Analyzing Evil: Travis Bickle From Taxi Driver
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- เผยแพร่เมื่อ 17 ส.ค. 2021
- Welcome everyone to the forty-second episode of Analyzing Evil! Our feature villain for this video is Travis Bickle from Taxi Driver. I hope you enjoy, and thanks for watching. If you have any feedback or questions feel free to let me know below!
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#RobertDeNiro #TravisBickle #TaxiDriver - บันเทิง
The thought of a bunch of dudes sitting in a dark public space watching porn together is just so weird to me.
It sounds awkward as hell.
@@rashonmygooch good pfp
@@PimpMan6 Friggin' sweet.
Mr. Bean was one of those guys once btw
@@froglegstastebestsalted You mean peewee?
*"There's no escape. I'm God's lonely man."*
Travis Bickle isn't quite the sympathetic villain in the traditional sense. But you feel sorry for him as his mental health deteriorates.
I never saw him as a villain just a far gone anti hero after all he never killed anyone who didn't have it coming and his heart ended up being in the right place
Travis is a hero
@@GrosvnerMcaffrey Not for lack of trying though. The politician did literally nothing wrong and Travis is a villainous character for attempting to kill him.
Joker movie was inspired by taxi driver
@@Brandonhayhew close it was inspired by king of comedy
“Half the population is full of Travis Bickles now”- Martin Scorsese
And that was FIFTY years ago. It must be more like 75%.
@@natalyd9674 No no, this was quoted from an interview he did for Killers of the Flower Moon just last year…
@@randomguy6679 Oh wow. Thanks for the correction. That makes it less frightening.
@@natalyd9674 Right?
its so true tho. Like most ppl on the internet thinking that their opinion is higher than anyone else's without even accepting their own flaws.
one thing you didnt mention is that travis wouldve blown his head off in front of Iris if he didnt run out of ammo. He really didnt care how she felt in that moment, and wouldve added to her trauma
Good point, he was on a suicide mission, didn't really care about saving the girl,,
It was never about her and what would ultimately become of her. It wasn't about actually doing good in the world, but being the hero he fantasied about, and to find purpose and direction in that mission. It was a blaze of glory, defiance against a system and world in which he had no agency, sold to himself under the guise of morality.
And I get it, because it's really easy to get yourself there when you feel like you mean nothing.
exactly. he may have rescued iris but he didnt truly care about her, she was a symbol of him saving something, not a girl. not a human.
Guy from the store basically saves his life as he took his gun
@@stuffwithsoph8264 I think this is incredibly harsh and there's no real evidence that he didn't care about her, when in fact his actions suggest he does care about her (you know, killing her abusers and all).
Yes some of the comments above are true, he was driven by extreme depression and worthlessness, but there's no suggestion at all that he didn't a) do the right thing and b) believe he was doing the right thing. I think it's just convenient for people to sum up characters as either bad or good, it's a serious flaw of the viewer that they can't rationalise the idea of a person doing a variety of things on the morality spectrum.
The film isn't about 'by the way, this guy is bad'. It's far more about the effect of your environment and lifestyle on your mental health. He was a disturbed and chaotic individual, but the fact is he did a decent thing in the end. Only the most cynical person would deny that just because he showed signs of anger and insanity in other parts of the film.
Fun fact: John Hinckley Jr, the dude who shot Reagan, was obsessed with this character, he even said he tried to assassinate the former president to impress Jodie Foster.
While Travis Bickle was based on Authur Bremmer, the man who shot George Wallace.
Fun fact: Johns family was good friends with the Bushes, as GHW was VP at the time, and they were having dinner at the time Hinckley Jr. shot Reagan. Very odd
I learned from American Dad lol
@@chasemiles9569 Just another one of those whacky "coincidences", involving the Bush family. Kinda like how his daddy (Bush Sr) was Director of the CIA during Kennedy's assassination. But yeah!
Only if he got the job done
I love how Robert De Niro had a role in Joker. The way I see it, that was him giving his blessing to a movie that was heavily influenced by his classic.
I agree
The bigger influence would be another Scorsese film, The King of Comedy. The full movie is here on TH-cam if you don’t wanna rent/buy it, but it is a fantastic film.
Joker was basically a combination of Taxi Driver and King of Comedy and Todd Phillips is a huge Scorcese fan so it was great seeing DeNiro in this film.
Brilliant. Never thought of it.
Duhh moment but true
This whole video reminds me of when kids in school are told to tell a teacher about bullying but then the staff doesn't actually do anything to intervene
Exactly in my country Pedophiles usually only get 1-2 months in prison for molesting a child and a guy that killed a pedophile got 14 years so the cops don't care about sexual crime at all.
Exactly. I'm sure he's reported stuff to the police before and saw them do nothing. He sees worthless DAs drop charges for the joy of creating more crime later on. He sees judges give a slap on the wrist to repeat offenders. Travis doesn't see society as evil because it contains evil people; all societies will contain evil people. The problem is that every level of society is filled with evil, and they actively promote evil. It's voters, it's police, lawyers, judges, politicians, media, schools. The only way to deal with evil is to skip the system entirely and deal with evil people directly.
Batman is exactly the same. The only difference between Travis and Batman is money.
In my experience they just encourage it
i sorta think of this series as “i’m analyzing the concept of evil through characters that do bad things” rather then “i’m analyzing EVIL characters”
but also we have to consider if evil actions make someone evil it’s a slippery slope
He did nothing bad , he handed out the justice so sorely missed in this world and long overdue . People are brainwashed by Lawyers, the source of so much of the Evil today who constantly demonize vigilantes for doing the job that a spinless society is too weak and neurotic to carry out
Well he's covered evil characters before but the analyzing evil could be the acts themselves however yes evil acts make you a evil person. There's no "he wasn't evil" when dealing with certain people. If you commit genocide for example there's no way you can say you aren't evil, if you sell large amounts of cocaine knowing what it does too communities and you kill people too make sure it's running smoothly you can't say you aren't evil, if you're someone who decides that shooting a public figure or mass amounts of people because you're lonely, mentally unwell and disillusioned with society you can't say you aren't evil, yes there's things that contribute too you making that decision but each person knows what their doing is right or wrong and once you decide "fuck it I'ma cross that line" benefit of the doubt goes out the window and you just become a case study on types of people prone too doing something like that. We should have sympathy for the ones that can still be saved and not do the crime but once you cross the line you no longer deserve sympathy
@@BlackHippy313 .. This is all true but unfortunately the purveyors of genocide these days coming all colors, with their main color being green.. it's all the corporation, those markets you mentioned where large amounts of substances are sold in evil conditions by evil people, I grant you that but in increasing areas of the business actual people are taking over along the lines of the new marijuana market.. prohibition that stands out as a great misplaced moral imperative of the last century which is unworkable premise carried into this century.. it's destroying countries as well as neighborhoods, and yet people keep saying, more prison terms and more people being locked up.. but not everybody who does these substances dies,, so take this example of Travis Bickle to be a white guy who went and killed a black dealer who was selling cocaine, would the response still be the same? Not from the black community because the brother was just trying to make a buck... if he was a piece of s*** selling to kids and selling bogus product and being an idiot, then people wouldn't really complain and might even still applaud Travis... but I agree that if a person refuses to take the higher view of these things, it will inevitably boil over to do the well-known Maniac kamikaze run..
@@BlackHippy313 When it comes to genocide or heinous crimes of that kind, I'm heavily inclined to think no one becomes evil by doing them, you have to be evil first. If actions really make people evil, it's probably going to be a sequence of evil acts which could be done by non-evil but deeply troubled persons, as Raskolnikov's intended wrongdoing. They would execute them hesitantly at the beginning, then, after some repetitions, would accept wholeheartedly its nature and do other pretty bad things more consciously. But I don't know.
Observation: "Making a person evil" could also mean "revealing (s)he is evil", instead of "causing one to become that". If this is the right interpretation for what you said - and I believe it's -, then I'd argue some really bad acts are able to prove one's inner maligne nature, specially well-thought, coldly done ones; not all evil acts would do it, though, because of the possible shadows on his/her conscience.
