Hi, this is Steve. In March of 1930, the Association of Motion Picture Producers agreed to a code of voluntary self-censorship known colloquially as the Hayes Code. In addition to its restrictions on language, nudity, and violence,

it also dictated what kinds of stories could be told.

According to the Code, films should never be presented in a way as to throw sympathy with criminals.

The sanctity of marriage shall be upheld, and pictures shall not infer that low forms of

sex relationships are accepted or common.

Topics like prostitution, drug and alcohol use,

and the exploration of obscenity in any form

were strictly prohibited.

In other words, according to the haste code, movies are about good guys who always win, never

want to sleep around, say no to drugs, and exist within a moral universe defined by a clear demarcation between right and wrong.

Needless to say, taxi driver, Martin Scorsese's haunting story about a man balancing on the razor's edge of rage, loneliness,

desperation, lust and violence simply could not have existed within the

confines of the Hayes Code. It is a film whose moral ambiguity, honesty, humor, violence, and madness tear at the

fabric of every convention and force us to examine the stark and often disturbing realities beneath our veneer of civilization.

It is at once a great and difficult film, fearless in its depiction of one man's journey into his own darkness, and unflinching in its determination

not to give easy answers to difficult questions.

Starring Robert DeNiro, Sybil Shepard, Albert Brooks, Jody Foster, Harvey Kitell, and Peter Boyle,

Taxi Driver remains a classic of 70 cinema, with a power and intensity that has rarely been

seen on film.

If you haven't seen this remarkable movie,

we highly recommend buying or renting it through our website,

cinephiles.net, that's Cinee-F-I-L-E-S-D-N-E-F-N-N-E-S-N-T, where you can check out Taxi Driver, along with every other movie we've ever reviewed.

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