study. Show all posts
Wednesday, 9 December 2015
Friday, 4 December 2015
Contextual Study of the American New Wave
Contextual Study of the American New Wave
In this contextual study, I foremost discuss how Arthur Penn’s Bonnie and Clyde (1967) and Martin Scorsese’s Taxi Driver (1976), were affected by their institutional context. I've selected these films as I consider them to be the most important and influential films of the American new wave of cinema; their creations consist of and highlight key factors for how the movement came to be.
Before diving into the defining era at the focus of this contextual study; the late 1960’s through to the early 1980’s, it's important to understand the impact of the French new wave of the late 1950’s and 1960’s. In fact, it was this new age of ground-breaking films made by artistic, avant-garde filmmakers for which the term 'Nouvelle Vague' (“new wave”) was coined by film critics of the time - Sterrit (1999). The industries’ traditional focus of film being simply a tool to present literature, as opposed to it being an art form of itself, fuelled young, dissatisfied filmmakers to create films with a fresh narrative and editing approach, among other components.
The French critics of this period, especially those of the film magazine Cahiers Du Cinema, believed a rise of ‘auteurs’ would be the best way forward for the French film industry. Auteur Theory refers to the idea in film criticism that the director is the primary creative visionary of a film. In other words, the director is the author of the film (“auteur” meaning “author” in French). No matter how collective and industrial the creation of a film, the basis of this theory is that when it is appropriately applied, the directors’ personal vision for the film still manages to be seen. The comprehension of auteur theory is essential when studying the rise of “New Hollywood” as to the majority of the up-and-coming directors that defined this era, it was how they thought modern cinema should be.
The auteur approach to film making allowed for audiences to better connect to the characters and stories on screen, as they were by nature, explorations of the human condition by the eye of the camera itself: the directors. For example, the theme of isolation from society and feelings of loneliness displayed in Taxi Driver, were introspectively explored by the director Martin Scorsese and tapped into the mind-set of the audiences because they're universal and deep-rooted concepts.
"I don't think people anticipated that the therapeutic writings of a twenty-something dealing with inner-city solitude would hit such a nerve with the audience" – Paul Schrader, the films screenwriter. What I find particularly interesting about this quote is how when viewed from another perspective, it also reflects the creation of the film's script by Schrader himself.
Prior to Taxi Driver, the Academy Award for Best Supporting Actor was awarded to Robert De Niro for his role in Francis Ford Coppola's The Godfather Part II and Ellen Burstyn was award Best Actress for her role in Scorsese's own previous film to Taxi Driver: Alice Doesn't Live Here Anymore. These recognitions of talent then allowed for Scorsese to get funding for Taxi Driver in 1976, as De Niro had already agreed upon starring in the film.
Robert De Niro, a previous Scorsese collaborator at the time, portrays Travis Bickle; the anti-hero, ex-US marine protagonist in this mid 1970's based vigilantly film. Throughout the film, a series of failed attempts to connect to people take place which ultimately leads him to take violent action into his own hands. The reason for this failure, from my research and view, is due to his psychological dysfunction caused by post-traumatic stress disorder: a result of exposure to the harsh realities of the Vietnam war he was recently honourably discharged from, as previously argued by Carrie Gorringe (1995). This most notably results in Travis never taking a step back to consider the possible viewpoints of others. Instead, he believes that the way he views his New York City surroundings; as filled with low-life scum, is in fact how the city truly is. Travis' inability to deal with the givens of existence only furthermore solidifies these viewpoints. This idea of existentialism is likely to have influenced and thus utilised by Schrader after he read Albert Camus' The Stranger (1942) around the time of writing the script: a novel which is often regarded as an exemplar of such. To the audience, it is clear that Travis' problems are self-inflicted. But in order to keep viewing himself as the protagonist of his life story, he must force himself to only focus on the things he despises. He insists all of the problems in his life; sexual frustration, loneliness and anger are the cause of others.
New York City was the ideal setting for Scorsese's first attempt at a mainstream major motion picture as according to the screenwriter Paul Schrader “Only true loneliness can be depicted when the protagonist is surrounded by people everywhere he goes”. Both Scorsese and Schrader were also born and raised in a religious household in New York City, as noted by Spark Notes (2013). Scorsese in particular has noted that whilst growing up in Little Italy, he experienced a lot of crime and violence and that to him it was "just the way things were". This perspective is likely to have influenced his approach to the filming and added to the films real-life resembling grittiness Biskind, P (1999). When compared to the city of today, the New York depicted in Taxi Driver is noticeably less of a family oriented tourist destination. Times Square was host to peep shows and the streets were regularly aligned with prostitutes.
Despite being overly-exaggerated by Travis in the feature, during the mid 70's, the period in which the film is set, the city of New York was a lot filthier than today's. Due to the near Bankruptcy of the city in 1974, the trash collectors went on strike, this meant that the city became increasingly aligned with warm garbage, to which the city did not have an immediate funded solution for. Jimmy Carter, a presidential candidate at the time promised that the city would not have to file for bankruptcy. He later won the national election in 1976 and solved New York's garbage problem. Comparably within the film, Senator Charles Palentine is also running for presidency. To Travis' surprise it just happens that Palentine requires his cab service. Whilst talking to Palentine, Travis states that he is a big supporter. However he was unable to identify him without confirmation and when questioned upon his policies, Travis admits that he is unaware of any. These are great example of Travis' many contradictions.
