Introduction: Taxi Driver Forward

Provides an overview of Paul Schrader’s career, important biographical information, and a contextual reading of thematic and stylistic preoccupations of Schrader’s films. Establishes the framework for the subsequent essays through an examination of Schrader’s contributions to cinema as both a critic and a filmmaker. Begins with Taxi Driver and uses that film as a jumping off point for the remainder of his work, seeing each of the subsequent films as part of that film’s legacy. Taxi Driver is an important through line for many of the essays included in the collection, but not the focus of any individual essay. Use Taxi Driver and its many influences, including those from Schrader’s biography and his intellectual background as a critic, to craft a lens through which his other films can be viewed.