Taxi Driver

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  • #76
    Re: Taxi Driver

    Originally posted by Erehwon View Post
    Just watched Taxi Driver again last night, because of this thread.
    You're so easily influenced.

    If I start a thread about PINK FLAMINGOS, will you watch that again?
    "Tone is now engaged in a furious Google search for Leighton Meester's keester." -- A friend of mine

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    • #77
      Re: Taxi Driver

      Originally posted by haroldhecuba View Post
      Agreed 100%, Jake.

      Except for the Proust reference...discovering Proust made me wish I hadn't discovered him. Luckily, I didn't get far in the digging. Lost time, indeed.
      I'm a big fan of Proust, read all of him (including the essays, stories and first draft of the novel) in English and French, and have been an acknowledged consultant to his most recent American biographer. (And was an interviewee for a PBS film on Proust who, along with John Updike, ended up on the cutting-room floor.)

      In literature, he's the great link between the 19th and 20th centuries, and was not just a great comic writer but also one of the first mainstream authors to deal with sexuality in a frank and often startling way. But you have to read to the end to see that!

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      • #78
        Re: Taxi Driver

        Speaking of writers like Tolstoy... Is there anyone else out there that read Dostyevski's CRIME AND PUNISHMENT and also thought a lot of parts in the book were downright funny? I cracked up a bunch of times.

        I think Dostyevski wasn't the total downer everyone interpeted him to be. At least not in that book.

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        • #79
          Re: Taxi Driver

          You're absolutely right, Landis. Dostoevsky can be a funny writer. My favorite novel of his is Demons (aka The Devils), one of the great works of literature about revolutionaries. And though the subject matter can be grim, there are some amazingly successful comic scenes in it.

          It's the same with Proust. Those who attempt him rarely get through volume one, but after that the writing becomes swifter (mostly because the first volume, for reasons too complicated to go into here, was polished and rewritten over a longer period of time) and more comic, partly because he didn't believe he would live that long and wanted to finish this work before he died. He was still polishing it hours before his death.

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          • #80
            Re: Taxi Driver

            Glad to hear it. I was at a party one time and some people were talking about Crime and Punishment, and the dramatic, existential writer Dostyevski was. I mentioned how much the book cracked me up. You should seen the looks I got. They almost crushed their wine glasses in their hands. Classic.

            I also heard not long ago that Investigator Porfiry was the inspiration for Peter Falk's Columbo. So there you go.

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            • #81
              Re: Taxi Driver

              I thought parts of C&P were friggin' hilarious.

              Glad to know I'm not alone.
              "Tone is now engaged in a furious Google search for Leighton Meester's keester." -- A friend of mine

              Comment


              • #82
                Re: Taxi Driver

                Originally posted by Ralphy W View Post
                You're so easily influenced.

                If I start a thread about PINK FLAMINGOS, will you watch that again?
                LOL, I LOVE that film!!! It's so... sick.

                Comment


                • #83
                  Re: Taxi Driver

                  ok - trivia, trivia, trivia:

                  1 - what color does betsy wear in almost every scene?
                  2 - what kind of pie did travis eat on their first date?
                  3 - what movie did travis take betsy to on their second date?
                  4 - where was scorcese's cameo in the flick?
                  5 - what town did iris' parents live in?
                  6 - what zodiac sign makes the best lovers... according to iris?
                  7 - how many guns did travis buy?
                  8 - "suck on this!" - suck on what?
                  9 - what radical haircut did travis give himself?
                  10 - what name did travis give the secret service dood?
                  11 - what did iris eat for breakfast?
                  12 - what was pallantine's slogan?

                  first one who get's the most answers right wins absolutely nothing!
                  first one who get's all 12 answers right wins bragging rights.
                  first one who comes up with another 12 trivia questions gets freakdom rights.

                  Comment


                  • #84
                    Re: Taxi Driver

                    what's wrong with pink flamingoes?
                    You only get one chance to rewrite it 100 times.

