"Taxi Driver Wouldn't be Made Today" - Jodie Foster - Taxi Driver (1976) Discussion

[–] Melton (4666) a year ago

The idea that a film like Taxi Driver would get funded by a modern studio, screened across the world, sell any tickets, or even be appreciated by a normie audience today is absurd.

The attention span and sensitivity required to appreciate and enjoy a difficult, cold and challenging film like TD has almost entirely evaporated in this world of zombified smartphone-glued endorphin junkies.

Hollywood pumps out endless swill, crammed with insipid woke messaging 🤦🏻‍♂️🤦🏻‍♂️🤦🏻‍♂️

It’s a miracle that Scorsese is still going and cranking out amazing films, but he needs to make deals with streaming companies to get anything made, and he’s lucky if he gets a tiny theatrical window before they hit Netflix etc.

Soon he’ll be dead, along with Spielberg, Coppola and the other 70’s movie brats, and with Tarantino retiring… cinema’s days are numbered.

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[–] Kowalski (76209) a year ago

EVERYTHING GETS OLD...BEST NOT TO DWELL ON IT.

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[–] Melton (4666) a year ago

Another useless anti-film comment from this site’s resident predatory homosexual.

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[–] Kowalski (76209) a year ago

DUDE...THERE ARE GREAT MOVIES FROM THE 30'S TOO...WHO WATCHES THEM ANYMORE?...NOT MANY...TIME MARCHES ON...CLASSICS FADE A BIT...STYLES CHANGE...IT IS VERY TELLING THOUGH THAT TAXI DRIVER IS STILL CONSIDERED ONE OF THE GREATEST FILMS AND STILL GETS TALKED ABOUT QUITE REGULAR LIKE...

YOUR DEATH OF CINEMA BULLSHIT IS THE ACTUAL USELESS ANTI-FILM TROLLING.

P.S. IN MY LIFE I HAVE PURCHASED AND OWNED TAXI DRIVER ON VHS,DVD AND BLU-RAY...THREE SEPERATE PURCHASES SUPPORTING THE FILM...MOUTHING OFF DOESN'T MAKE YOU SPECIAL...JUST MOUTHY.

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[–] Melton (4666) a year ago

Yeah I won’t be taking advice about the dangers of ‘mouthing off’ from a bloviating narcissist who champions the death of cinema by constantly celebrating woke - the cancer that is killing cinema - and floods this site with vapid all-caps shite screaming about yourself in between flirting with male users.

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[–] Kowalski (76209) a year ago

YOUR DESCRIPTION OF ME IS GETTING CLOSER TO CORRECT...SO THAT'S PROGRESS...DO YOU COLLECT PHYSICAL MEDIA,MELTON?

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[–] Melton (4666) a year ago

Apologise for your disgusting behaviour and drop the caps to earn the right to discuss anything with me.

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[–] Kowalski (76209) a year ago

SETTLE FOR MEETING HALFWAY?...I AM TRULY SORRY FOR ANYTHING I HAVE SAID THAT YOU FOUND DISGUSTING...JUST KNOW IT WAS ALL SAID IN HUMOR AND FRIENDSHIP.💐

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[–] Melton (4666) a year ago

Apologise for your disgusting behaviour and drop the caps to earn the right to discuss anything with me.

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[–] Kowalski (76209) a year ago

DUDE...I ONLY POST IN CAPS...HAS BEEN FOR 25 YEARS...I AM MAKING HONEST GESTURES HERE...WORK WITH ME.

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[–] Melton (4666) a year ago

Piss off you dishonest, greasy, perverted POS. Stop clogging up these boards with your narcissistic vomit.

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[–] Tabbycat (878) 3 months ago

Why are you yelling?

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[–] Kowalski (76209) 3 months ago

STUBBED MY TOE?🤔

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[–] GenoWashingline (874) a year ago

If Taxi Driver was made today, describe what it would be like....

Personally here's my version...

1. Beginning...
Travis Buckle is a lovely but lonely lapsed Muslim guy from Mexico who emigrated to the USA from doing taxi work to save up for his sex change to become Mavis Buckle, and supported his 3 non binary non race kids

2. Middle...

(Still working on it).