Travis is not evil - he does not take pleasure in the suffering of others, even those he himself made to suffer.
Deeply troubled and disturbed - but not evil.
Underrated comment.
A true antihero
I'm not sure if I completely agree. Compelling villains often pursue evil for reasons that seem almost exculpatory. I agree, at least, that evil seems to be on a continuum.
@@lionsandhyenas
Maybe.....
But on the premise of the flawed character he is - not natively evil.
(Beating around the bush as you do with the premise of evil in my opening statement)
‘Only’ evil in the Christian sense - maybe in an excessive way - but they way that we are all evil compared to true unselfish goodness - which is unhuman.
Most people - myself included - tends to exclude themselves when describing the flaws and wickedness of the world.
We all have it in us - the urge to be Gods sergeant major - and only a very few succeeds being good in the idealistic scale outlined by the publisher of this video:
Instead of focusing on the misdeamors of others - to focus on your own.
Can you yourself TRULY claim to that?
Hopefully not because then you would already be halfway to be the next Travis.
Travis misfortune making him extreme is only the bad circumstances which he did not choose for himself - his loneliness.....probably combined with PTSD from the war...and alienization.
The latter probably being an underestimate - because the term is based on the premise being integrated in the first place.
Which I doubt was ever the case for Travis.
I appreciate what you are saying, and mostly agree. If I am beating around the bush with evil, it is because evil is such an ambiguous concept, that it’s easy to turn a deed or an entity in just such a way that what has occurred or what the entity has become can seem evil or not. Perhaps it is pure malice that makes evil; but perhaps evil can come from individuals who would otherwise be good. Perhaps evil isn’t the best way to conceptualize Travis; but most human monsters were not necessarily born sociopathic - it is a condition that the world imposed on them. Again, I am not agreeing or disagreeing with you, as I both agree and disagree. Perhaps it’s the prism of the paradoxical, and the unsteadiness of language.
I think Travis’ style of dress (cowboy boots, western style shirts, etc.) might indicate he’s from rural America. Look at what everyone else is wearing; polyester shirts, ties and slick shoes. You don’t even see many other ppl in the movie wearing blue jeans except for Travis.
That is actually a very good observation!
Wow. Never even considered that. Bickle does sound like a hick name, too.
@@kai-in1xt Even his first name is pretty common in Rural Areas.
It probably contributes then since he wouldn't have grown up in this kind of degeneracy. He probably grew up in a nice area, went to church, had friends, was a part of clubs, etc. He's clearly well spoken and has the ability to be social. He's smooth when he wants to be.
Thats a really good theory but he does have a pretty heavy New York accent, though that’s just DeNiro’s default accent
a real doomer, very weird the fact that a character from a 70's movie would be so relatable by the outsiders of the last generations... what a movie
he's a lonewolf. in which lonewolves get rejected many times before attracting a mate or die alone. those socalled alpha males on the internet are not even betas they are fornicating rabbits mocking wolves.
@@WolfRhymesEntertainment wolves don’t have hierarchies
@@onodera3238 yeah there are such things as Lonewolves and if you look at a documentary they even say that the lonewolf gets rejected by many females before finding a mate that accepts them or they die alone.
@@onodera3238 only men with great hatred and envy are murderers not charismatic humorous men that have everything so why would they kill anyone. They don't have. A homocidal bone in their body they don't know the anger of a wolf when it is hungry and angry. They will never know that
@@onodera3238 th-cam.com/video/m7w-_o4XYbU/w-d-xo.html
My favorite scene is when Travis walks into the liquor store, approaches the counter, flips a coin and catches it mid-air, slams it to the counter then says to the cashier: "Call it friendo"!
You sure this isn't from no country for old men
Lmao
hey get a new joke, that jawn is super fkin played out ya hear
my fav scene from no taxi for old men for sure
Travis states that: "Loneliness has followed him his entire life" which tells us that he's been a loner his entire life.
Great insight there.
Hmm yes the floor is made out of floor
He was lonely, not a loner. There's a big difference between the two.
A lonely person pines for company they don’t have, a loner shuns the company of others.
So really if there’s a lack of insight here it’s shared by both you and the narrator, just for different misinterpretations.
Ah, and does he like to free his mind at night?
@@Daniel_Lancelin at at at night?
When he met Iris it gave him some sort of purpose in his life, he was never a fully immoral villain and we know he did have compassion in him; albeit a little twisted. When he met someone who was extremely young and on an incredibly destructive path, maybe he saw a bit of his younger self in her or at least saw where her trajectory was heading. In his mind, he considered fixating on her safety as a healthy occupation for him, a goal.
You commented this 46 minutes ago.
@@fillingsauce7130 Yes
I personally think he was just trying to do something with life and be remembered, he tried to kill palantine but failed so he found someone else. He also tried to kill himself in front of iris which would indefinitely scar her so idk
@@actimeladdict2564 Yeah I get that, Travis was extremely personality disordered so his behavior is unpredictable and unstable. But I think there's more to his interactions with Iris, he did have genuine moments with her and seemed to really latch onto her until his behavior became erratic. So I see it as more than just a way to be remembered.
@@fillingsauce7130 Are you an american?
1:44 this script writing lmfaoooo.
“Travis states that loneliness has followed him all his life, which tells us that he has been a loner his entire life” Has the same vibe as “the missile knows where it is because it knows where it isn’t”
What do you expect from someone who thinks Travis is evil
@@ckwk8347 true
Lmfao, what would you expect from a dude WHO said that killing a guy WHO robs someone at a gunpoint is too much and you should take chances so that he leaves
You’re conveniently leaving out what he says next, lol
Or the same vibe as “your birthday is on the same day you were born.”
One correction is that men were drafted into the Vietnam war. Most didn’t volunteer back then.
No lie, I’ve known more than a few “Travis Bickles” working on the graveyard shift. They’re out there man. That’s the most disturbing part of Taxi Driver. The story is fiction, but that shits as true as it gets.
Good
Be their friend
Nah man, it isn’t like that. The problem is something closer to being maladaptive to society in general, resulting in a hatred of humanity itself. The hypothetical evils of society are just a convenient excuse. These guys? The problems always “out there”. It’s always society or some personal betrayal or the universe itself conspiring against them; it’s never their alcoholism or addiction, never their poor choices, never their lack of empathy or introspection that’s the problem. Try and befriend one. All you’ll be is their dumping ground for them to unload their bullshit onto in the hope that you’ll agree with them, “yeah man, you got a raw deal, the worlds sure fucked you over”.
Anyway, there is a correlation between the graveyard shift and these kinds of personalities. It can be a reinforcement of their isolation - some people just shouldn’t worn at night. It can work some weird shit on the brain.
So many people out there just a step from becoming a Breivik. It's scary.
@@samgott8689 You.. really don't know any actual abnormal/mentally ill people do you? Lol. Ignorance is bliss my friend.
Easily one of the greatest films ever made! Travis has to be one of the most complex and fascinating characters ever written, and the entire film has such a perfect tone and atmosphere, everything about it is so masterful done.
IMO travis is pretty simple; a low-class person who saw the worst of the US and concluded the entire country must be like that. It's easy for humans to assume their experiences are universal.
I would definitely not say one of the greatest films ever made, its worth a first and second viewing
I wish there was a sequel
Your only saying that because that's what you have heard everyone else say. It's not, it's slow and boring until the last 5 minutes. Poorly made
@@TheRandalHandle Noooooooo! Especially not 45 years after
I feel that you have missed the real motivation for Travis' actions. He feels himself to be invisible and takes the actions he takes in an attempt to manifest himself into the world he has imagined exists around him. He wants to make an impact one way or another and does so in the only way he knows how, given his upbringing and mental conditioning.
Even if that convo with the cabbie wasn’t helpful, it was refreshing to see 2 men trying to understand each other. Especially at that time.