Unknowingly, you can convince yourself of something that isn’t true. This is why such self-inflicted isolation and loneliness can lead to the formation of what we call “Mad Men” such as Travis. Travis Bickle is a true American in the sense that there are heroes and villains in his anti-hero viewpoint. The thought of being a powerless victim is what drives him to commit what he believes to be heroic acts: this is confirmed by the posting of the newspaper articles. One thing for sure is that Travis has “good” intentions, this is why we can feel for him. However, as expressed by Scorsese's most recent collaborating actor Leonardo DiCaprio (2013), this is what also traps us.
Sometimes certain camera movements and techniques were employed just because they felt 'right' during shooting. In an interview with Scorsese, the director stated that often times decisions such as the “style” of the film in terms of its visuals were just the way Scorsese thought the film would be, not necessarily intended to be Gothic New York horror-esque, Scorsese, M (2011). This is what is referred to as organic film making, it was a major part to the free-style of film making explored by the French. It was the director following the vision in his head in that particular moment, not trying to add meaning via metaphors such as the smoke in the opening shot being representative of a certain hell on earth.
Taxi Driver draws parallels to John Ford's The Searchers (1956), in which the protagonist tries to save someone who doesn't necessarily want to be saved. However the difference between The Searchers and Taxi driver is that Travis does so for his ego, not because its the moral thing to do. His violent actions in the final scene are likely to have psychologically scarred Iris, a 12 year old prostitute played by Jodie Foster, counterproductive to supposedly "saving" her: his intended plan. Due to not viewing his first film until his late teens, Schrader's influences are mostly literature such as The catcher in the Rye: similarly to Travis Bickle, Holden's attitude remains unchanged at the story's end, implying no maturation. Another work of influential loneliness is Fyodor Dostoevsky's Notes from Underground.
Upon release, despite ringing the zeitgeist of the youthful audience and therefore achieving commercial success, Taxi Driver was not a raving critical success. In fact, when it comes to truly ground-breaking films such as this, most are not referred to as such until their impact on the industry has been recognised much later. Film critic Roger Ebert (1976) was one of the few of the time that understood the messages and purpose behind the films shockingly lurid sequence of events.
Almost a decade prior to the release of Taxi Driver, Arthur Penn's legendary film Bonnie and Clyde was released on August 13th 1967. The film came at a critical time for Hollywood: the studio system had been on a dramatic downward trajectory since the mid 1940's as a consequence of the rise of television and an outdated business model that relied on attracting audiences with extravagant musicals, films based on popular novels and famous movie stars. Overall, the types of mainstream movies released had become typical and thus tiresome to many. The audiences were being pulled in to the small screen with consistent coverage of various revolutionary movements of the time such as the civil rights movement and sexual revolution. In order to survive the system had to change; studios started to have greater confidence in younger, unknown filmmakers following Penn's commercial smash hit. Thanks to the successes of Bonnie and Clyde and The Graduate, mainstream films started to become more original and less novel-based. Now revered film critic Pauline Kaul argued upon release that Bonnie and Clyde indicated the rise of a “new” Hollywood, to much disbelief of her peers.
The feature shares common revolutionary cinematic themes of idiosyncrasy, sexual frustration, alienation and rebellion with that of Taxi Driver. It awakened audiences from their movie-going slumber; they were liberated by a form of cinematic entertainment that needn’t rely on sheer spectacle alone. Subversive comedy and frank sexual discussions resonated. Unlike any mainstream films before, the "villains" in Bonnie and Clyde were The violence in Bonnie and Clyde is a means to an end for their joyous ride. 'Moreover, from the moment Clyde introduces himself and his partner, saying, "I'm Clyde Barrow and this is Miss Bonnie Parker. We rob banks", the movie brazenly romanticises the outlaws – bank robbers and killers.' page 49, Biskind, P (1999). This startled and challenged the pre-conceptions of sadism within villains that audiences and critics alike were accustomed to with “old Hollywood”. How could these murderers seem so innocent? It was this confusion that led to initial bad reviews. This film broke significant ground because it made audience members step back and consider why they disliked it when so many others didn’t.
The characters of Clyde Barrow and Bonnie Parker are based off real-life Great Depression-era bank-robbing outlaws of the same names. The famed outlaws and their gang, originally from Dallas, Texas, travelled across the United States until their ultimate death in a police ambush in Sailes, Louisiana. Accurate to the real ambush, the ending of the film was ground-breaking for its time as it unflinchingly showed the 167 bullets shot at their vehicle, kill the gang. The graphic violence in the film reflected the live-television news images of a brutal war in Vietnam which was taking place during production, as mentioned by Snider, E D (2010). The fact that many Americans could watch a war unfold live from their living rooms contributed to a growing opposition to the war.
In this contextual study, I foremost discuss how Arthur Penn’s Bonnie and Clyde (1967) and Martin Scorsese’s Taxi Driver (1976), were affected by their institutional context. I've selected these films as I consider them to be the most important and influential films of the American new wave of cinema; their creations consist of and highlight key factors for how the movement came to be.