3. End...

(Still Working on it)

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[–] Kowalski (76209) a year ago

🥱

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[–] Melton (4666) a year ago

Nailed it. Just need to work in an evil white man somehwere…

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[–] whynotwriteme (7725) a year ago

The Iris character is an underaged assigned-female-at-birth-person with gender dysphoria and the equivalent to the pimps are her own white parents named Kyle and Karen, who are trying to prevent her from having a sex change. Travis/Mavis raids their home and kills them both so Iris can go get the operation and become Ivan. Then Ivan and Mavis get married, despite Ivan still being underaged. Happiest Liberal ending ever!

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[–] Melton (4666) a year ago

Perfect 👏🏻

Only Leftists would consider a child being violently orphaned, sterilised, and having her developng tits cut off and a fake cock grafted on to her mutilated genitals… a happy ending.

Fucking demons.

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[–] roger1 (3703) a year ago

"Taxi Driver Wouldn't Be Made Today.' "Blazing Saddles Wouldn't Be Made Today." "Animal House wouldn't be made today."

True. On the other hand, they aren't being BANNED today. Just edited sometimes(they took the "n word" out of The French Connection."

Meanwhile, where we are: I found a quote -- a few years old -- from Seth Rogan - an example of today's movie comedy star -- in which he said "If you look at Animal House today, some parts of it are appalling." I would disagree with Seth Rogan on general principles -- I've seen The Green Hornet , and THAT was appalling -- but you can see his point: one of the gags in that movie was how one of the young college guys ended up having sex with a (very up for it) 14 year old girl.

Just as -- on the serious side -- Jodie Foster in Taxi Driver plays a -- what, 13-year old? -- hooker and is asked to say sexual things and START to DO sexual things and -- hey, it was disturbing THEN, but NOW it plays right into the take on "pedophilia" in Hollywood.

(my beef then -- with Jodie Foster and with the younger Linda Blair in The Exorcist -- was how sick it seemed to have recruited underaged actresses to perform those scenes but worse -- how those underage actresses WANTED those parts.

Eh...I don't know. That was THEIR problem -- the underage actresses with the voracious stage mothers who wanted those roles. Taxi Driver is still a great film, a deeply sick and disturbing film -- and light year's away from Old Man Scorsese's current work in sheer audacity and outrage of content.

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Quentin Tarantino, in his recent book "Cinema Speculations" (based on part in his actual FRIENDSHIP with Taxi Driver writer Paul Schrader) points out that in Schrader's original script for Taxi Driver, the pimp played by Harvey Keitel was African-American...the studio wouldn't allow that casting, demanded he be made white. Sayeth QT, "So don't go thinking that they were allowed to work in total freedom back in the 70s."

CONT

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[–] roger1 (3703) a year ago

But overall its very true: the movies of the 70's --roughly from the coming of the R and X rating in 1968 and the "feel good youth oriented movies" that came with Star Wars in 1977 -- have LOTS of movies that wouldn't be made today.

It was a "fever-dream" period in Hollywood. That R rating -- and sometimes that X -- gave Hollywood the freedom to go WILD with cussing(The Last Detail), with nudity, with sex(so often represented in non-consensual rape -- see A Cockwork Orange, Straw Dogs, Frenzy and for the guys -- Deliverance) We would now also get graphic scenes of vomiting(an act usually taking place off screen with no sound in earlier movies) and urinating and defecating (Military boss Martin Balsam gives orders to chaplain Anthony Perkins while sitting on the toilet in "Catch 22.") And scenes of castration. Taboos were shattered just to make sure to shatter them: Incest in Chinatown(CONSENSUAL incest) and man-on-man rape in Deliverance.

But eventually the fever broke. A lot of those movies didn't make much money really -- the R and X kept people out and the sick content didn't help. TV executives took over the studios and cut the contracts on the 70's directors(who were very influenced by European films with documentary technqiues.) Spielberg and Lucas led the youth-based 80s.

And here we are.

CONT

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[–] roger1 (3703) a year ago

I think one definite aspect of the 70's movies that needed to go -- and for the most part HAS gone -- were all the rape scenes. Time has shown that a lot of those movies were made by men -- Peckinpah and yep even ol' Mr. Scorsese(in his taxi cab tirade in Taxi Driver) who seemed to be getting off on making pretty young actresses enact these scenes for them(Peckinpah pretty much bullied Susan George into doing the Straw Dogs rape scene because "I gave you the role because you promised you'd do it!) Even REALLY old man Alfred Hitchcock put a long and graphic rape scene in his Frenzy of 1972 -- and had his rapist strangle the victim to death , to boot. Good riddance to all that.