                    Comment


                    • #85
                      Re: Taxi Driver

                      Originally posted by THEUGLYDUCKLING View Post
                      what's wrong with pink flamingoes?
                      They clash with white shoes.

                      Comment


                      • #86
                        Re: Taxi Driver

                        And their ankles (not their knees) bend backwards!!!
                        "Only nothing is impossible."
                        - Grant Morrison

                        Comment


                        • #87
                          Re: Taxi Driver

                          Originally posted by sc111 View Post
                          For example ... seeing Benjamin Button last weekend .... Should have been an amazing character, but in my mind he was a gimmick. Jeeze ... think of the insights such a character could have. But his dialogue was practically nil.

                          Rainman had more depth as a character and he was autistic. Forest Gump had more depth and he was mentally reatrded. WTF? I'm not referencing 1940s films here either.
                          SC111, I haven't seen Ben Button yet. But what made Forest Gump relatable IMO, was he couldn't obtain the one thing he really wanted - Jenny. Not the historical gimmicks. Who hasn't had that one love they couldn't get, or hold onto for some reason? His longing and love for Jenny was the heart of the movie.

                          A well known screenwriter said to me once, that every good script at the heart of it has to be about something - love, revenge, wanting to belong, etc., to make it work.

                          Comment


                          • #88
                            Re: Taxi Driver

                            Originally posted by Landis26 View Post
                            Speaking of writers like Tolstoy... Is there anyone else out there that read Dostyevski's CRIME AND PUNISHMENT and also thought a lot of parts in the book were downright funny? I cracked up a bunch of times.

                            I think Dostyevski wasn't the total downer everyone interpeted him to be. At least not in that book.
                            Yes, it's a favourite novel of mine, have read it a number of times, the comic elements endear you to the characters, with Marmeladov's entry to the novel early on. The drunk who turns out his pockets in front of his wife, to prove that he's not concealing any money after a drinking spree, has hay sticking out of his hair when we first meet him, because he spends all night sleeping on barges instead of facing his wife ... referred to as 'a figure of the wildest Dostoevsky humour.'

                            The Jessie Coulson translation is considered by many to be the best, with an introduction by John Jones, a professor of English at Oxford, who enthuisiastically extols, amongst other things, such comments as 'the difference between Tolstoy and Dostoevsky is that the former's greatness is with us all the time whereas the latter's comes back like a revelation, even a surprise each time we pick up one of his books ...' and calls C & P the most accessible novel in the world, and the most exciting, the king of murder stories, and of detective stories. Inspiring opening essay, unlikely that you'll think Dostoevsky is glum after reading it. The novels imo are a treasure trove of characters, often unusual/unhealthy psychological types, but so human and real.

                            Dostoevsky said himself, his lifelong ambition was 'to find the human in a human being', that's what he's up to in Crime and Punishment.

                            Forthcoming: The Annual, "I JUST GOT DUMPED" Valentine's Short Screenplay Writing Competition. Keep an eye on Writing Exercises.

                            Comment


                            • #89
                              Re: Taxi Driver

                              Originally posted by Landis26 View Post
                              Glad to hear it. I was at a party one time and some people were talking about Crime and Punishment, and the dramatic, existential writer Dostyevski was. I mentioned how much the book cracked me up. You should seen the looks I got. They almost crushed their wine glasses in their hands. Classic.

                              I also heard not long ago that Investigator Porfiry was the inspiration for Peter Falk's Columbo. So there you go.

                              Yep, that's correct. Porfiry inspired charac. of Columbo.
                              Forthcoming: The Annual, "I JUST GOT DUMPED" Valentine's Short Screenplay Writing Competition. Keep an eye on Writing Exercises.

                              Comment


                              • #90
                                Re: Taxi Driver

                                This thread took a cool literary turn.
                                "Tone is now engaged in a furious Google search for Leighton Meester's keester." -- A friend of mine

                                Comment

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