Before diving into the defining era at the focus of this contextual study; the late 1960’s through to the early 1980’s, it's important to understand the impact of the French new wave of the late 1950’s and 1960’s. In fact, it was this new age of ground-breaking films made by artistic, avant-garde filmmakers for which the term 'Nouvelle Vague' (“new wave”) was coined by film critics of the time - Sterrit (1999). The industries’ traditional focus of film being simply a tool to present literature, as opposed to it being an art form of itself, fuelled young, dissatisfied filmmakers to create films with a fresh narrative and editing approach, among other components.
The French critics of this period, especially those of the film magazine Cahiers Du Cinema, believed a rise of ‘auteurs’ would be the best way forward for the French film industry. Auteur Theory refers to the idea in film criticism that the director is the primary creative visionary of a film. In other words, the director is the author of the film (“auteur” meaning “author” in French). No matter how collective and industrial the creation of a film, the basis of this theory is that when it is appropriately applied, the directors’ personal vision for the film still manages to be seen. The comprehension of auteur theory is essential when studying the rise of “New Hollywood” as to the majority of the up-and-coming directors that defined this era, it was how they thought modern cinema should be.
The auteur approach to film making allowed for audiences to better connect to the characters and stories on screen, as they were by nature, explorations of the human condition by the eye of the camera itself: the directors. For example, the theme of isolation from society and feelings of loneliness displayed in Taxi Driver, were introspectively explored by the director Martin Scorsese and tapped into the mind-set of the audiences because they're universal and deep-rooted concepts.
"I don't think people anticipated that the therapeutic writings of a twenty-something dealing with inner-city solitude would hit such a nerve with the audience" – Paul Schrader, the films screenwriter. What I find particularly interesting about this quote is how when viewed from another perspective, it also reflects the creation of the film's script by Schrader himself.
Prior to Taxi Driver, the Academy Award for Best Supporting Actor was awarded to Robert De Niro for his role in Francis Ford Coppola's The Godfather Part II and Ellen Burstyn was award Best Actress for her role in Scorsese's own previous film to Taxi Driver: Alice Doesn't Live Here Anymore. These recognitions of talent then allowed for Scorsese to get funding for Taxi Driver in 1976, as De Niro had already agreed upon starring in the film.
Robert De Niro, a previous Scorsese collaborator at the time, portrays Travis Bickle; the anti-hero, ex-US marine protagonist in this mid 1970's based vigilantly film. Throughout the film, a series of failed attempts to connect to people take place which ultimately leads him to take violent action into his own hands. The reason for this failure, from my research and view, is due to his psychological dysfunction caused by post-traumatic stress disorder: a result of exposure to the harsh realities of the Vietnam war he was recently honourably discharged from, as previously argued by Carrie Gorringe (1995). This most notably results in Travis never taking a step back to consider the possible viewpoints of others. Instead, he believes that the way he views his New York City surroundings; as filled with low-life scum, is in fact how the city truly is. Travis' inability to deal with the givens of existence only furthermore solidifies these viewpoints. This idea of existentialism is likely to have influenced and thus utilised by Schrader after he read Albert Camus' The Stranger (1942) around the time of writing the script: a novel which is often regarded as an exemplar of such. To the audience, it is clear that Travis' problems are self-inflicted. But in order to keep viewing himself as the protagonist of his life story, he must force himself to only focus on the things he despises. He insists all of the problems in his life; sexual frustration, loneliness and anger are the cause of others.
New York City was the ideal setting for Scorsese's first attempt at a mainstream major motion picture as according to the screenwriter Paul Schrader “Only true loneliness can be depicted when the protagonist is surrounded by people everywhere he goes”. Both Scorsese and Schrader were also born and raised in a religious household in New York City, as noted by Spark Notes (2013). Scorsese in particular has noted that whilst growing up in Little Italy, he experienced a lot of crime and violence and that to him it was "just the way things were". This perspective is likely to have influenced his approach to the filming and added to the films real-life resembling grittiness Biskind, P (1999). When compared to the city of today, the New York depicted in Taxi Driver is noticeably less of a family oriented tourist destination. Times Square was host to peep shows and the streets were regularly aligned with prostitutes.
Despite being overly-exaggerated by Travis in the feature, during the mid 70's, the period in which the film is set, the city of New York was a lot filthier than today's. Due to the near Bankruptcy of the city in 1974, the trash collectors went on strike, this meant that the city became increasingly aligned with warm garbage, to which the city did not have an immediate funded solution for. Jimmy Carter, a presidential candidate at the time promised that the city would not have to file for bankruptcy. He later won the national election in 1976 and solved New York's garbage problem. Comparably within the film, Senator Charles Palentine is also running for presidency. To Travis' surprise it just happens that Palentine requires his cab service. Whilst talking to Palentine, Travis states that he is a big supporter. However he was unable to identify him without confirmation and when questioned upon his policies, Travis admits that he is unaware of any. These are great example of Travis' many contradictions.
Unknowingly, you can convince yourself of something that isn’t true. This is why such self-inflicted isolation and loneliness can lead to the formation of what we call “Mad Men” such as Travis. Travis Bickle is a true American in the sense that there are heroes and villains in his anti-hero viewpoint. The thought of being a powerless victim is what drives him to commit what he believes to be heroic acts: this is confirmed by the posting of the newspaper articles. One thing for sure is that Travis has “good” intentions, this is why we can feel for him. However, as expressed by Scorsese's most recent collaborating actor Leonardo DiCaprio (2013), this is what also traps us.