Here in 2024, there are SOME movies that push the envelope. Poor Things evidently has lots of consensual sex in it, enacted by an actress (Emma Stone) quite willing to enact it. And Tarantino , with one film left in him, has bragged that he has been allowed to put pretty much whatever he wants in HIS movies -- ultra violence, the "n word" (though in Django Unchained, his biggest hit, the black hero kills all the white men who say it), a scene of rape in Pulp Fiction(white man rapes black man under duress of torture) and in The Hateful Eight a scene of rape of a different sort(A black man demanding fellatio from a white man under duress of torture.)

But for the most part, the 70s are long behind us, those movies aren't coming back in any large volume(Tarantino swears he only has one film in him}, it is the age of Marvel and DC and...no, Taxi Driver wouldn't be made today.

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[–] Boromir (10059) a year ago

Until you mentioned it, I didn't notice that they filmed a lot of rape scenes in the seventies. I can only imagine how difficult it is for the actress, and actually also for the actor who plays the rapist, to film such a scene. In the seventies, there were fewer boundaries and rules of ethics regarding the filming of rape scenes. I know from two of my females friends who have been raped that such scenes can be triggering. So I am glad that they filmed fewer scenes like this. But remember, we are talking about storytelling about the human race, and not all stories are happy. Unfortunately, rape is not uncommon among the human race. So if the directors want to depict a story about a woman who gets raped, they have the Freedom of Expression to do it, like they did in the "Game of Thrones" series (personally, I wouldn't have the heart to film such a difficult scene). It's just important to film the scenes in a sensitive manner while fully considering all participating parties. Something that probably didn't happen during the 1970s when the directors loves to abuse the cast members and especially the females.

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[–] roger1 (3703) a year ago

Until you mentioned it, I didn't notice that they filmed a lot of rape scenes in the seventies.

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Yes, they did. I saw some of those films on release, and read/heard about many more. I'm not sure you can say that EVERY movie had rape, but too many did.

Sometimes the act was shown. Other times, simply referenced. (In Dirty Harry, we are TOLD that the psycho killer raped his murder victim, and we see her nude body -- no rape shown, but as CONTENT in the film -- it was there.)

I recall a story about Barbra Streisand asking for copy of the then-new movie Deliverance to be delivered to her home for a personal screening: She said "I want to see a movie where a man gets raped, for a change." So SHE was aware of the trend.

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I can only imagine how difficult it is for the actress, and actually also for the actor who plays the rapist, to film such a scene.

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I am a Hitchcock buff, and so I read an interview with Barry Foster, an obscure British actor who played the rapist-strangler in Frenzy(1972). He said that he and the actress who played his victim -- another near-unknown named Barbara Leigh-Hunt (Hitch HAD to use unknowns in this film -- Michael Caine turned down the rapist-killer and Glenda Jackson turned down the victim) sat down with each other and discussed the need to remain professional and focussed elsewhere during the scene. "We had to hold our stomachs," said Foster. Foster said the horrifying sequence took three days to film -- I'm guessing one day for the preliminary arguing and taunting leading up to the rape; one day for the rape; and then one day for the strangling. Anyway, here was an actor discussing how hard it was to film such a scene. However, though critic David Thomson said the rape-strangling scene was "exploitative of the actress," Leigh-Hunt later said she actually had no problem enacting the scene, saying "we had to see exactly what this killer was capable of."

CONT

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[–] roger1 (3703) a year ago

At the end of the day, Frenzy didn't make the money that "lighter" Hitchcock classics like Notorious, Strangers on a Train, Rear Window, To Catch a Thief and North by Northwest did --Hitchcock paid a price for going "hard R," but I guess he felt he had to "join the crowd' in 1972, prove he wasn't an old guy. And yes, Psycho was a huge hit with sordid material and that shower stabbing of a naked woman, but not nearly as graphic as Frenzy.

CONT

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[–] roger1 (3703) a year ago

In the seventies, there were fewer boundaries and rules of ethics regarding the filming of rape scenes.

