THE MICHIGAN DAILY A rts &Et r a et Tuesday, February 24, 1976 Page Five mm TAXI DRIVER': Brilliant Sco By BRUCE WEBER ed. It was simply a place they DIRECTOR Martin Scorsese would never leave. last left us with the modest Travis Bickle, the hero of spire of the Monterey Motel Taxi Driver, is constantly at glowing in the embers of a red odds with New York, and it1 Tuscon sunset, where just out- takes on a menacing quality< side of town, Alice undoubtedly for him that sets him adrift in lives with her son Tommy and a stream of dissatisfaction. a shaggy - haired folksinger I turned cowpoke. IN ALMOST every way, Bick- Though as a successful melo- le stands opposed to his sur- drama, Alice Doesn't Live Here roundings. He is overwhelmed1 Anymore was often a film of by the unflagging squalor thatc remarkable perception and the city flings at him, and we grit, the hesitant optimism of feel he is not accustomed to its conclusion holds to a signi- the introspection he has as- ficant insincerity. sumed. Ile drives a cab be-' It is the city that keeps Scor- cause he cannot sleep nights: sese honest, and in his new his aloneness and his mounting1 film, Taxi Driver, it is the city frustration keep him alert, and1 that emerges as the implacable his observations screw his in- enforcer of conflict. In a pre- sides tighter.t vious New York film, Mean He thinks of himself as per-I Streets, Scorsese allowed the ' sonable, the city as oppressive-: city to be more of a backdrop, lv impersonal. He sees himself a highly charged atmosphere as humane, the city as sick. that had bred the volatile char- And he is painfully uninformed acters of the film, in his belief that the city has IN TAXI DRIVER, the city a heart and that he can pene-j assumes a different face, but trate his frustration and get not because Scorsese's vision of to it. it has changed. The city itself remains the same, as angry ROBERT DeNIRO as Bicklea and festering as it was in Mean lets his character stew with j Streets, the difference being superb restraint. We are awarei that we get it this time through from the start that he is a com-, the more intimidated viewpoint bustible figure. His movements of an outsider. are planted and concentrated in Mean Streets' protagonists, oppositio" to the way his mind Johnny Boy and Charlie were at churns. home in New York. It was not Only once does he succumb| a place they exalted or criticiz- to a violent instinct - he shootsi rsese-DeNiro a man who is robbing a grocery store-and it frightens him into greater obsession. De Niro is riveting because he makes us believe that Bickle can erupt at any moment - which is not at all the case. The violence is, to Travis, a last and only resort. By the time he explodes, the thread of good will in him has been snip- ped irreparably. He has tried' out his good intentions in all imaginable ways. HE APPROACHES a girl named Betsy (Cybil Shepherd) he sees working in an office building, and dates her, but his unfamiliarity with the so- cial eitquette of a strange place offends her. When she spurns him, he becomes obsessed with his failure. He attempts to confide in an experienced cab driver called Wizard, played with gutter elo- quence by Peter Boyle. Wizard is sympathetic to Travis, but cannot understand him. "A man becomes his job," says Wizard, spouting a deter- ministic attitude that Travis finds absurd. A person, accord- ing to Travis, does not become what he already is - he must try to be something else. IN THE END, Taxi Driver comes up just short of being great. The character of Betsy is never fully explained. The way she originally falls for Bickle's dull and pitiable charm and the way she rejects him for his naive insistent behavior are not consistent. But even more serious is the epilogue quality of the final sequence. It follows five of the most brutally violent minutes ever screened, and predicts, for Travis, a recycling of emo- tion. The violence has left him where he once started - un- knotted for now, but unstable too, and with his motor already running. From a narrative standpoint, the implication is clear, but from the point of view of sheer pictures, the abrupt removal of action in fa- vor of inaction is plummeting for the nerves. We relax too Uo film 0 quickly. WHAT IS permanent about Taxi Driver is a stunning and utterly convincing portrayal of a character and a conflict. Ie- Niro is alarmingly on target as Bickle. We recall him as a phenome- na - the suppressed psycho- path, the introvert who goes berserk, and we are left with a small knowledge of his con- dition, and a cautious sym- pathy. We see New York as Travis sees it - colorful, but the glar- ing colors are dazzling and in- separable. From inside the cab, the city is huge, gaseous and dirty. Whatever reaction we have in Travis's side is there because of how we respond to the oppression of Scorsese's New York. . THE TWISTED ending keeps Travis from being labelled tragic. In fact it is an ironic twist - his violence is miscon- strued by the law and he goes free. Join The Dally Photo © DAVID RAPP Karl Struss MACYis NAKED & FUNNY.. Oh-,, Cafc'" Struss exhibit recalls a photographic genius a;, . 