Anyways, it was an interesting movie. Netflix rated it as a 92% match, whatever that's supposed to mean. I suppose they were rather correct though; I did like the movie. I hadn't realized that Martin Scorsese's directing career extended all the way back to 1976. I have liked some of his other work, such as The Departed and Shutter Island (he also directed The Wolf of Wall Street, which I also should watch at some point... and which also features Leonardo DiCaprio).
The movie is set in the 70s, presumably contemporarily to when it was released. The 70s aesthetic and fashions you can see in the movie were interesting to me and it makes me want to go to the thrift store and buy some 70s clothes... although perhaps I could cobble together an outfit out of some stuff I already have.
I liked the cinematography; it was nice and measured, particularly the various scenes of the nighttime taxi driving. Visually, I liked the movie. (I can't quite think of movies where I distinctly disliked the cinematography -- maybe No Country For Old Men, but I just generally hated that movie overall, not specifically due to the cinematography).
In tandem with the cinematography, I also liked the soundtrack/score -- again, it had a measured/meditative feel to it and contributed to the atmosphere of the movie.
Obviously watching this movie in 2019 is a bit of a trip; there are various outdated things that we don't do/have anymore. Typewriters, payphones, having to go to a record store when someone tells you about a song... I wonder if a present-day remake or movie with a similar premise would be able to have the same effect as Taxi Driver. I guess in a present-day version, the eponymous taxi driver would probably drive for a ride-hail app... Taxi Driver was contemporary to the time it was released, so obviously the sense of outdatedness I get watching it now, decades later, was not present for people who saw it back then. And maybe I shouldn't say outdatedness; that has a bit of a negative connotation yet I don't mean it in a negative way. Maybe retro is a more fitting term.
I thought that maybe this movie might have some kind of funky twist at the end, but it didn't. Still, it was an interesting and worthwhile watch. It was also a bit more tame, in a way, than some other movies I've seen. I thought that maybe it might be a bit more suspenseful and thrilling and/or have more action or something, although it didn't. Not that this was a bad thing; it was just a somewhat calmer movie than I thought it might be.
I guess what I mean is that I thought it might have more conflict, or rather, more drawn-out conflict/conflict that was less subdued. Subdued is a good word to describe it I think. This movie wasn't an emotional or action rollercoaster as some others are, movies that are really intense. Most of the conflict in this movie happened in succinct bursts, with very quick falling action phases.
I was not really familiar with this movie at all before watching it; I read a brief blurb about it to give me an idea of the premise, but otherwise I just knew that it's apparently a famous movie. I think at some point I might've read that it's supposed to be a commentary on American society in the post-Vietnam era, although I don't remember the details.
I think it's interesting to view media and consider how or what it reflects about the time period it was made in. What is it portraying, and how does it portray said subject. The tv shows and movies that are being produced today or within the last few years are a reflection of our current era.
I got the feeling that Robert De Niro, in this film, looks like someone, but I can't figure out who. I know that I'd watched another movie in the past that he was also in (albeit older) so that's why he could look vaguely familiar, but I'm not quite sure that's it... I'm always thinking that people look like other people, so this shouldn't be too surprising. (edit: he also apparently was in The Deer Hunter, which I've seen a portion of)
It was in the same vein as various other movies I like: the other Martin Scorsese films I mentioned above, The Girl With the Dragon Tattoo, Prisoners, even Requiem for a Dream, etc. I seem to like movies that are darker/grittier thematically. If it fits in the genre psychological thriller, it's probably my thing. I'm not really sure where I got my taste in movies; I watch stuff that my mother would have absolutely no interest in.
Come to think of it, this movie also reminded me a bit of Nightcrawler (which Jake Gyllenhaal is in). So I went to go look up and see if Nightcrawler was influenced by Taxi Driver, and it seems like it was -- the poster strongly alludes to Taxi Driver's poster:
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