Sometimes certain camera movements and techniques were employed just because they felt 'right' during shooting. In an interview with Scorsese, the director stated that often times decisions such as the “style” of the film in terms of its visuals were just the way Scorsese thought the film would be, not necessarily intended to be Gothic New York horror-esque, Scorsese, M (2011). This is what is referred to as organic film making, it was a major part to the free-style of film making explored by the French. It was the director following the vision in his head in that particular moment, not trying to add meaning via metaphors such as the smoke in the opening shot being representative of a certain hell on earth.
Taxi Driver draws parallels to John Ford's The Searchers (1956), in which the protagonist tries to save someone who doesn't necessarily want to be saved. However the difference between The Searchers and Taxi driver is that Travis does so for his ego, not because its the moral thing to do. His violent actions in the final scene are likely to have psychologically scarred Iris, a 12 year old prostitute played by Jodie Foster, counterproductive to supposedly "saving" her: his intended plan. Due to not viewing his first film until his late teens, Schrader's influences are mostly literature such as The catcher in the Rye: similarly to Travis Bickle, Holden's attitude remains unchanged at the story's end, implying no maturation. Another work of influential loneliness is Fyodor Dostoevsky's Notes from Underground.
Upon release, despite ringing the zeitgeist of the youthful audience and therefore achieving commercial success, Taxi Driver was not a raving critical success. In fact, when it comes to truly ground-breaking films such as this, most are not referred to as such until their impact on the industry has been recognised much later. Film critic Roger Ebert (1976) was one of the few of the time that understood the messages and purpose behind the films shockingly lurid sequence of events.
Almost a decade prior to the release of Taxi Driver, Arthur Penn's legendary film Bonnie and Clyde was released on August 13th 1967. The film came at a critical time for Hollywood: the studio system had been on a dramatic downward trajectory since the mid 1940's as a consequence of the rise of television and an outdated business model that relied on attracting audiences with extravagant musicals, films based on popular novels and famous movie stars. Overall, the types of mainstream movies released had become typical and thus tiresome to many. The audiences were being pulled in to the small screen with consistent coverage of various revolutionary movements of the time such as the civil rights movement and sexual revolution. In order to survive the system had to change; studios started to have greater confidence in younger, unknown filmmakers following Penn's commercial smash hit. Thanks to the successes of Bonnie and Clyde and The Graduate, mainstream films started to become more original and less novel-based. Now revered film critic Pauline Kaul argued upon release that Bonnie and Clyde indicated the rise of a “new” Hollywood, to much disbelief of her peers.
The feature shares common revolutionary cinematic themes of idiosyncrasy, sexual frustration, alienation and rebellion with that of Taxi Driver. It awakened audiences from their movie-going slumber; they were liberated by a form of cinematic entertainment that needn’t rely on sheer spectacle alone. Subversive comedy and frank sexual discussions resonated. Unlike any mainstream films before, the "villains" in Bonnie and Clyde were The violence in Bonnie and Clyde is a means to an end for their joyous ride. 'Moreover, from the moment Clyde introduces himself and his partner, saying, "I'm Clyde Barrow and this is Miss Bonnie Parker. We rob banks", the movie brazenly romanticises the outlaws – bank robbers and killers.' page 49, Biskind, P (1999). This startled and challenged the pre-conceptions of sadism within villains that audiences and critics alike were accustomed to with “old Hollywood”. How could these murderers seem so innocent? It was this confusion that led to initial bad reviews. This film broke significant ground because it made audience members step back and consider why they disliked it when so many others didn’t.
The characters of Clyde Barrow and Bonnie Parker are based off real-life Great Depression-era bank-robbing outlaws of the same names. The famed outlaws and their gang, originally from Dallas, Texas, travelled across the United States until their ultimate death in a police ambush in Sailes, Louisiana. Accurate to the real ambush, the ending of the film was ground-breaking for its time as it unflinchingly showed the 167 bullets shot at their vehicle, kill the gang. The graphic violence in the film reflected the live-television news images of a brutal war in Vietnam which was taking place during production, as mentioned by Snider, E D (2010). The fact that many Americans could watch a war unfold live from their living rooms contributed to a growing opposition to the war.
Bibliography
References:
- Bonnie and Clyde (1967) Film. Directed by Arthur Penn. [DVD] Warner Bros.-Seven Arts.
- The Graduate (1967) Film. Directed by Mike Nichols. [.mov] United Artists.
- Taxi Driver (1976) Film. Directed by Martin Scorsese. [.mov] Columbia Pictures.
- EBERT, R (1976) Taxi Driver Review. www.rogerebert.com. [Online] [Accessed: 4th November 2015].
- SPARK NOTES (2013) Taxi Driver: Context [Online] Available from: www.sparknotes.com. [Accessed: 1st November 2015].
- Snider, E D (2010) What’s the Big Deal?: Bonnie and Clyde (1967) Available from: www.thefilm.com [Online] [Accessed: 27th October 2015].
- Carrie Gorringe (1995) Taxi Driver, Nitrate Online [Online] Available from www.nitrateonline.com [Accessed: 27th October 2015].
