God's Lonely Man

God's Lonely Man (2007)

*** 1/2 (out of 4)

Terrific interview with writer Paul Schrader who takes us through his career leading up to writing TAXI DRIVER. It's funny but if you listen to Schrader, DeNiro or Scorsese they all share how they could connect with Travis in the film but seeing this featurette makes it quite clear that every part of Travis was Schrader. The writer goes into great detail about the personal troubles in his life and how a failed marriage and leaving AFI pretty much made him feel like Travis and this is where the character came from. There's some great early talk about how he was studying to be a critic and how he started to watch more off-the-wall films and how this opened his eyes as to what could be done in cinema. Thousands of articles and stories have been written on the making of TAXI DRIVER but fans will certainly love watching this because Schrader really gives one a terrific look at what he was going through and how this got transfered over to the big screen. The most interesting thing is seeing how Schrader talks about Travis because it's just like he's a real person. Schrader breaks down the screenplay, what was going on in Travis' mind and how most of Travis' thoughts are his very own. This could be the speech to the future President about cleaning up the streets or the stuff dealing with Jodie Foster's character selling herself off for someone else. Another terrific aspect has the writer going over his thoughts on why a writer shouldn't be on the set when filming begins. Schrader, once again, goes into great detail explaining why a writer's job is done as soon as the cameras begin filming. This featurette will certainly have you thinking about various aspects of the film the next time you watch it.