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Evidently. You had a mix of macho man directors(or even non-macho men like Hitchcock) with this new "freedom of the screen," you had hungry young actresses looking to make it in the business(I'd say that often it was unknown or non-star actresses who played these scenes) and a kind of "swinging free love" backdrop that could convince the players that this was just make believe and sex on film was "in"

There was a story reported about macho Sam Peckinpah screaming at actress Susan George to do the rape scene she said she would do and the refused to do. She gave in. The results are on screen and memorable but that movie doesn't get shown a lot anymore. (A remake in the 2000s was a flop, I've never seen it but I'll guess the rape scene wasn't nearly as detailed.)

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I know from two of my females friends who have been raped that such scenes can be triggering.

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Now there's a trigger warning worth having. I can't imagine.

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So I am glad that they filmed fewer scenes like this.

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And I tell ya, though I for some years have championed loving, consensual sex scenes as a good bet(loving, consensual sex is a great part of adult life), I must admit I'm starting to figure even THOSE scenes require some coercion of the actress, and even the actor (one known, married actor says he has a policy of not kissing actresses on screen -- it has lost him some roles.)

All that said, we seem to have hundreds of hot women voluntarily putting themselves on OnlyFans(beats waitressing, I guess) and the porn industry will always be its own world with its own "consent."

i dunno...maybe just a good sensual AND consensual KISSING scene is the best we should sanction these days, though even then -- imagine THAT job, if you are married. Go to the office and get hot and heavy with someone not your spouse, and then go home. Acting is a bizarre profession.

CONT

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[–] roger1 (3703) a year ago

But remember, we are talking about storytelling about the human race, and not all stories are happy. Unfortunately, rape is not uncommon among the human race.

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Well, that's sadly true and ever thus throughout history. As I post this, rape is being reported as an almost natural "act of war battle" in the Middle East and Eastern Europe. Those of us who live in calmer climbs should thank the heavens its not a daily part of OUR lives.

And so, SOME movies (particularly perhaps those with a real or ficitionalized sense of "long ago history) can justifably show rape as part of that horror.

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So if the directors want to depict a story about a woman who gets raped, they have the Freedom of Expression to do it, like they did in the "Game of Thrones" series (personally, I wouldn't have the heart to film such a difficult scene). It's just important to film the scenes in a sensitive manner while fully considering all participating parties. Something that probably didn't happen during the 1970s when the directors loves to abuse the cast members and especially the females.

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A good paragraph all the way around and one that I agree with.

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Meanwhile, Taxi Driver from way back there in 1976 was shocking then, and seems even MORE shocking now, when so few movies with that kind of content are even made. And yet, it doesn't have a rape scene in it -- unless you consider Jodie Foster's "consensual" hooker job as a kind of rape. And I do.

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[–] roger1 (3703) a year ago

I return to add a very "Taxi Driver-ish" experience in modern days:

An HBO show called "The Deuce." Ran three seasons. Available for streaming.

For the most part, it takes place in the same NYC neighborhood as Taxi Driver and is a "period piece" that starts, I think, in 1977(the year after Taxi Driver) and heads on towards the 80's. I have not watched all of The Deuce, but what I did see was plenty "Taxi Driver-ish" except I don't recall a child hooker. T

The show is about hookers, pimps(who are African-American and mostly REALLY bad guys, beating and killing their hookers --though one heroic African-American kills a pimp and does time for it), and the burgeoning porno industry, from film to video. Various actors and actresses play various graphic sex scenes -- consensually, of course.

I did notice that some of them -- including star Maggie Gyellenhaal, seemed to do a few sex/nude scenes EARLY ON, and then step back just to dramatic scenes, as if to say "OK , I showed you I'm willing to do it, but only for a couple of scenes to establish character."

So if you're looking for Taxi Driver in the 2010s, try The Deuce.

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[–] Boromir (10059) a year ago

I give a chance to any movie with David Simon as the creator. I think I watched the first two episodes a few years ago and for some reason stopped - maybe they took the series off streaming.

I've always been interested in films and series about the dark world of the streets at night. Scorsese is the master in that kind of films.

If you love the genre try less known films as Out of the Blue (1980), Blow Out (1981) and Exotica (1994).