I wonder when such things will be allowed in our culture again
"If you hold a high moral view of yourself in society, it would be in your best interest to congregate with like-minded people and not attempt to find in others, the values you assume they'll hold based on your own superficial assumptions." Damn.
I am jacks TH-cam comment
His name was robert paulson
Yes, it’s called ‘confirmation bias’ and you need look no further than your favorite news outlet or political party to see it in glaring relief.
@@longfade or religion.
But it's funny how the "others" expect you to respect their lifestyles which affect you.
We need a Gus Fring episode.
*adjusts tie*
I'm wondering if he's waiting until Better Call Saul is finished before he covers Gus.
@@BloodylocksBathory I'd rather he wait for that to fishing first
Saul Goodman also
@@wmhhealth2018 Saul isn't evil. He's a criminal yes, but he's like a scout boy compared to Gus's psychotic and sadistic nature
I would’ve liked to hear some more insight on him as a veteran and how his cabbie friends refer to him as “Killer”
He was probably a combat vet, infantry......
To everyone asking "is Travis evil?", remember he was going to murder Palantine outright despite knowing nothing about the man, simply because Betsy spurned him.
Yes, exactly this. If he was arrested during the rally, he would be ushered straight into the villain category.
100%. The defense of Travis as some hero in these comments is crazy, and doesn’t look beneath the surface of the movie
Totally. This comment section is nuts.
one comment who absolutely destroys the whole "travis is a hero" thing explains the whole thing very well.
travis choose iris as a second option, had he succeded with palantine, iris would have been stuck there with the pimps.
betsy was the first option, iris the second, lets think that for a second.
@@hyperionofhyperness1883in other words, he did the right thing for the wrong reasons.
That brings to question if a hero is defined by their actions or motive.
Hey may be a lonely social outcast, but man the way he talked to Betsy into going out with him was hella smooth.
Much better than what I could have ever done.
Sure but then he acted like a freak for the rest of the movie. Im sure you are a 1000times more datable my guy
@@derekpinsonnault2902 Either way he was smooth with it. Just couldn't keep it up
If only he had kept that smoothness. I would love it if an attractive man approached me that boldly but he botched the rest
You just need Paul Schrader to write your dialog for you.
That is true he was smooth and handsome dude, but he couldn't take rejection easily. Instead he became very attached and clingy when a girl left him. I don't think that is a good thing. In my opinion, this movie gives a good oversight that courage, charm, smoothness is nothing for men with very unstable personalities. Never be that guy who goes on a second date and can't handle being ignored after that. It's just dating, nothing more.
A couple of thoughts about Travis and his relationship with the Marine Corps:
1. A lot of Marines join looking to escape a sense of isolation, wanting to fit in. Another aspect is a desire to overcome anxiety and insecurity. I was typical when I enlisted. I remember a billboard showing three Marines in dress blues, standing shoulder to shoulder, looking cockily down out of the billboard with the caption, "MAYBE You Can Be One of Us." They didn't look as if they were insecure about anything, and they looked like they were each part of tight-knit fellowship. I didn't enlist because of that billboard. I was going to do it anyway for more pragmatic reasons. That billboard surely struck a couple of chords with me, though.
I remember boot camp being hard, but not as hard as I had expected, and on graduation day, I realized that I'd been anticipating feeling like the person I wanted to be - sure of myself, no longer anxious and insecure, no longer lonely. Instead, I was still just me. Didn't feel any different, and I was bitterly disappointed. Later on I did feel that sense of being part of something bigger than myself, a sense of belonging to a tribe, and of a lot of faith in my own strength and resilience.
2. When he was doing pullups in his apartment, he was wearing a Marine Corps T-shirt, but he had it on inside out so that the Marine Corps emblem and script were reversed. Might have been coincidence, but it could also have been an oblique reference to his situation being the photographic negative of the personhood he had hoped to find in the Corps.
I have to disagree with your faith in the police and the correctional system, though. I worked in corrections after I retired from the Marine Corps and had a fair amount of interaction with both the corrections side and the law enforcement side of that system. I hate to say it, but your trust in the police to intervene effectively to rescue Iris is giving them too much credit - it might happen, but you wouldn't be able to count on it, and her interaction with the police might be almost as traumatic as with Matthew. There's a pretty good chance she would even have been arrested along with the men. And if the villans did go to prison, pimping a teenage girl would not be seen by most other inmates as pedophilia, so it would not have made them pariahs or targets.
I agree that Travis killing the men in front of Iris further traumatized her, but I think that the best thing to do would have been to pick her up from the street and rescue her that way, without having to shoot anyone but without having to rely on the system to be as open-minded and compassionate toward her as he was. That system would have almost certainly have disappointed him.
Well he is also drafted in (if in Vietnam War), granted he chose USMC.
Good points! I would add to your third point that Travis (conceivably) had been living in NY for some time before the events of the film began. Observing the incidence of prostitution and other crimes on regular basis from his taxi cab probably made him lose faith in the police's ability to respond to and to fight crime. Also, the fact that he was prepared to assassinate the politician because of his corruption indicates a lack of faith in the system.
Fascinating observation about his emblem that I had never noticed, despite seeing the film multiple times. And your insights were really interesting. I’m curious as to how old you are? Only in terms of how close a contemporary of Bickle’s character you are? You certainly got a lot out of this movie.
In fairness to the narrator, if you pay close attention to his choice of words, he would be right. The police back then were worse than they are now, and that part of New York was a notorious den of iniquity, patrolled by a jaded, underfunded and openly racist police force. But, whatever legitimate criticisms you could level at them, they certainly would have payed lip service to their duty. They would naturally reject all criticism, which was all the narrator really said. I suspect that any adult living in the late 1970’s would have scoffed at the notion of going to the cops, but it had to be considered in terms of Bickle’s options.
I’ve given a lot of thought to Travis Bickle’s back story. Probably too much? It occurred to me, with the current vogue for prequels and origin stories, “Travis,” would make a great prequel movie or mini series?
I could picture the schoolboy who doesn’t fit in, but wants to who, just like in the movie, gets an even stronger rejection from women who find him shockingly weird. So, he joins the marines, thinking he’ll fit in and find friendship there, and is then sent to Vietnam. At first, he thinks he’s found the answer and wants to go career, training well, committing 100% and loving the routine and discipline. He even gets on well with authority figures and his fellow marines, and is looked up to by his squad, because he is able to disregard setbacks and injury in a way they all take for his inner strength.
But the contradictions of Vietnam soon hit home when he’s deployed in the field. The one guy he gets close to, intimate with, (another undiagnosed mentally ill person) gets killed, horribly. And it’s only later that he discovers that his friend was murdered by his fellow combat troops during a combat mission, because they found him to be such a weirdo, and because he threatened to tell on them for atrocities they routinely carried out. Travis being Travis, there’s a scene where he takes a souvenir from his buddy, a finger or an ear, and we see him cut off part of his friend, wrap it up, and we never learn what it was.
The story culminates in a shootout, at the end of a particularly gruelling battle in which half of his platoon was wiped out. The showdown occurs in the gap between the end of the battle and the wait for inbound choppers to pick up the survivors. The army can’t get the truth out of him about what went down, though they’re sure he’s murdered other troops. So, they can’t award him a Purple Heart for his wounds, without stating how, when and where he received those wounds, so they discharge him honourably, but that’s why he has no medals, despite having exit wound scars.
The whole thing could be told in flashbacks, from the interview in which the top brass are trying to get the truth out of him, perhaps? Before we meet Travis, we can see him being described by the other survivors of that final battle, painting a picture of a man who frightens them (possibly into silence) and of a man with deep intelligence, despite no formal education. All of their descriptions could build him up to be at odds with the man when we finally see him. We’re expecting a giant, covered in scars, with steely eyes, but we get a small, mumbling, average looking man, deepening the mystery about people who know him, versus the impression he makes upon first meeting. Another reason why so many seriously deranged people fly under the radar is that they never look like the, “monsters,” we expect. Having done several prison visits, I have always been struck by how normal and average everyone looks and acts when you meet them, regardless of whether they’re petty criminals or monsters.