- Sterrit, David (1999). The Films of Jean Luc Godard. Cambridge, UK. Cambridge University Press, Print.
- Scorsese, M (2011) Martin Scorsese, Paul Schrader & Sam Rockwell Talk "Taxi Driver" Rerelease With AMC [Online] Available from: www.youtube.com [Accessed: 28th October 2015].
- DiCaprio, L (2013) Leonardo DiCaprio on Taxi Driver | Charlie Rose [Online] Available from: www.youtube.com [Accessed: 28th October 2015].
- Biskind, P (1999) 'Easy Riders, Raging Bulls'. 1st Edition. Simon and Schuster.
- Merchant, G (2005) 'The Making Of Taxi Driver'. 1st Edition. MQ Publications Ltd. Book.
Friday, 16 October 2015
Taxi Driver Research
Peter Biskind's 'Easy Riders, Raging Bulls':
'Scorsese absorbed the filming-on-the-fly flavour of the new cinema vert movement pioneered by Donn Pennebakbr and Ricky Leacock that was going on around him. The slice-of-life influence would show up in his student films, then in Woodstock, and later in the grittiness of Mean Streets, Taxi Driver and Raging Bull.' page 228
"No other film has dramatized urban indifference so powerfully; at first, here, its horrifyingly funny and then just horrifying." page 119
(Notes from) Taxi Driver Analysis - Part 1: //www.youtube.com/watch?v=8se9Zxy1Njo
Taxi Driver Analysis by Xanatos:
Is the Travis a hero or a villain?: http://rateyourmusic.com/board_message/message_id_is_4509004
He's an antihero. The character has good intentions but no regard for society and its standards.
Right. Keep in mind that right before he kills the criminals, he tries to shoot the guy who's running for president, but gets spotted by Secret Service. His killings are less a heroic rescue than an outcry of rage against a world that disgusts him (remember that he tries to kill himself immediately afterwards but has run out of bullets). The ending is ironic; he's celebrated as a hero because his fury happened to target rather despicable people, but had he been successful with his first attempt, he would have been considered a villain by the very same who celebrated him. Scorsese said the last shot of his eyes in the rear view mirror is meant to convey that his impulses are not "cured," and it's possible he may strike again.
Taxi Driver Essay: http://www.nitrateonline.com/ftaxi.html
'Scorsese absorbed the filming-on-the-fly flavour of the new cinema vert movement pioneered by Donn Pennebakbr and Ricky Leacock that was going on around him. The slice-of-life influence would show up in his student films, then in Woodstock, and later in the grittiness of Mean Streets, Taxi Driver and Raging Bull.' page 228
"No other film has dramatized urban indifference so powerfully; at first, here, its horrifyingly funny and then just horrifying." page 119
(Notes from) Taxi Driver Analysis - Part 1: //www.youtube.com/watch?v=8se9Zxy1Njo
- Martin Scorsese's first attempt at a mainstream major motion picture just happened to become one of the most revered pieces of American Cinema and to ring the zeitgeist immediately upon its release.
- After making Mean Streets, Scorsese finally got the opportunity to adapt the screenplay written by Paul Schrader and collaborate once again with his future filmic partner Robert De Niro, but this time on a much more introspective and lurid journey.
- "I don't think people anticipated that the therapeutic writings of a twenty-something dealing with inner-city solitude would hit such a nerve with the audience"
- What was originally thought of as a very personal story, may have just arrived at the right time.
- Taxi Driver is a film that deals with loneliness, obsession, self-hatred and the need to be belong.
- I think the themes of this film become more evident once they become amplified by Travis's downward spiral.
- Even though the film follows a single character whose characteristics are on the extreme end of the spectrum, the experience as a whole can still be seen as a relatable one. This is because all of the emotions that make up Travis are all of the emotions that we, the audience have to deal with.
- We are his existential complex, his yearning to be included, we just don't admit it. Or perhaps we're more like Travis than we thought, in that we don't want to admit it.
- Taxi Driver (I believe), is a story which is more about the essential aspects of the human condition, rather than just an entertaining glimpse into the mind of a mad-man. Because as the film shows us, we all have the capacity to become Travis. It just a matter of whether we want to be.
Similarly to Taxi Driver's Travis Bickle, Holden's attitude remains unchanged at the story's end, implying no maturation, thus differentiating the novel from young adult fiction.
Taxi Driver Analysis by Xanatos:
"Roger Ebert, an avid fan of the film once said that the one part of the famous mirror scene that never gets quoted is: "well I'm the only one here". And that is the line that perfectly describes Travis: He's simply a loner that can't deal with his emotions who has a tendency to lash out in anger and frustration. All the while being driven to madness by urban decay as he witnesses it by the streets of New York. Only true loneliness can be depicted when the protagonist is surrounded by people everywhere he goes. Taxi Driver draws parallels to The Searchers, in which the protagonist tries to save someone who doesn't necessarily want to be saved. However the difference between The Searchers and Taxi driver is that Travis does so for his ego, not because its the best thing to do. His violent actions in the final scene are likely to have psychologically scarred Iris, counterproductive to supposedly "saving" her."