3 SUOWTIMES: MON.-SAT. 7:00 & 9:00: SUNDAY 5:00-7:00-9:00 By JANE SIEGEL SOMEWHERE during the! shuffle between New York and Hollywood, Karl Struss's name seems to have gotten lost. In Robert Doty's Photo-Seces-, sion: Photography as a Fine still and motion picture photog- raphy, Susan and John Harvith have broughtttogether the works of Karl Struss. The exhibit, which premiered at Cranbrook, opens in Ann Ar- bor on February 25 at the Mu- seum of Modern Art. The dis- +t 3 t t Unusual sounds reverberate 7 - t 1 -' r! L 1 Er~i- t -~ . w ax - -% L~!"h111C T - ! / Art, hi isteapas a rather b- play of 96 still'photographs is 1 oA#I1 e hotgrapherned to be seen along with "Strauss". aweek of film showings. From his films we remem- Struss, 89, will be in resi- By NANCY COONS I formance techniques. No long- ber not the cinematography, dence during the film festival.1' er limited to their intrinsic; but the names of actors, direc- He will appear at the opening ITHE CONTEMPORARY Di- tone, the instruments are tors and "stars." Even among of the exhibit as well as at the rections Ensemble present- plucked, muted and slapped for photographers Struss's name is screening of Sunrise the follow- ed a sampler of sounds Satur- musical effects. The results not exactly a common house- ing Sunday night. day night at Rackham, per- were fascinating. hold word. And it is no small The exhibit itself is divided forming in unusual combina- While this trend in instrumen- wonder that, while his contem- into three sections. It traces tions and producing a wide va- tal experimentation is hardly poraries have received wide- Struss from his membership in riety of aural effects. new to composition, local mu-I s p r e a d recognition, Struss the Photo - Secession in New The instruments were not sicians still refer to lesserl himself has been more or less York to his Academy Awards only combined in colorful ways, works as "funny music," and forgotten. for cinematography in Holly- but their sound potentials were those works which rely on spe-! FOLLOWING their interest in wood. explored with expanded per- cial effects for their substance, ~~~~~~-~-c-c asionalu nickervr,. their instruments, pluck them with pencils, and alter the strings with paper strips, as well as play them "normally" The combinations of sounds were extremely effective. The least directional of the works on the program were those of Eastern Michigan Uni- versity's Anthony lannaconne, who attended the performance. Both Hades and Three Mythi- cal Sketches, scored for two euphoniums and two tubas, pre- sented little more than a unique sound. THOUGH THE final number,, Poulenc's Le Bal Masque, is OFFICE OF STUDENT LIFE Presents o4 The Sinners plus SPECIAL GUEST STAR NATALIE COLE Friday, March 12 8 P.m.-Bowen Fieldhouse EASTERN MICHIGAN UNIVERSITY $6.50 reserved-$5.50 general admission Tickets on sale at McKenny Union Also at Mr. Music at Briarwood, Huckleberry Party Store, Richardson's Pharmacy, Where House Records, Hudson's. No smoking or alcoholic beverages allowed in Fieldhouse Mask show at East Quad t'was not 'brillig,' but dull the audience. THE ONLY snickers heard Saturday night were during the intentionally humorous Poul- 1 E' By CAROLYN SMITH created a slight tension in the only action involved.c audience; thus, the final act "The Champ" could be con-} S THE SHOW began, the seemed the most enjoyable, if sidered the climax. This actl stage was black. Two whitel only because it was accompa- brought the whole ensemble of gloves clenched the curtain.Inied by music. characters together. Two boxers Then, a leotard - clad figure The show's humor was de- were brought on to fight along emerged wearing a flourescent rived primarily from the masks with their promoters and a green mask, slowly contorting worn by members of the com- "masked" w o m a n to cheerj like a caterpillar. It was defi- pany. Made in Switzerland, the them on. nitely not your ordinary theater Basel Masks were, large, white, The aggressive, active fighter performance. and plaster-like with exagger- was knocked out with surprise! Thus began the mime and ated features. punches from the nervous un- mask show T'was