Anyway, Travis ends with him showing up in New York and using his discharge papers and veteran’s experience to impress the guy who owns the yellow cab company, where he gets a job . . .
@@MrYoko101 : Yes, that whole thing about the politician, shows us that not only are his priorities pretty warped, but that he could just as easily be chained to that hospital bed, awaiting trial for the assassination of a senior politician. It drives home the point that we were not watching a hero’s story. It’s meant to take away the ambiguity that so many others have debated over without getting the point.
Ice.
Travis was a trained and possibly experienced killer: He was an USMC infantryman who deployed and fought in Vietnam. As a USMC infantry veteran, I would know, Travis had violence pounded into him, we are brainwashed and conditioned to want to kill badly enough to die for it. The only thing that's more important is accomplishing the mission, which is worth more than anyones life ...
Deniro's best role I would say. I can relate to Travis's pain. Just wandering around aimlessly. I get it. Living perpetually in the grey area. Nothing really mattering because you're all alone.
Loneliness is a catalyst for self destruction hence my alcoholism
The moment when Travis stops drinking and working out again would today be the moment he starts unironically posting in a “self improvement general” thread on 4chan
don't hate on /sig/
@@thqd9137 based
Lol
@@thqd9137 BASED
/fit/
Still a good thing, exercise is linked to diminishing depression, among purpose.
I’m not sure I would categorize Travis as an evil character, he was troubled and disturbed, but evil?
I agree, he's actually a pretty sympathetic character beyond the social awkwardness and inner disturbances.
To be honest, yes. Travis would have left the true evil to fester and chosen to kill Palantine if he had gotten his way. He had little reason to actually believe Palantine to be a force for wrongdoing.
Yes? He tries to kill the candidate for president for like, no reason. He never wronged him. Even if you think the murder of the pimps was good, him killing the robber and attempting to kill the president candidate is unacceptable.
Rewatched the movie recently. He literally says a racial slur in the first five minutes of the movie, and let’s Iris touch his schlong for a solid couple of seconds before stopping her.
@@Zephyr_Uhh How saying a word is evil?
Travis gave people WHAT THEY F***IN DESERVED
I love how the guy sitting next to Palatine in the back of the cab is looking at Palatine like "sir, this guy is NUTS". LOL
I was Travis Bickle for some time while I would work a closing shift delivering pizzas. I was 21 and would spend lonely nights dropping off pizzas to families, groups of friends, couples, and parties and would feel like some sort of outsider watching the world turn while I was stuck inside a car driving from the restaurant to various houses without much contact with any body past "hi" and "bye". I loved it
Hey man everybody loves the pizza guy. I mean you bring the pizza👍
@@thomasgreen1557 yea people would hand me $5 all night long
You were just a pizza relocation specialist nothing more
@@nittygritty7503 haha u just made my Thursday internet philosiphizer
Kids thinking they’re edgy because they deliver pizza
When you’re talking about Travis not going to the police, I. 1970s NYC not only was there a social code agaisnt talking to police. But the police were notoriously corrupt and regarded as useless. They probably would’ve even took bribes from the pimps. It doesn’t excuse Travis but it helps explain why he doesn’t go to the police
With the operation being as brazen and open about it as they were, this was likely what was going on.
Pedophilic prostitution is sure to get taken care of, that’s ridiculous. Everyone hates children getting abused the prostitution ring would’ve been taken down
@@lukeveon4282 you really don’t know much about the way cops really are, do you? Majority of kiddie diddling rings are run BY those same police.
I mean what ur saying literally excuzes Travis. In dat case there is nuthin wrong with what he did. His overall character is a different story considering he tried assassinating the presidential nominee, but there’s nuthin evil about what he did with the pimps.
@@lukeveon4282 sad u actually think that, oftentimes, especially back then, police were even involved in those rings. u don’t rlly believe the justice system cares, do u? explain the countless amount of abused children who had to save themselves??
The assessment of the Iris situation is so weird.
“He could have went to the police.”
So could have anyone else, in fact: a good number of people probably did already.
It seems like the morality of the situation was brought into question only to make a weird statement about Travis being slightly evil, not because it makes sense.
Calm down
@@dlz190 at no point do I ese caps lock, exclamation, etc.
Seems like you need to calm down and stop assuming that you're some kind of main character.
@@Jaaaa315 calm down
@@marusthegoat No need to get mad, bro
@@Renan-kn4dg No need to get mad
Travis is rather well adjusted this day and age.
If a robbber (he wasn't a thief) is pointing a loaded firearm at someone in the commission of a crime, deadly force is more than warranted. That wasn't murder.
Its crazy how many people are killed during robberies.
Maybe a cop should try to solve it without killing anybody, but a civilian should have the right to defend himself like Travis did in that situation.
The "right" thing to do would be to let it play out and hope for the best, but prepare for the worst. But that doesnt mean he did the "wrong" thing either.
Lots of robbers don't want to kill their victim, and they use unloaded guns. There's no way of knowing. Travis (or another bystander if a real situation) isn't the ultimate judge of the robber's life
@@waltchamberlain5165 the problem is when you go around pointing guns at people bad shit can happen. People frequently die, people end up in prison for life.
The robber instigated this entire situation by committing an armed robbery.
Travis Bickle was indeed a walking/living contradiction. But instead of doing something like killing a politician. He saves a girl from child prostitution and kills 3 men. So my viewpoint on that is this. Travis saved that girl from a fate worse then death and if she was more damaged but is still alive it is a lot better then her previous work.
Some times being the hero doesn't earn you the respect and admiration of people and there are many heroes who have died doing the right thing rather then doing nothing and that has earned them various types of reactions.
Because sometimes doing the right thing is a lot harder then doing nothing at all. I'm not freeing Travis Bickle from this because before he did his deed he wanted to commit political assassination and there was so many things that could've helped him even back then but he chose his path and the end result is what we got.
Here are my suggestion for your next video Vile Eye.
-El Sueno from Wildlands
-Griffith from Berserk
I think any case against vigilantism in general has to focus on the potential more than the outcome. The specific outcomes of Travis's actions can be debated; it is possible that in the end he caused more good than harm, though whether and to what degree that's true is ambiguous at best. However, even the most charitable interpretation of what he did falls short of providing a good justification for his taking things into his own hands. The police and the government have their problems--loads of them--but leaving justice up to every random nut on the street would be far worse, and I'm sure you would agree that Travis is about the last person you'd trust as a reliable purveyor of justice.
@@Kylopod Yes I agree. But I still stand with what I said about saving that girl's life. But that is why he became a polarizing character. Would he be a purveyor of true justice(that time yes) but later on hell no. Like you said it is about the potential then the outcome that might come to pass. That is why VE pointed out all of the other choices Travis could've made but he choose not to and well.
He didnt DECIDE to not kill a politician (who was running for president, with serious chances of getting elected), he COULDNT.
@@Jose-se9pu yep exactly. He didn't opt to not do it, he was unsuccessful in it.
Travis was not a hero. Nor do I think 'evil' is a good word for him, the deep dive into his psyche that this movie is is too complex for such descriptors. Everything he did was about a *story* he told himself wherein he was the hero who brings retribution to the 'scum' who antagonise him and dies righteously, like a Western with a climactic shootout - it should be beyond clear that what he did was not out of genuine concern for Iris the moment you see his intention to blow his own brains out in front her as she screams in terror and leave her alone in a room of dead bodies.
When you say her life as child prostitute was 'a fate worse than death' - that reflects paternalistic mores about innocent young virginal girls shared by Travis himself ('that's not what a person does..') than any real empathy. Neither you nor Travis ever sought to understand just why she would rather be where she was than at home with her parents - who clearly don't empathise with her either, as long as she's doing the right thing and going to school things are good in their eyes. Travis didn't do her any good, he compounded whatever trauma she was already dealing with to the moon and back.