Is the Travis a hero or a villain?: http://rateyourmusic.com/board_message/message_id_is_4509004
He's an antihero. The character has good intentions but no regard for society and its standards.
Right. Keep in mind that right before he kills the criminals, he tries to shoot the guy who's running for president, but gets spotted by Secret Service. His killings are less a heroic rescue than an outcry of rage against a world that disgusts him (remember that he tries to kill himself immediately afterwards but has run out of bullets). The ending is ironic; he's celebrated as a hero because his fury happened to target rather despicable people, but had he been successful with his first attempt, he would have been considered a villain by the very same who celebrated him. Scorsese said the last shot of his eyes in the rear view mirror is meant to convey that his impulses are not "cured," and it's possible he may strike again.
Taxi Driver Essay: http://www.nitrateonline.com/ftaxi.html
- Overthinking as a result of isolation from others can lead to convincing yourself of a lie to be true. That we see the world through our own perspectives that do not mirror the reality; as shown by the contrast of the type of people the audience do not see through Travis' viewpoint, compared to those we see through his viewpoint. People, generally young men who at the time felt loneliness, obsession, self-hatred and the need to be belong. The outcast within us all. Even though the film follows a single character whose characteristics are on the extreme end of the spectrum, the experience as a whole can still be seen as a relatable one. This is because all of the emotions that make up Travis are all of the emotions that we, the audience have to deal with.
- Below this narrative surface, Taxi Driver eloquently addresses the massive social and political changes that had taken place in the post-World War Two era; more specifically, the film addressed the consequences of these changes. Foremost among them was the decay of the inner-city core, the result of waves of suburban "immigration" by middle-class whites, seeking not only more property but "relief" from the taxation "pressures" of having to support ghetto regions populated almost exclusively by minorities. Since the 60s had been scarred by the Vietnam War and three assassinations, the contexts in Taxi Driver were, at the time of the film's original release, like newly-opened wounds in American society. American society seemed to be on the verge of collapse, and the life of Travis Bickle seemed to capture the frustrations of an entire group of Americans who felt not only alienated, but powerless to stop the collapse. Much of Taxi Driver centers around Bickle's desire to stop feeling isolated. But it isn't only Vietnam that has isolated him; his most essential problem stems from the shortage of options available to him on a professional basis. When the subject of education comes up in his interview with the cab company, his reply is vague. "Here and there...", he admits sheepishly, before his voice trails off. What makes the film so prescient as a historical document is the fact that many of the issues it raised are still relevant; more depressing has been American society's inability to rectify these situations twenty years later.
- Unfortunately, as Taxi Driver so obviously demonstrates, Travis may not be the only victim of the effects of the war, although he certainly seems to be the one most sensitized to them. When Travis tries desperately to connect on some elemental level with his society, he discovers that it is as disconnected as he is. Even worse, and unlike Travis, society seems to be acting as a parody of itself, paying only lip-service to the values it claims to uphold. In perhaps one of the most striking scenes in Taxi Driver (in a film which is never less than striking on a thematic and/or visual level at any time), Travis, under the influence of his temporary psychosis, asks the question, "You talkin' to me?" The phrase often elicits laughter in an audience, because the phrase is so familiar to the cinematic cognoscenti; however, this familiar laughter often contains within it a sense of unease. Travis' question is relevant, because, despite his best efforts, everyone has been talking at him, not to him. All of his passengers, regardless of socio-economic position, have been and are perfunctorily engaged in life; their dialogues with Travis indicate that their aim is not communication (with the central aim of comprehending another's point of view) but rather to have a Greek chorus parrot approval of their opinions. Mutual understanding is, at best, irrelevant. This situation is made most relevant in Travis' discussion with the presidential candidate, Palantine. Palantine asks Travis for his opinion, but doesn't want to hear that the solution is to clean up the streets; not only would such a solution be too difficult to achieve, but it would take an unequivocal ideology to achieve, something which would be politically suicidal. It is easier to brush off Travis's concerns with vague promises interpreted by Travis as indifference. Given the number of socially-unsatisfying encounters that Travis has in his taxi, in all areas of the city, the taxi rides act as symbolic microcosms of the dissolution of American society. Under the circumstances, Travis' vigilante turn is not surprising; how can he value a society that does not even value itself?
- Director Martin Scorsese was born in New York City to Italian immigrant parents in 1942.
- He grew up in an observant Catholic family in Little Italy, and at a young age he wanted to be a priest. His dreams soon changed, however, and he attended New York University film school.
- After film school, Scorsese moved west to Hollywood.
- Roger Corman, a pulp movie director and producer, hired him to direct Boxcar Bertha in 1972.
- Scorsese's first collaboration with Robert De Niro, who plays Travis in Taxi Driver, was on Mean Streets (1974), a film about Catholic Italian-Americans in Little Italy that was rooted in Scorsese's own childhood experiences.
- The next film Scorsese directed was Alice Doesn't Live Here Anymore, for which Ellen Burstyn won a Best Actress Academy Award, the same year that Robert De Niro won Best Supporting Actor for his role in Francis Ford Coppola's The Godfather Part II. These Academy Awards helped Scorsese raise the funds to make Taxi Driver in 1976.
- The film received huge critical acclaim, cementing Scorsese's reputation as a major director.