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[–] Boromir (10059) a year ago

Meanwhile, Taxi Driver from way back there in 1976 was shocking then, and seems even MORE shocking now, when so few movies with that kind of content are even made. And yet, it doesn't have a rape scene in it -- unless you consider Jodie Foster's "consensual" hooker job as a kind of rape. And I do.

Agree. It's a type of rape.
The shocking part is that they pick a 12-13 years old child to play the hooker. As I said below they might cast today a teenager (16-21) to play Jodie Foster's character. However, based on what I recall from the movie, there were no particularly challenging scenes for her. There was one disturbing scene where she 'dances' closely with a customer. This may explain why she didn't conclude the shoot with trauma or a negative experience.

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[–] roger1 (3703) a year ago

As I said below they might cast today a teenager (16-21) to play Jodie Foster's character. However, based on what I recall from the movie, there were no particularly challenging scenes for her. There was one disturbing scene where she 'dances' closely with a customer.

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I haven't seen the movie in a few years, but I do remember her "pitching" DeNiro as to what kind of sex he wanted, and then moving towards trying something oral -- but he stops her.

I found this disturbing when I first saw it but...

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This may explain why she didn't conclude the shoot with trauma or a negative experience.

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...but I suppose that we have to admit that the acting profession and the movie business lend themselves to "old before their time" pre-teens who have "already seen it all" and don't particularly care about "faking" sexual type things or saying sexual type things.

Moreover a lot of pre-teen actors (and I don't THINK Jodie Foster was in this category) come from extreme poverty, support their parent or parents, have actually had to live in CARS with their parents. Life has already shown them some hard knocks, so they aren't really children. And Hollywood dangles big bucks and fame..

One more thing: let's flash ourselves back to the age of 13. I trust we felt older than being "mere children" at that age. Sex stuff was around -- Playboys were snuck in my generation, the internet offers it all now. Its only looking back from an older age that 13 seems the same as 5.

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[–] Boromir (10059) a year ago

I haven't seen the movie in a few years, but I do remember her "pitching" DeNiro as to what kind of sex he wanted, and then moving towards trying something oral -- but he stops her.

Oh right, that scene slipped my memory. Although I read in IMDb trivia two interesting facts:

1. "Jodie Foster was twelve years old when the movie was filmed, so she could not do the more explicit scenes (her character was also twelve years old). Connie Foster, Jodie's older sister, who was nineteen when the film was produced, was cast as her body double for those scenes".

I assume that the two scenes we mentioned they used body double.

2. "Before taking on the role of Iris, the teenage prostitute, Jodie Foster was required to attend counseling to make sure someone so young could cope with the demands of the role."

We don't have sufficient information about the type of counseling she received; maybe this is only for the record. Nevertheless, it's an interesting trivia detail.

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[–] Boromir (10059) a year ago

...but I suppose that we have to admit that the acting profession and the movie business lend themselves to "old before their time" pre-teens who have "already seen it all" and don't particularly care about "faking" sexual type things or saying sexual type things.

Moreover a lot of pre-teen actors (and I don't THINK Jodie Foster was in this category) come from extreme poverty, support their parent or parents, have actually had to live in CARS with their parents. Life has already shown them some hard knocks, so they aren't really children. And Hollywood dangles big bucks and fame..

It's pretty clear from her Wikipedia entry that her parents pushed her to be a actress from a young age. Probably at any cost. This is the only way to explain why they agreed to let their daughter play a prostitute.

I'm guessing that during adolescence the boy or girl is aware of certain aspects of the adult world and can imitate them in the form of a acting. The age of 13 is old enough to know, at least in general terms, this thing called prostitution. If indeed her sister replaced her in problematic scenes then Joddie didn't really need to "faking" sexual acts during the movie. Still problematic, but at least they prevented her from taking part in the difficult scenes.

In the bible I learn in younger age than Joddie in Taxi Drive about the story of Rahab the prostitute (The book of Joshua). So I guess that at least from the age of 12 most teenagers knows what prostitution is.

BTW, you happen to have examples of actors in the seventies who came from backgrounds of poverty? It is interesting how the difficult background they came from affected them as actors - If any.