He's not evil because he's literally me and I'm not evil
based+same
People who saying this man is evil doesn't know how our feels 😮
Lot of people saying Travis isnt really evil, and I think theres a point there, at the start of the movie, we're watching an anti social man with relatable problems but by the end, we're not. Were watching a deranged vigilante who answers to nobody trying to kill people for his own morality. He doesn't do it out of a genuine care for society, he does it because he can't kill all of society, which disgusts him. Even the "good" actions he does are motivated by his own violent impulses and disgust for the world. Maybe he could've been a good person but he ends up doing some pretty horrible things. He is evil. He just ended up taking out his violence on people that were also evil
Travis is an anti-hero, not a villain. He has good and evil inside of him, just like all of us. Just because someone is suffering from mental health issues doesn't mean they are evil. Evil is about intent. Travis's intent was always good.
He went into that on walts video
Though it's worth noting most people can justify any action to themselves as "the right/good thing to do" and rarely see their own actions as "Evil." Travis convinced himself that he was providing a public service by killing them and their lives weren't important. Those pimps could've been convinced that they're providing a public service, that Iris' life wasn't important.
"Some of the worst things imaginable have been done with the best intentions"
He's a sympathetic villain at best. Very far from an anti-hero. There is nothing heroic about Travis harming himself and killing other people.
Exactly right.
I don't agree that 'evil' is at all a helpful word for understanding his psyche, but I think anyone thinking his intent and motivations were ever anything resembling 'good' is simply misunderstanding the character. Tends to happen a lot with 'badass' characters who get admired for the wrong reasons
There’s a little Travis bickle in all men.
And in some, more than others.
12:55 Sums it up perfectly. Recently it almost feels like we're actively trying to manufacture more people like Travis.
😎
That lonely dark place we all have deep in our souls. It's scary.
Nope. Only in those who have problems that they need help in dealing with.
Yeah, I agree with others that Travis is NOT evil. He is a desperately lonely and troubled person, but not "evil" But the ending was perfect because it showed how if he would have killed the senator, he would be seen as evil, but through fate, he killed real bad guys and was instead seen a hero. I think some people "want" Travis to be seen as evil because of his stalking like behavior towards the main female, which is why they floated the idea the ending was all a dream. But the ending was perfect not only because it examines what society sees as "evil" but also commented on NYC at the time. Taxi Driver is a great movie on many levels, and one of the levels is encapsulating the disgust people had in the mid to laye 19070's with how dirty and crime ridden cities were. And it is happening again .
Wow that look back into the mirror at the end was always jarring but I never considered it was an indication that the cycle might start again. Brilliant! Thanks for the insight!
"I can't tell if the world is good or evil. I just know a lot of people leave their garbage, rather than take it with them."
- Unknown
I disagree about the Iris stuff.Wizard gave him the good advice to "Go get laid." Hormones mess with young men and getting laid helps abate their affect. He was attracted to her, but ONCE she told him her real age he realizes he can not sleep with her. She is not the young adult he thought she was, but rather an underage girl and a victim. Biology takes a back seat and Travis' morality takes over. He is not an animal. He will not give in to his base desires like Sport's customers.
Yeah that act alone shows me his true self more than any killing, some ppl need killed.
If he’s not an animal stop treating him like one. Getting laid won’t make his situation any better.
@@hydrodudes5135 Sure it will. Men get backed up and they put too much thought into women's opinions of them instead of loving themselves for who they are. If one gets laid it puts a stopper in that negative self torture, because you don't care what lil miss blonde super crotch thinks, because the "P" no longer has that power over you, till the back up occurs.
@@damionepsilon4737 Travis didn't go to help to be a good person, it was all self indulgence
@@reservoirfrogs2177 So what? If you give a homeless man some money because it makes you feel good, that doesn't take away from your good deed. Travis killed a couple of pimps, and returned a young girl to her family. Who cares if he did it for himself or not? The act is good regardless
You have a thoughtful and thorough analysis of these characters. I enjoy your content a lot.
I think the most interesting thing about taxi driver is how it touches on issues that are still prevalent today. For example, men feeling lonely and atomized as well as the negative effects of consuming adult entertainment. This movie was so ahead of its time.
'the negative effects of consuming adult entertainment' - if anything it highlights why having porn on your computer for whenever you need it is so much better than watching it in a theatre.
I think the "war vet" angle of Travis is always overlooked in it's importance. He's a man who probably did very well in that violent escenario and when taken out of it, he's left with no way to acomodate and relate to his new context.
I say this because of how important Ford's "The Searchers" is to Martin Scorsese, John Wayne's character in that movie having that same element, and in relation with Travis' cowboy motiff.
This is a concept the Punisher comics by Garth Ennis bring up frequently, that maybe Frank Castle always had murderous intent but was looking for a valid excuse to lash out at the world.
Cowboy outfit is because Travis might be from rural area originally. Just compare what he is wearing throughout the film and what the others around him are wearing. That would also make sense in a context of him being vs city narrative
I consider this so called “evil” as a Chaotic Neutral.
So just cuz im curious, who then would fall under chaotic evil?
@@derekpinsonnault2902 joker from the dark night maybe?
Chaotic Neutral is definitely very fitting for Travis. Chaotic in a sense that he follows a type of ambiguous idea of justice brought on by his trauma, and is not based on a strict code (lawful) but rather his emotion and said trauma, making it impossible to pin down a set of rules he lives by. Neutral in a sense that it is, again, morally ambiguous whether or not what he is doing is truly good OR evil. He truly BELIEVES what he is doing is nothing short of heroic, but it is clear there were alternatives with better outcomes.
Thing is, he has the *desire* to do good. His trauma and mindset hold him back, and with the right help could be a truly "good" person, albeit likely still a chaotic loose-cannon type, but with a clear head. It's a sad reality that your typical idea of cops and the justice system actually working the way it's intended is a pipe-dream, and people like Travis are an unfortunate necessity to be the real driving forces in removing the scum of the world, if there were someone to ACTUALLY HELP get Travis' head on straight, he could go about doing good in a much better manner.
Or Neutral Evil. He's acting with is own moral standards out of selfishness and frustration. And those are basically the worst kind of evilish character you can find, they're the most unpredictable kind of evil you'll find.
Dudes not a D & D character
This movie really hurts to watch. How much I can relate to this, when suicide stops looking like a proper solution everything outside of you seems like the problem. Who knows? Maybe it could actually be. I have only seen this film once as an adult not too long ago, and seen the parallels between me and Travis and lost my sh*t. I still fell lonely af. Still feel bitter, and my time in the military caused me to see absolutely no future, in which I could trust others, even enough to form a friendship. Finding myself abusing Pot here and there to forget everything and hide a future I either don't deserve, or am too far gone to achieve. Where my healthiest days are the one where I hate the most and my unhealthiest are the ones where I am passive and docile to even care (gradual suicide). I find my sober days, the ones where I am prone to killing some one for saying to right or wrong thing to me depending on where I am at mentally that day, are the days I would rather have to myself. At least I'm not killing myself those days.
The lesson I learned from this movie is its really hard to get a grip the longer you are prone to severe loneliness, especially when you actually try not to be isolated. (It's why suicide looks so good). for me its a lesson in just maintaining terms with reality and knowing you are not the only one walking this earth and your actions can affect others more than you think. While I gave up on trying to make friends a while ago, I want to get back into it. I'm not at all as dense as Travis, sadly I find living in gentrified Brooklyn as a Black man with all these yuppies doesn't really help as I feel even more isolated even with people around.
My best friends are my dog and this tree I practice my boxing on every now n then. I still have the tiniest bit of envy for someone who can without hesitation just take their own life.
This movie hurts to watch.
Keep pushing you can get through this I feel the same way but I put all my focus towards a goal and I dedicate every day towards it
@@timmy5563 Thanks, I'm trying as well. Appreciate ya.
It's all a fuckin dice roll. Could've been born into a third world country where you're lucky to eat once a day, could've been born as a billionaire's son and never have to worry about working a day in your life. Some sort of a sick joke.
