OnVideo DVD Briefs
BigStar DVDs


OnVideo Logo

DVD Brief: Taxi Driver

home page
calendar
reviews
widescreen
features
video
resources
video sales
links
video news
sell-through
kidvid
information




dujour
iway 500
winner


Good
& Associates logo

Masthead created by Good & Associates

Taxi Driver
Taxi Driver Collector's Edition

Columbia TriStar Home Video
1976
R
114 minutes
Widescreen 1.85:1
Soundtrack remastered in Dolby Digital 2.0 surround
Interactive menus
Closed-captioned
Subtitles: English, Spanish, Chinese, Korean, Portuguese, Thai
Extras: Theatrical trailer, photo montage/portrait gallery, storyboards, advertising materials, filmographies, interactive screenplay, documentary.
Suggested retail price: $24.95
Director: Martin Scorsese
Writer: Paul Schrader
Cast: Robert De Niro, Cybill Shepherd, Peter Boyle, Jodie Foster, Harvey Keitel, Albert Brooks

Description: Director Martin Scorsese's landmark film about loneliness, alienation, violence and the media's search for heroes gets the royal treatment here. Columbia TriStar has added enough goodies to keep film buffs preoccupied for hours with this tale of a psychotic taxi driver. In addition to the requisite filmographies, stills and advertising materials one has come to expect, there's a wonderful non-DVD-ROM screenplay link that lets you run through Schrader's non-continuity screenplay and quickly jump to the corresponding scene in the film (at any time during the film a click of the "title" function allows you to jump back to the screenplay) as well as a comprehensive 70-minute "making of" documentary that is just about the best we've ever seen.

The documentary features insightful interviews (illustrated with film clips) with Scorsese, De Niro, Foster, Boyle, Brooks, Shepherd, Keitel, Schrader, cinematographer Michael Chapman and make-up artist Dick Smith. There's a host of behind-the-scene's tidbits: Scorsese was urged by the producers to get more of a track record before tackling the film; De Niro bored Foster at numerous lunches to get her to act natural in their scenes together; Schrader befriended a prostitute to get more insights about the Foster role (the prostitute was in the film in an early shot, walking with Foster); Brooks had to play down his stand-up comic sensibilities to make his character more of a regular guy; De Niro, working in Italy on Bertolucci's "1900" at the time, flew back to New York on weekends, got a taxi license, and drove a cab to prepare for his role; Shepherd initially threw her script against a wall in disgust because she felt her role was too "small"; composer Bernard Herrmann at first didn't want to work on the film because he didn't "compose music about taxi drivers."

There's also an in-depth discussion with Chapman about the difficulties of filming many of the scenes (shot entirely on location in Manhattan), including how the crew took over and tore apart a dilapidated Brownstone for the bloody finale (in order to get an R-rating, the color in that sequence was desaturated to play down the color of blood). And Smith details the steps taken to create the effects of body parts and blood being blasted over the brownstone walls in an era well before computerized special effects. All-in-all, an impressive effort.

Image: Filmed entirely on location in Manhattan, the film oscillates from the bright-lit gleam of New York days to the inky black of the city's mean streets at night. The bright-colored glow of neon signs, car tail lights and stop lights reflect off the water-drenched streets and the rain splattered windshield and hood of Travis Bickle's cab. The famous opening scene -- of a cab slowly appearing out of a haze, sets the tone for the whole film. The color of these images are rendered tightly and accurately in this transfer, making the film a joyful vision to behold.

Sound: Bernard Herrmann's beautiful, jazzy score (he died two days after finishing work on the film), at times melodic, at times dissonant, both perfectly complements and counterpoints the action on the screen. The sound is two-channel stereo, with some effects bouncing to the side but for the most part centered on the screen.


All DVDs are screened on a reference Onkyo DV- S717 third-generation DVD player.



More Reviews
E-mail OnVideo
| Home | Resources | Features | VidNews | KidVid | Calendar |
| Sell-Through | Reviews | Links | Widescreen |


E-mail: mail@onvideo.org
© 1998, 1999 OnVideo. All rights reserved

(ISSN 1094-3676).