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[–] roger1 (3703) 10 months ago

It's pretty clear from her Wikipedia entry that her parents pushed (Jodie Foster) to be a actress from a young age. Probably at any cost. This is the only way to explain why they agreed to let their daughter play a prostitute.

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I suppose. Its a big world with milions of people with millions of "personal goals," and from child beauty pageants to child acting, "stage parents" will forever be with us. History shows that some such parents were nice and good people(Rance Howard, the father of Ron and Clint Howard...and only a minor character man himself) and some...weren't. The "not nice" parents did things like making the child support the parents early on and pushing them into sexual sitatuations OFF SCREEN to advance their careers. Its a world we probably don't want to know about and I'd say that both "Taxi Driver" and "The Exorcist" brought us into that world by showing us young pre-teen girls doing those things for all to see.

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I'm guessing that during adolescence the boy or girl is aware of certain aspects of the adult world and can imitate them in the form of a acting.

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Probably. Who knows HOW early "children" become aware of the ways of the world these days, given all the things to watch on "TV"(streaming) and the internet.

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The age of 13 is old enough to know, at least in general terms, this thing called prostitution.

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Oh, probably. I grew up watching movies of the 60s and 70s where women were clearly "hooker characters" who took men behind closed doors but...a general sense of what was going on was clear. And of course Westerns has "dance hall girls" all dolled up.

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[–] roger1 (3703) 10 months ago

Re the age of 13. None other than the famous movie star Cary Grant once gave an interview where he felt that nature prepared boys and girls for adulthood when puberty arrived (menstruation for girls) and...that's when they SHOULD be considered sexual adults, said Cary. It was only nature, Cary said.

Possibly. But in today's modern world, you may be able to have sex at 13, but you can't earn a living, marry, raise a family with any real world ability. American society(at least) requires some years of education and job experience before adulthood arrives beyond sex. Except: CHILD stars(and pre-teen stars) can earn a helluva living on TV sitcoms (as Leo DiCaprio and J Law did) so...maybe they get to be the exception sexually too.

CONT

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[–] roger1 (3703) 10 months ago

BTW, you happen to have examples of actors in the seventies who came from backgrounds of poverty? It is interesting how the difficult background they came from affected them as actors - If any.

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Oh, I'm not sure if I can be specific to actors in the 70s, but from my readings of their biographies and autobiographies, quite a few rich and famous actors rose from poverty.

Here are some examples:

Michael Caine wrote that he grew up poor in London, and he said this "in my youth there were only two ways out of the ghetto: show business and athletics. I wasn't athletic so I chose show business."

Hilary Swank is one who spoke of living out of her car for a time -- with her mother who brought her to Hollywood to find work. There are a lot of single mothers of movie stars -- and directors(Quentin Tarantino.)

Janet Leigh grew up poor in the Depression, and eloped at 14 to try to escape. Then there was a later marriage before finally landing movie star Tony Curtis the third time.

Demi Moore evidently grew up poor.

And Billy Bob Thornton in his autobio spoke of poverty growing up, and MORE poverty living in Hollywood for a few years before landing TV series work before his career moved up with Sling Blade(screenplay Oscar.) Billy Bob wrote, "When I was poor in Hollywood, people asked me why I didn't go back to Arkansas. But I had nothing to go back TO."

Al Pacino grew up poor. Jack Nicholson grew up poor(his sister was really his mother, and helped with the grandmother's beauty salon. Some men helped out as father figures.)

But for all the poor people who became rich actors, some actors came from rich families to begin with: Julia Louis Dreyfuss, Sigourney Weaver, William Hurt come to mind.

Still, if you had a "hunger for fame and a paycheck"(see Michael Caine) ..being poor was a good incentive to become a star and get rich.

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[–] Boromir (10059) a year ago

Evidently. You had a mix of macho man directors(or even non-macho men like Hitchcock) with this new "freedom of the screen," you had hungry young actresses looking to make it in the business(I'd say that often it was unknown or non-star actresses who played these scenes) and a kind of "swinging free love" backdrop that could convince the players that this was just make believe and sex on film was "in"

as Marilyn Monroe said: "Hollywood's a place where they'll pay you a thousand dollars for a kiss and fifty cents for your soul."

You nicely summed up the justifications of Hollywood producers in the 1970s for the many rape and sex scenes in their films. It is quite common in Western culture to use abstract values and agreed-upon norms to justify and sometimes normalize certain behaviors. 'Free love' and 'creative freedom' are two tools they used.