- In addition to Taxi Driver, Scorsese has directed over twenty-five films, including the documentary Italianamerican (1974), the highly controversial The Last Temptation of Christ (1988), and, more recently, the popular Goodfellas (1990) and Gangs of New York(2002)
- Taxi Driver elevated Scorsese's status as a director, and it assured Paul Schrader's reputation as a major screenwriter.
- In the mid-1970s, Schrader was an up-and-coming screenwriter whose first screenplay, The Yakuza (1975), was considered a success even though the film had not performed well financially.
- Taxi Driver's success bolstered Schrader's career and ensured his place in the Hollywood community.
- Although some scenes in Taxi Driver were influenced by the actors, the film follows Schrader's screenplay closely, more so than Scorsese has followed his other films' screenplays.
- Many of Schrader's later screenplays deal, like Taxi Driver, with one man's loneliness and alienation, including American Gigolo (1990) and the more recent Bringing Out the Dead (1999), which is in many ways an update and homage to Taxi Driver.
- Like Scorsese, Schrader grew up in a religious household.
- He did not see a film until his late teens, so his influences are more literary than cinematic.
- While writing Taxi Driver, he was under the spell of existentialist novels such as Albert Camus's The Stranger and earlier portraits of loneliness such as Fyodor Dostoevsky's Notes from Underground.
- Scorsese made Taxi Driver in the mid-1970s, a decade famous for its diverse and innovative films.
- The 1970s produced a group of directors, sometimes called the "film school brats," that included Steven Spielberg, Francis Ford Coppola, Martin Scorsese, George Lucas, and Brian de Palma. These men were young Americans who had studied European filmmakers at film school, and they were also the first generation of filmmakers to have grown up watching television.
- Their movies feature close attention to technical detail, while demonstrating an encyclopedic knowledge of film and television history.
- At the same time, their films were not just art house pictures but huge box office successes, funded by Hollywood.
- The fall of the Hollywood studio system at the end of the 1950s, combined with the various political upheavals of the 1960s, including the sexual revolution, the anti-Vietnam movement, and the civil rights movement, made predicting the public's taste increasingly difficult.
- During the early 1970s the largest studios lost over $500million.
- They knew their methods of attracting audiences, which included using big name stars, making high-budget musicals, and releasing films based on popular novels, had become outdated.
- Studios became open to giving money to young and unknown directors who could make more original and risky movies.
- Taxi Driver centre's on a racist, sociopathic, and violent protagonist and features a twelve-year-old prostitute, but at the time of its release it was a popular, well-received film.
- The movie was critically acclaimed in the United States, received four Oscar nominations, and did even better financially in Europe.
- Taxi Driver immortalizes New York City in the 1970s, a city vastly different from the New York we know today.
- The city's filth is exaggerated in the film partly because it is seen through Travis Bickle's skewed perspective, but during 1975, when the movie was filmed, New York was literally a filthy city.
- New York nearly filed for bankruptcy in 1974, so when the New York City trash collectors went on strike in the summer of 1975, causing the streets to fill with warm garbage, the city didn't have the funds to fix the problem.
- One of the promises Jimmy Carter made when campaigning for the presidency, which he won in 1976, was that he would make sure New York City wouldn't have to file for bankruptcy.
- Taxi Driver presents a true-to-life portrait of what Manhattan once was. Times Square was filled with peep shows and prostitutes, and during the summer of 1975, when the film takes place, the country was in the middle of a presidential campaign where one of the main issues was moving beyond the Vietnam War, which had officially ended only in 1973.
- We can easily imagine an ex-marine in New York being disgusted by the filth, finding the politicians who are supposed to help him to be artificial, and feeling that he needs to approach the city as he would a special combat mission.
Friday, 9 October 2015
Peter Biskind's 'Easy Riders, Raging Bulls: How the Sex-Drugs-And-Rock 'N' Roll generation saved Hollywood'
Bonnie and Clyde
'Bonnie and Clyde came out in the middle of the sexual revolution, and its real originality lays in the fact that it recognised that in America, fame and glamour are more potent than sex.' page 48
'Moreover, from the moment Clyde introduces himself and his partner, saying, "I'm Clyde Barrow and this is Miss Bonnie Parker. We rob banks", the movie brazenly romanticises the outlaws – bank robbers and killers.' page 49
'Bonnie and Clyde came out in the middle of the sexual revolution, and its real originality lays in the fact that it recognised that in America, fame and glamour are more potent than sex.' page 48
'Moreover, from the moment Clyde introduces himself and his partner, saying, "I'm Clyde Barrow and this is Miss Bonnie Parker. We rob banks", the movie brazenly romanticises the outlaws – bank robbers and killers.' page 49
An Introduction to the American New Wave
An introduction to the American New Wave from 1969 - '73
I am going to be studying the american new wave from the years of 1969 to 1973. This was the era in which the wave broke through to American mainstream cinema with films such as The Graduate and Easy Rider. The Films that I will be studying in particular are Easy Rider, &
I am going to be looking at the social conditions of the production of these films and their cultural impact.
I am going to be studying the american new wave from the years of 1969 to 1973. This was the era in which the wave broke through to American mainstream cinema with films such as The Graduate and Easy Rider. The Films that I will be studying in particular are Easy Rider, &
I am going to be looking at the social conditions of the production of these films and their cultural impact.