You sound so chill, can relate to everything u said.
Please consider stepping into a boxing gym. If you find the right people, be consistent and give yourself an actual chance when shit gets really tough, it will get better eventually. Blessings, brother.
The narrator has such a high sense of morality its honesty disgusting, so incredibly biased, he actually trust his government, laughable.
This the type of guy that thinks everything that's illegal is just immoral, good job little drone.
@@theguy3500 Yeah. I've watched his other videos. Putting a bit too much emphasis on your local cops. Sometimes you need to do the dirty work.
It's finally here! Now, Scorsese has two movies analyzed by The Vile Eye.
What was the first tho?
We now need one on Tommy DeVito from Goodfellas
@@yungpihov6610 max Cady (Cape Fear)
Truly one of Scorsese’s greatest accomplishments.
Oh it's a scorsese movie? Nice. Gotta watch it
Sorry, but no. Given New York in the 1970's, Travis' action to kill the pimps was great. Law enforcement of the time would have done nothing useful.
Couldn't he have joined the police himself in order to gain the power to send them to prison?
@@Zephyr_UhhYou simply must be a sheltered child to ask such a naïve question like that.
@naka Operation Gladio fed.
@@Zephyr_Uhh Guns work better. The system is the problem.
Yup there’s a reason the New York vigilante was considered a hero at the time.
"waaaaa, the movie hero killed to many pedos, thats so evil"
HOLD L.
Wow media literacy is dead. Holy fuck…
@@marlom7882 Nah, I'm just not gonna value the opinions of people too weak of will to make a moral judgement on anything. It is a waste of time to appreciate weak willed opinions driven from fearful morons.
Grow a spine and hate blatant evil.
That's all you've got from the film? Lol
Intentions of Travis matter, and his intentions were selfish and filled with blood-lust
@@JudgeHolden2003 Hating evil is a good intention. Destroying evil is a good action. Being fearful to get your own hands dirty is just being submissively evil.
@@coldeed he really just wanted to have someone to shoot at. Remember the Easy Andy scene? Travis was pointing his gun at random Ladies on the street from behind the window. He also wanted to assasinate Palantine because Betsy dumped him, despite knowing nothing about Palantine himself. He also tried to blow his brains out in front of Iris which would give her immense trauma, which shows he doesn't care much about her.
Travis is not a hero at all, more like an unstable maniac.
”that says loneliness has followed him his whole life which tells us hes been a loner his entire life”
I’d say from a legal standpoint, it is a stretch calling the armed robbery killing murder. Don’t know how 70s NYC law stood, but at least nowadays, someone pulling a deadly weapon out even just to rob is grounds for justifiable self defense.
He probably wasn't licensed to own or carry a handgun in NY. He couldn't have been charged for murder for shooting an armed robber, only for unlawful possession.
Subway Vigilante
@@cristianespinal9917 Back then, it was near painless to get a license in NYC.
@@sadsenmmxvi Yeah, I don’t think vile eye really knows how much of a shitshow NYC was especially in the 70s when the city basically went broke. Hell this movie and “the warriors” are basically documentaries.
@@spacemarinechaplain9367 definitely has a lot of faith in law enforcement at the time. Try telling a cop in NYC in the 70s that you know where a pimp is, like that’s unique information. The dude wasn’t hiding, he literally stood outside on the corner. There were a lot of problems going, the Bronx was on fire. A 12 year old being tricked may have just not been that high on the list.
You should do Tony Soprano. One of the most interesting and despicable characters on television, but we can still find ourselves rooting for him.
He’s stated that video is happening
He wasn't necessarily evil per say, but very misunderstood and socially awkward.
I've never in my whole life thought of him as evil.
Because hes not, we need more travis bickles
Troubled man, but not evil
@@mjc4073 What? Mentally ill vigilantes who aim to kill politicians, and take it out on criminals only when they fail?
I have...he tried to murder a presidential candidate. That is evil.
@@mjc4073 oh no we dont
Loneliness is a prison cell without walls.
Replaced with human society
That moment when you realize Travis is the good guy of the story.
Sport/Charles rain is the actual true bad guy/villain
How???
@@ayaelayoubi2007 his intentions of clearing the filth is good, but his actions are inexcusable. He is an antihero type of character
Nope
You missed the entire point of the film if you call him the good guy of the story.
I would describe Travis Bickle as more of an antihero than a true villain.
Same man i agree with you 100%
Vile Eye analyzes Travis Bickle
Travis: You Talking’ To Me?
I love how Travis resists being forced on a moral archetype of good or evil and makes us question just what kind of person he is, I guess it's because he's far too human
You're thinking of NY post-1980s. Back in the '70s New York was dirty, and a lot more fun according to some of the people who were there. You couldn't just turn up at a police station and report a pimp. They'd keep you there, listen to your story, and by the time you'd finished and walked round the corner, there would be the pimp and 4 of his friends to kick the shit out of you. Police corruption was beyond a joke back then.
If the law worked, Harvey Keitel wouldn't be there hawking his wares on a busy urban street. Everyone must have known there was a brothel there, at least anyone who wanted to know, how else would they get customers? And yeah even child sex, back then, wasn't seen as horrifying as it is now, at least not for older teenagers. People used to tell jokes about it.
As for Scorsese in the the back of the cab ready to fire his pistol up his wife's tuppence, Travis is clearly scared for his life the whole time. He's constantly trying to think of a way out. Afterward, it's just one more example of what a pit of scum and lunacy society is, to Travis. He isn't encouraged. Scorsese's motivation is petty revenge and bloodlust, he's fascinated by what might happen when you stick a gun up where one might otherwise keep one's chewing gum. Travis sees himself as a sort of independent-operator cop. Because the cops are corrupt, and any good ones are bound with red tape. Travis already knows where the scum lives, so he tools up, and goes to fix the problem like a plumber bringing a wrench.
Travis sees it as necessary work, though he's also motivated by guilt, as well as horror and sympathy, at Iris's case. He's gonna do a bit of cleaning up the streets, as a moral and necessary act, that might inspire society to pull it's socks up.
Of course, he's a nutcase, that goes without saying. But this is what I think his main motive is, in his own opinion.
He wasn’t lying about being in the Marines during the end of the movie when it shows the newspaper clippings on the wall they confirm he was in the Marines and served in Vietnam and was honorably discharged
Robert Pattinson’s character from Good Time would be a pretty good episode.
When he gives that dude a monster dose of acid, It’s the most evil thing I’ve ever seen. That dude would be fucked for life from that.
@@jamesgatz5301
To be fair, that was ray that did that.
@@jamesgatz5301 seriously this! And it broke my heart because that security officer was just some immigrant trying to do his best
@@GigaChadh976 oh shit I got that part mixed up. Either way that’s super fucked. Awesome name btw.
.
Really evil, yeah, killing a pimp who sells children and some johns 😂
But that's the whole point, just the fact that he ends up doing something good doesn't negate the fact that at his core he's not a very good person. He still has very fucked up views by the end of the movie and was entirely prepared to straight-up murder a politician. That's the irony in the movie that people only see him as a hero from their limited perspective. While the movie may not have entirely condemned him, I definitely don't see Travis Bickle and go "what a stand up guy, I want to be just like him" and I really don't think Scorsese intended that either.
This man just watched the end of the movie without any context and decided to post a comment
@@Despair505I use to dislike travis at first time see him
Now I know travis was right
Morally speaking Travis Bickle is not evil.
Di Niro played him so well. From the first scene in this movie I could feel that there was something about Travis that wasn't right. I wouldn't call him a total bad guy, at least not naturally. But even before seeing it, you could see that there was something about him that I didn't trust. I put it down to Di Niros mannerisms as the character. That's such a testament to his acting ability. Before I'd even seen him say a word, I could tell he was a shady guy. Hats off to RDN
The market scene is something I’ve always comeback to every once in a while with my friends. While the point vile eye made is definitely solid and one I agree with, my friend made this interesting argument: if you’re holding someone at gun point, you’re committing to taking someone’s life, regardless of whether you pull the trigger or not. Under those circumstances, you are also in a position to be killed. Whether it’s self defense or an act of protection from someone else. Putting yourself in a situation like that is entirely your fault and the consequences can be your final one. Sorta like the saying, you play stupid games you win stupid prizes.
