Wednesday, May 23, 2007

The Alienated Man of Violent "Honor"



It is a well known fact that Scorsese modelled Taxi Driver's Travis Bickle after Ethan Edwards of John Ford's brilliant The Searchers. Each anti-hero is a war veteran, a "searcher" whose obsession (what becomes a monomania) with a particular code of honor leads to violence. Both of this "outsiders" attempt to rescue the young girl, the object of their obsession, although she might not REALLY want to be rescued. Anyway, I have never had the opportunity to watch these two closely together, but we are doing that in my film class this week. We just finished The Searchers and will see Taxi Driver tomorrow, so I will let you know how it goes.

3 comments:

lt said...

i didn't read this but i bet it has mary's opinions, and emotional responses to some certain subject matter.

it might also perhaps pertain to events in her life.

Mary said...

Very funny, Jonathan.

Josh said...

At the age of 19, when I first saw Taxi driver, I drew more than a few similarities with Travis and myself, and I have not watched it since. These similarities have since faded away, and I may be time for another viewing, perhaps alongside The Searchers, which I have not seen.