Monday, 5 October 2015
The American New Wave Resources
Resources:
Videos:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7emBSfwbgro
The Rules in Editing French and American New Wave - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UTeOhlva3k0
Books:
Videos:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7emBSfwbgro
The Rules in Editing French and American New Wave - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UTeOhlva3k0
Trends of American New Wave Cinema - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IkLjmwz942Y
The Influence of the French New Wave - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=f9X4p74jHoo
Easy Rider - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=00FWUfHaiU8
The Graduate - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VhrkzsflaQU
Websites:
http://www.newwavefilm.com/international/american-new-wave.shtml
http://www.newwavefilm.com/international/new-hollywood.shtml
http://www.newwavefilm.com/international/new-hollywood2.shtml
- Peter Biskind's book 'Easy Riders, Raging Bulls: How the Sex-drugs-and Rock 'n' Roll Generation Changed Hollywood': 'Bonnie and Clyde came out in the middle of the sexual revolution, and its real originality lays in the fact that it recognised that in America, fame and glamour are more potent than sex.' page 48 'Moreover, from the moment Clyde introduces himself and his partner, saying, "I'm Clyde Barrow and this is Miss Bonnie Parker. We rob banks", the movie brazenly romanticises the outlaws – bank robbers and killers.' page 49 Notable directors profiled in the book:
Steven Spielberg
Martin Scorsese
George Lucas
Francis Ford Coppola
Terrence Malick
Roman Polanski - The Age of New Waves: Art Cinema and the Staging of Globalization by James Tweedie
Biskind, Peter (1990). - The Godfather Companion: Everything You Ever Wanted To Know About All Three Godfather Films (HarperPerennial)
- Belton, John (1993). American Cinema/American Culture. New York: McGraw/Hill.
- Berliner, Todd (2010). Hollywood Incoherent: Narration in Seventies Cinema. Austin, TX: University of Texas Press.
- Cook, David A, “Auteur Cinema and the film generation in 70s Hollywood”, in The New American Cinema by Jon Lewis (ed), Duke University Press, New York, 1998, pp. 1–37
- Harris, Mark (2008). Pictures at a Revolution: Five Movies and the Birth of the New Hollywood. New York: The Penguin Press.
- James, David E, Allegories of Cinema: American Film in the Sixties, Princeton University Press, New York, 1989, pp. 1–42
- Kael, Pauline "Bonnie and Clyde" in, Pauline Kael, For Keeps (Plume, New York, 1994) pp. 141–57.
- Kael, Pauline, "Trash, Art, and the Movies", Going Steady: Film Writings 1968–69, Marion Boyers, New York, 1994, pp. 87–129
- Kanfer, Stefan, The Shock of Freedom in Films, Time Magazine, Dec 8 1967, Accessed 25 April 2009, http://www.time.com/time/magazine/article/0,9171,844256-7,00.html
- King, Geoff (2002). New Hollywood Cinema: An Introduction. London: I.B. Tauris. ISBN 9781860647499.
- Kirshner, Jonathan, Hollywood's Last Golden Age: Politics, Society, and the Seventies Film in America, Ithaca: Cornell University Press, 2012. ISBN 978-0801478161
- Krämer, Peter (2005). The New Hollywood: From Bonnie And Clyde To Star Wars. Wallflower Press. ISBN 978-1-904764-58-8.
- Monaco, Paul (2001). The Sixties, 1960–69, History of American Cinema. London: University of California Press.
- Schatz, Thomas (1993). "The New Hollywood". In Jim Collins, Hilary Radner and Ava Preacher Collins. Film Theory goes to the Movies. New York: Routledge. pp. 8–37.
- Thompson, Kristin & Bordwell, David (2003). Film History: An Introduction (2nd ed.). McGraw–Hill.
Potential Films:
MASH
Easy Rider
The Godfather
MASH
Easy Rider
The Godfather
Bonnie and Clyde
The Graduate
Patton
Taxi Driver
Platoon
Videos:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7emBSfwbgro
The Rules in Editing French and American New Wave - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UTeOhlva3k0
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7emBSfwbgro
The Rules in Editing French and American New Wave - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UTeOhlva3k0
Trends of American New Wave Cinema - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IkLjmwz942Y
The Influence of the French New Wave - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=f9X4p74jHoo
Hollywood Warfare: How the Pentagon Censors the Movies - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_NoFTpDzQZs
Operation Hollywood: How The Pentagon Shapes & Censors The Movies - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FPZL5WTilRE
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=c9kpUW5mwZ8
Websites:
http://www.newwavefilm.com/international/american-new-wave.shtml
http://www.newwavefilm.com/international/new-hollywood.shtml
http://www.newwavefilm.com/international/new-hollywood2.shtml
The Relationship between Hollywood and The pentagon
http://america.aljazeera.com/articles/2014/7/29/hollywood-and-thepentagonarelationshipofmutualexploitation.html
Rules of Editing: http://www.lavideofilmmaker.com/filmmaking/film-editing-tips.html
The Psychology of film editing: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FinhQb3jiAs
Taxi Driver:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Taxi_Driver
The Graduate:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Graduate
1960's Berkeley Protests - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1960s_Berkeley_protests#cite_ref-gales_2-0
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