I beg to differ. If a man is pointing a gun at another man and making demands, you are totally justified in killing that man. You think he's going to lower his gun once he gets the money? Why? Because he said so? Sorry, it doesn't work that way in the real world. In the real world, if somebody is pointing a gun at somebody else, and you have a gun yourself, take the shot.
According to Scorsese, the film is not an analysis of evil, but of loneliness.
This character is hard, as we have to keep in mind that New York in that time was vastly different from what it is today. While I do admit that Travis lacks self reflection, his worldview isn't wrong(at least in regardsto his city). I don't consider him evil, nor do I think he was unjustified in his actions,specifically the actions that he in the end decided to take. As you said, if he would've engaged in assassination, he would've been villainous, full stop. However his choice to go after the pimp puts him much more in a anti hero category.
I think that there is something to be said about someone who is struggling so bad with mental illness, yet decides to engage in an activity that is less anti social and destructive than originally intended. It doesn't make it right, but it does make me wonder if that was the beginning of reflection for Travis.
I will have to rewatch the film again sometime soon to refresh myself . That scene with the passenger tailing his cheating wife messed with me the first time lol
I also think his actions only make more sense taking into account his past, he isn’t a lonely person in a big city, but a soldier left behind that hasn’t fully left the battlefield.
@@Nostalg1a especially considering how the government didnt (and still doesnt) really give proper care to veterans.
Travis is pretty much a 70s incel
Wtf is an incel? Damn internet people gotta word for everything.
@@scottv9667 an incel stands for involuntarily celibate. Basically somebody who can't get laid, usually because of a combination of being socially awkward, don't shower, are loners, have high opinions of themselves, and feel like people owe them something like attention or sex
would love to see an episode on "Angel Eye's" from "The Good, The Bad, and The Ugly"
or even "Tuco"
All three leads of the film have their own level of wickedness. In a way the title is more like "the not-as-bad the bad and the ugly". The setting influences the morality of the characters, being the rough and tough wild west. Even Angel Eyes has his own set of rules and finds the war to be foolish (in a deleted scene he surveys a camp of dead and gravely wounded soldiers and shakes his head in disgust). Tuco's label of "ugly" isn't so much a remark of his looks but his personality, bouncing back and forth between awful and sympathetic. Blondie, while the least evil of the three, is still a contract bounty hunter and does the most killing in the film. The wild west makes heroes and villains of everyone, depending on what kind of day it is.
I personally think tuco would be a better one as there is more screen time of tuco and we know more about him for a more in depth analysis. Was always my favorite in the movie even though he is objectively a despicable criminal he is still so likeable (mostly thanks to Eli’s portrayal IMO) but still I think he was the most interesting character
@@hogansmith7075 I agree. Eastwood and Van Cleef’s characters pretty much take a backseat to his story and development.
Ironically the projection of "evil" onto Travis is part of what makes him who he is.
He moves the rear-view mirror away from his own reflection because he cannot or will not look at himself, only the world around him.
I watched this movie a while back. It hit home in a lot of ways. I'm a veteran and I've had a bad upbringing. One of the main reasons I joined the military was to make something of myself in order to combat my awkwardness, poor education, and overall weakness. I've always struggled to fit in but on many occasions I've separated myself from possible situations where I very well could've fit in. Alcohol has always been an issue for me. I stick to my fitness routine and it helps. I refuse to blame others for my issues. My thought process often says otherwise. I always tried not to be "that guy." An Incel. I can go on but that's enough.
hang in there g
Thank you for your efforts & your service
Which branch? I was Army.
What’s your workout routine?
"I refuse to blame others for my issues" ⇔"I've had a bad upbringing." ?
I hope you stick to your fitness routine. Fitness is great
@@TimothyTakemoto I am, I've been on the wagon for almost 2 weeks so far. I'm not counting the days this time. Main reason is my health. Just one drink causes me to get alcoholic gastritis.....or at least I hope that's what it was. Plus my chest would get inflamed. So my body told me to stop and I'm gonna listen. I love fitness......fucking love it. Best feeling in the world.
Probably one of the best written characters in cinema. Every time you watch Taxi Driver you notice something different and that's truly amazing filmmaking.
It's not analyzing, it's analyzizing
Thanks for making this Vile Eye!
When I watched this and then the Joker, I couldn’t help but notice how similar the two storylines actually are.
You should also watch The King of Comedy, another Scorsese movie!
The joker film even has Robert deniro play Murray in it, I think they made the joker movie similar to taxi driver as a sort of love letter to it and king of comedy, Auther even has a similar jacket to travis in the beginning of the film.
They cited this movie when making the Joker.
some scenes in joker imitate scenes from taxi driver
I’m gonna do a triple feature then. I hope I don’t get corrupted. 😄
I've been waiting for ages for this one. I'd like to request the ship from "event horizon"I think we all know what it's about but I would love your take on it.
Agreed big time!
Ohhh, good one!
Oh snap, good one
Basically analyzing chaos and the warp
Oooh that would be awesome 😎
Travis did not murder the store robber, the robber clearly pointed his revolver at Travis, making clearly a justifiable homicide.
he didnt have to shoot him lethally
@GreeneggsandArkham from a society that made him one
A justified murder
Murder is homicide that is Illegal, self defense has never been illegal in the US, And this was clearly justified, so, no it is not murder, which is, again, illegal homicide.@@kainkong274
@@Anonymous-xq5cs Lol in 70's NYC, get outta here. It was kill or be killed.
I like how the modern form of "laws and justice" in America is the golden word and doing anything that's not part of the structure planned by fallible people is considered evil, immoral or vigilante esk.
I always found a lot of similarities with Taxi Driver and parts of The Watchmen comic. Rorschach is like a more extreme version of Travis Bickle, even the way NYC is depicted and the use of colours remind me of the dreary atmosphere in this movie
They're also both narcissistic assholes who blame everyone and everything else for shortcomings while never really looking in the mirror (Rorshach just ignoring the Comedian attempting to rape Laurie's mom, for example). One of the saddest things about Watchmen is how people on the internet idolize Rorschach when Alan Moore literally wrote his character to make fun of the hypocrisies in Objectivism and Steve Ditko characters like Mr. A. Oh well, an artist can never know or control exactly how people relate to their work. You're right though that there is a lot of overlap in the two characters.
I remember seeing an easter egg in one of those Watchmen prequel comics, where Rorschach takes a cab and it's Travis driving.
@@TheCyanSqueegee
Watchmen always struck me as an out of touch old man's embittered pisstake of the super hero genre, as all the characters are funhouse-mirror parodies of established figures; Nite Owl is Batman if he was broken and impotent, Comedian is Captain America if he was a violent sociopath, and Rorschach was a deliberate attack on Ditko and his politics. The novel was a good read the first time around, but after a few reads you see just how petty Moore was being in the telling.
@@chesterstevens8870 I can't argue against anything you said. I just really enjoy Watchmen for its artistic aspects and I think it raises interesting questions in its story, but I say this as a relative outsider to the superhero genre, so perhaps I am a bit naive. I think it really works as a perfect encapsulation of the end of the cold war era, and the way the storyline is woven kept me engaged all the way through. I understand your perspective, though.
@@TheCyanSqueegee Rorshach only ignored the rape because he knew that it would result in Laurie being born it was actually high iq and justified. Also Rorshach did nothing wrong, he needed to eat Owl mans beans cause he was hungry. If my mom was a literal prostitute I probably would adopt similr views towards women and sex.
I can relate to Travis on so many levels. The self-made loneliness, Lying about non-important things and the disgust I see around and within myself. I'm not gonna buy firearms and go on a rampage though.