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[–] Boromir (10059) a year ago

And I tell ya, though I for some years have championed loving, consensual sex scenes as a good bet(loving, consensual sex is a great part of adult life), I must admit I'm starting to figure even THOSE scenes require some coercion of the actress, and even the actor (one known, married actor says he has a policy of not kissing actresses on screen -- it has lost him some roles.)

I wouldn't call it coercion. In the acting profession, less boundaries - more work opportunities, which makes sense. I don't agree with the concept that an actor must show openness on a sexual or other level, for example, to play characters that go against their values. Parts of the industry think this is the ideal model, similar to how a psychologist must undergo psychotherapy himself to step into the patients' shoes. In my opinion, it is entirely legitimate for a director to discuss certain requirements with actors. However, it is best and more wise to confirm with the actor or actress their limits before filming begins.

It's a really interesting discussion. I wonder what I would be willing to do, probably not much. One of the reasons why I will never work as an actor.

i dunno...maybe just a good sensual AND consensual KISSING scene is the best we should sanction these days, though even then -- imagine THAT job, if you are married. Go to the office and get hot and heavy with someone not your spouse, and then go home. Acting is a bizarre profession.

It's really strange profession. Kissing can be fוn, even with all the staff watching. "Sex" scene is one of the most embarrassing thing I can think about. I'm sure the wives and husbands are going crazy with jealousy.

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[–] Boromir (10059) a year ago

I believe that around this time, a certain period of moral panic about strangers start in the urban areas of the United States (not in the racist sense) .Reports of serial killers started to emerge in the mass media. This phenomenon can be explained why Hollywood preoccupation with the subject.

Barbra Streisand story is really interesting. Deliverance is really precedential and exceptional in this aspect.

The story you provided about Barry Foster and Barbara Leigh-Hunt illustrates well what I mentioned earlier—the emotional and physical challenges of portraying such a scene.

I must point out that you have a profound knowledge of the history of cinema.

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[–] roger1 (3703) a year ago

I believe that around this time, a certain period of moral panic about strangers start in the urban areas of the United States (not in the racist sense) .Reports of serial killers started to emerge in the mass media. This phenomenon can be explained why Hollywood preoccupation with the subject.

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Well, what's odd I suppose is that this "early 70's movie phenonmenon"(the rapes) gave way to a "slasher trend in the late 70;s and 80s in which victims were simply stabbed or hacked or chopped to death -- Halloween Friday the 13th, etc. These were horror movies for a teen audience and as I recall, the sex was pretty much consensual between the teens(OLDER teens.)

The rape element was removed.

I sometimes think about "the Christmas movies of 1971." Back then, Christmas, not summer was where the studios put their blockbusters and/or "hot films." And December of 1971 saw three major films released with rape shown or discussed: A Clockwork Orange, Straw Dogs, and Dirty Harry. Now these were "auteur films" -- Kubrick, Peckinpah, even Don Siegel -- and given serious study and debate. But there can be no doubt that this male filmmakers felt it was time to put rape on the screen.

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Barbra Streisand story is really interesting. Deliverance is really precedential and exceptional in this aspect.

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Yes, I read that somewhere and realized that Barbra certainly was taking notice of a trend.

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The story you provided about Barry Foster and Barbara Leigh-Hunt illustrates well what I mentioned earlier—the emotional and physical challenges of portraying such a scene.

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When you raised the topic, I thought of those interviews. I will again note that Michael Caine and Glenda Jackson turned down those roles. Hitchcock had to recruit near-unknowns to play them. (Foster had worked a lot, but always down the cast list; Leigh-Hunt was new.)

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CONT

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[–] roger1 (3703) a year ago

I must point out that you have a profound knowledge of the history of cinema.

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Well, not that profound. But one thing I have tried to bring to moviechat is sharing interviews and stories I have read over the decades -- books, newspaper articles, magazine articles. I read these stories as a hobby, I suppose, organizing in my mind "how the movie business works" without any thought about working there. "Everybody's second business is the movie business" has been said many times. That and pro/college sports, I suppose.