Brillig that However, after the initial won- derdog who, in turn, became! was performed at East Quad der and amusement of the an aggressive champ. Ending in last weekend. Unfortunately, the masks wore off, the acts should mass rug and towel throwing, use of humorous masks to con-; have held more dramatic in- this act was more lively, but vey impressions cannot carry a terest. ultimately dragged too. performance by themselves. FOR EXAMPLE, in "Love in All in all, the Roadside At- R o a d s i d e Attractions are the Morning," two people dis- tractions performance showed! mime artists from Oakland Uni-' cover each other and comically, that masks can be used to hide versity who were featured in frantically rotate one another's emotions, but they should never T'was Brillig. Although dedi- toes. It was humorous up to a be used to cover-up shallow cated to "new" theater innova- point, and then became slightly material and a monotonous tions like the use of masks, expasperating as this was the pace. monotonous and reputitive ac- - - - tion marred this collection of short mimes. TO BEGIN with, the entire FREDRIC MARCH As 1932 show was performed in silence except for the last act. This ¢ ~(AT 7) Stud in This early film version of the Robert Louis Stevenson tale Sdiis a classic chiller that features array of visually dazzlinq Guadalajara, Mexico film techniques. Starrinq Miriam Hopkins. Cinematography by Karl Strus. enc: the rest of the concert not a direction which contem- provided several examples of porary music is taking, the 19321 absorbing and powerful music. "music carnival" is great fun Farberman's Progressions and ended the program beauti- onened the program. Skillfully fully. blending and contrasting flute Any occasion where Leslie with a variety of percussion in- Guinn performs is a treat, es- str'iments, the work alternated pecially where humor is involv- between a free cadenza style ed. One of the most flexible and a ranid, steady tempo, performers in the area, baritone breaking on one occasion into a Guinn has sung works by sonhisticated fugue. Brahms, Telemann, Orff, and The three performers, Nancy civil-war song-writer George RPffer on flute with David Col- Root this year with the same son and William Moersch on relish. percussion, approached the mu- The Contemporary Directions sic sensitively and A ith a flair concerts, presented by the Com- for the fluttering and shimmer- position department of the ing effects. - School of Music, are rehearsed I M P R O V I S A T I 0 N,;and conducted by Uri Mayer, by Conrad Fakin, required whose mastery of the contem- harpist Elinor Niemisto and pi- porary non-idiom is more evi- anist Donna Coleman to slep dent each season. At.. JTRV 3 hok ; G ~a t s O S 3 C~~avER i I O y Mr a r i p S E A x FO EI Nazcnrradas. , ,~)TTTTQIX~~I!sa toda Blanca, C ' ' 'i.,M..pA..ib iad de I t ' t o : S A Iplc y aboniiga. Las v; -~ Q l L~ Denmadniigada Ana Ib vat's, ., do..Kf i'i .' -,rr ry.;imy L A V T' 7 '.VN,'w,.. g t ' -.- . 'S. 'tit,> - ~sr~ru 'f ~0 0',~ / ll~ ~50X ~- rt .Mr G", ROI p 5 !"X NE t ~NiTO { gs'E ' G 1 ji ~ {, ' "s f sA'j f ° '/ aTsuI jE l' i.,pelLO:?11 [/ { ' '" L Z(, v'} 1tk- j)/ D F RI, AP O The GUADALAJARA SUM- MER SCHOOL, a fully accredited UNIVERSITY OF ARIZONA proaram, will of- fer July 5-Auqiust 13, an- thropolo y, a r t, education, folklore, history, political science, lanquage and litera- ture. Tuition and fees, $1 95; board and room with Mexi- can family $280. Write to GUADALAJARA SUMMER SCHOOL, Office of Interna- tional Proqrams, University of Arizona, Tucson, Arizona 85721. CAMPIN "dr A n Is JAMES STEWART or JOHN WAYNE 1962 THE MAN WHO SHOT ' LIBERTY VALENCE (AT 9:05) Starrina Stewart, Wayne, Lee Marvin and Vera Miles in INI .MflGUILD BOTH SHOWS OLD ARCH. FOR $2.00 AUD. I 3TOURS OF EUROPE 111 1"' l I~nr AiTfJ/ C1A/ AC " SPATCHWORK JEANS PRE-WASHED in Den im & Painters Cloth / MOON STRIDERS'j PRE-WASHED 28" Wide Bottom by LEE I BIGOTOPSI U THINK SPRING! TROPICAL PLANT SALE 20%/-SO / BELW £.JOO R ET AIL MICHIGAN UNION BALLROOM t A YUUNG EUKROPEAN IHIS.) UMM r FOR PEOPLE BETWEEN 18 AND 30 YEARS OF AGE TOUR : Three week tour through France, Switzerland, Italy, Austria, Ger- many, Holland, Belgium plus London. Dates: June 14/July 12, July 9/August 6, August 2/August 30. TOUR II: Five week tour through Belgium, Holland, W. Germany, Den- mark, Norway, Sweden, Finland, USSR, Poland, E. Germany plus London. Dates: June 7/July 19, June 18/August 1, July 26/September 6. TOURS INCLUDE: Round Trip via chartered jet, hotel in London for 7 or 9 i 5 R. TUESDAY February 24-9 A.M.. to 8 P.M. WEDNESDAY February 25-9 A.M. to 6 P.M. r- nrr . -r- r~ir - - - ' I . ! U }