*3 weeks later* “BREAKING NEWS: a gunman by the name of Kimmo Laine was seen murdering…”
@H Man shhh, we might get arrested too at this point
U guys... :)
Edgelord
@@3ssgg415
>NOOOO I MUST BE POSSITIVE, I CANT COMPLAIN ABOUT ANYTHING OR EXPRESS MY REAL FEELING OTHERWISE ILL BE CALLED EDGELORD
are you the type that doesnt like seeing criticism and only mindless bootlicking ?
Love the analysis but you made me laugh when you said he should go the police in 1970s nyc . The cops for sure were on the take back then lol
Dumb take, funny how Vile Eye conveniently leave out how the robber is pointing a gun at the owner and becoming increasingly agitated at his unmeetable demands being unmet. Sitting on your hands and thinking "well maybe the robber won't shoot him" is not the ethical decision to make. Not defending travis either - he's obviously very poorly socialized and has a lot of uncontrolled issues, and is a danger to society and himself, but he's not evil.
exactly, sitting on your ass is usually worse than doing something. idle hands are the devil's plaything and all that, travis did the right thing killing the robber regardless if the robber had no intention to kill the owner or if say the gun was empty or it was fake travis had no way of knowing that and acted correctly according to the circumstances.
I don't think Travis was wrong for shooting the store thief. Travis met him with the same level of force. The guy had a gun, and deadly force was definitely justified.
Definitely agree, once deadly force is in use it overrides whatever lesser crime there was, in this case theft.
There's a huge difference between a pickpocket & an armed robber.
yeah but travis is not a cop. he isn't qualified enough in that situation to make that call. Travis brandishing a firearm in that situation only escalates the potential for violence to break out. Putting other peoples lives at risk. If travis was to let the guy go, there most likely wouldn't be any harm done and the police could have maybe apprehended the store thief without any loss of life.
@@stippyme567 That what if shit doesn't really apply because the what if counter is just "what if the robber shot the clerk"
Self defense also applies to defending others, though in modern new york not so much.
@@missfire9480 It is statistically unlikely that the robber would have shot the clerk. Store robberies usually result in the mugger just running away with the cash. It would have been safer for travis to not intervene and let him get away then report to the police later.
@@stippyme567 have you looked into how NYPD responded to the armed robbery issue in this era?
Travis is not evil. Not in my book. Also, if you pull a gun on a store owner and try to rob him, and you get shot and killed, I for one, do not feel sorry for you one little bit.
Agreed. It's also worth noting that the robber is very likely going to shoot the clerk. He keeps demanding more money that the clerk doesn't have to begin with and getting more frantic and unpredictable as time passes. It's nearly guaranteed that he would have shot the clerk imo
He’s mentally unstable, which makes him very volatile to do something very bad
100% correct. Make stupid choices...
yeap, it might have been for the wrong reasons but he did the right thing at that time,
and that might have pushed him even more to do what he did afterwards in the movie.
I agree defending the store owner was a good idea and the guy did have it coming.
But holy shit legally speaking, that store owner is fucked.
He's gunna have to explain how he got shot with a gun that the store owner now has in his possession without him having a license to it. Then on top of that he beats the potentially still alive man with a pipe.
It's illegal to beat a corpse like that and if he was alive then technically he's now the murderer. Once you're on the ground and unable to act, it's up to you to NOT kill that person or bring further harm to them.
Like, there is no way that store owner isn't getting 15 years to life for that one.
The problem with this whole video is that it takes for granted that reporting crimes to the police would accomplish anything.
shit, i love amerimutts saying >"uhh, horrifying murder bad, evil person, he shouldve volunteered at insert_public_organisation_name or joined the insert_state_organisation_name"
what kind of submissive and state-loving sentence it is in my opinion, has appeal to authority in its core
Based
Minor details and they could be nothing but he had a Macv sog patch and a marine recon patch which where special ops units during Vietnam
Good catch. I don't think anything is minor with DeNiro and Scorcese.
Deffinilty worth mentioning.Macv Sog guys were the baddest of the bad in Vietnam
Look up John "Tilt" Stryker Meyers to get a sense of what these MACV-SOG guys were like. Badass is an understatement
I just looked at his patch and that's not a macv sog patch, it says king Kong company still cool
Looking forward to this, would love one on Micheal Corleone
Travis Bickle is not evil.
He is a antihero. He’s alone and lonely and cannot connect but he knows good, he know the filth and disease in the streets and sees the corrupt and he’s fed up of it all.
He’s fed up with being a social outcast and feeling like a loser.
Even how disturbed he is, he just wanted to become better, to be more. To find a purpose in his life.
He's an antihero for being scared off on killing the president and instead killing a bunch of pedophiles
He viewed “the world” as beneath him and he chose to inflict violence on others as his coping or self-empowering mechanism. Hes the prototype for many of today’s mass shooters. Similar to D-Fens. He refused to take responsibility for his own flaws and instead focused on finding a way to justify his desire for violent outbursts. He is a case study in the progression from “troubled” to “evil”. His most redeeming feature is that the movie ends when it does. We can “best case scenario” his trajectory because of that but realistically someone who went that deeply into their psychosis, got away with it, and even received social reinforcement for it is almost destined to get worse, not better.
@@MP-db9sw On politicians and pedo,litteraly peoples every body hate
the true technical term would in fact be anti-villain here.
He not evil for trying to kill the politician?
I appreciate your analysis, especially in regards to his early interactions with Betsy. However you lost me a little near the end. Taxi Driver is my favorite movie and I was intrigued by the idea of someone explaining the point of view that he’s evil, but I think you’re stretching it a little. The only thing Travis does that’s evil is conspire to assassinate Palatine out of a deranged delusional line of thinking. Does that make him truly evil or mentally ill? In regards to the vigilante killings you could argue that it’s morally wrong (which I disagree) but to go so extreme as to call it evil is using the term a little too loosely. That being said I did like the analysis overall.
It does seem like he's conflating extreme action with evil.
Conflating killing pedophiles with evil is ass backwards...
Regardless of one’s beliefs, almost every religion has religious sayings of how allowing evil is on par as being evil.
@@lostsaxon7478 that’s why he could’ve gone to the police station. Where’s the Bible say commit evil to stop evil? Nowhere
@@lukeveon4282 defending others is not considered evil, the Bible says nothing about pacifism. Quite the opposite, fighting for good is righteous.
@@lostsaxon7478 There was an ethical solution. He chose murder. He wasn't even defending someone the actions were really for himself. All he did was further traumatize her
His character reminds me of Holden from the book catcher in the rye. The self alienation, superiority complex over the rest of society, being highly judgemental and thinking they can clean up society. Martin was probably inspired from it.
I can see Holden living a lonely, New York life in his twenties and thirties.
But because he came from a upper middle class family he would be okay financially depending on what he decided to do as job.
I respectfully think you misunderstood Holden.
The only things they have in common are being lonely,judgemental and depressed.
Holden never really tries to hurt anyone,he's got a sister who loves him,grew up with money,and is also able to recognise some of his own flaws.
They aren't much alike.
@@superiorspidey3384 he does attempt to fight one guy but that guy was also a rapist so he isn’t exactly in the wrong there. Holden for the most part though doesn’t really hurt anyone and even by the end reforms quite a bit
@@plugshirt1762 we are basically saying the same thing.
Which rapist though?
I remember him throwing hands with his roommate but other than that..
@@superiorspidey3384 his roommate was a date rapist and Holden suspected he did something to the girl he was with who had a history of being sexually assaulted which is a large reason it upset him so much. Sexual abuse is something that comes up in every couple chapters in one way or another but for quite a few of the instances it is pretty easy to miss that that is the implication
17:30 The problem with your little solution that Travis didn’t make happen is that almost more than half of the cops in New York were corrupt during the 70’s and since Travis probably knew that he knew it was most likely the cops wouldn’t do a thing about the situation as always
I love how the movie Joker combined elements of taxi driver and king of comedy, and then actually put DeNiro in the movie too. They did a great job.