Anyway, a lifetime of reading about these movies creates some of the knowledge - borrowed from the readings. And I'm old enough to have "actually been there" when all those rape movies hit in 1971-1972. They disturbed me as a young person and I remember them now.

I might add that the "Trivia" secton on any movie in IMDb collects a lot of this stuff, too.

That said, the idea is not to simply regurgitate the trivia, but to USE it. To understand the history of the movies and the people who make them.

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[–] roger1 (3703) a year ago

It's really strange profession. Kissing can be fוn, even with all the staff watching. "Sex" scene is one of the most embarrassing thing I can think about. I'm sure the wives and husbands are going crazy with jealousy.

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Sometimes, the wives and husbands are actors themselves and enacting competing love scenes in competing movies. I've read for instance that in 1960, Janet Leigh was doing her torrid love scene(one scene) in Psycho while husband Tony Curtis was doing love scenes with Debbie Reynolds in The Rat Race. The spouses would return from kissing other people to live as a couple.

Speaking of Debbie Reynolds, her husband Eddie Fisher left her for Liz Taylor, who left HIM for co-star Richard Burton. Modernly, Jennifer Aniston lost Brad Pitt to HIS co-star, Angie Jolie. So its not the world's safest profession for marrieds.

THAT said, I think we "civilians" are meant to be aware that these are not "normal" humans, these actors and performers. They indulge in all sorts of pleasures "for the art, and because they can." Many are beautiful people. Some actors and actresses have been very fine with sex and nudity on the screen, they're exhibitionists at heart.

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[–] e3e34ifj (1912) a year ago

It literally was made today. Joker, 2019.

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[–] Bateman (601) a year ago

For all the hue and cry made about it, Joker is a pretty safe film; especially in comparison to Taxi Driver. There's nothing in it that's even remotely as provocative and risqué as Jodie Foster's character in TD.

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[–] e3e34ifj (1912) a year ago

Yeah I guess that's true. Taxi Driver has way more balls and is way better.

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[–] roger1 (3703) a year ago

Actually Joker was based on ANOTHER Scorsese/DeNiro film, yes? "The King of Comedy" (1983) with Phoenix placed in Robert DeNiro's old role as young Rupert Pupkin and DeNiro shifted over to Jerry Lewis old talk show comic role.

And neither "The King of Comedy" NOR "Joker" is as gutter-level sick as Taxi Driver. "Joker" did go for a couple of gory murders(ho hum today), but didn't get down and dirty like Taxi Driver. I don't recall "Joker" having much (any?) sexual content, for instance, in word or deed.

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[–] jacotodd47 (1896) a year ago

I don't know about that. Certainly you'd have to put touches on it to make a 2024 movie. I'll give you an example. "Kramer vs Kramer". Huge hit, came out in 1978 I believe. I knew this movie well, saw it first as a boy - later as a young adult. ANyway, just a few years ago, I caught a film called "My Sister" starring a girl named Grace Kaufman. When I watched "My Sister" I said to myself - this is like a "Kramer vs Kramer" for today's world. Same applies to "Taxi Driver". In fact, a huge hit that is a bit similar in theme (lonely guy experiences the world around him and goes nuts) - "Joker", was released just a few years ago.

So, I don't know, it seems to me a "Taxi Driver" could be made today.

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[–] Boromir (10059) a year ago

Overall, I highly doubt whether anything can be written against the Zeitgeist. However, I am not sure why it can't be remade today, considering our television and movies are filled with anti-hero characters, and violence in movies still exists. I speculate they might cast a teenager (16-21) to play Jodie Foster's character and perhaps omit the N-word. I can anticipate concerns about the portrayal of black people in the film from Hollywood commissars, but that's about it. I can't think of any director/screenwriter who is capable of writing such a complex, deep, and dark character, but that's another topic.

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[–] BKB (10069) a year ago

Why would they have to omit the "N" word?? Samuel L. Jackson says the word all the time in his movies and no one has a problem with it??

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[–] Boromir (10059) a year ago

Because they do it in the past. Someone give example about The French Connection but they do it with other classic films also. I am not sure why Samuel L. Jackson yes, and others no. This is open to debate.

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[–] blue1981 (7825) 10 months ago

If Taxi Driver was made today the penis hating lunatics would call Travis Bickle an Incel. A sexist and racist who glorified toxic masculinity.

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