Lars Von Trier And Martin Scorsese To Remake Taxi Driver, De Niro Again To Star…?!?!
This is easily my favourite film news story of the year so far. According to reports coming out of the Berlin Film Festival,Lars von TrierandMartin Scorseseare to team up for a remake ofTaxi Driverand thatRobert De Nirowill star, presumably still in the role of Travis Bickle.
This sounds like Werner Herzog’sBad Lieutenantsquared, or even to the power of von Trier’s ownThe Five Obstructions. I hope – hell, I pray – that Scorsese or De Niro don’t pull out and scupper this.
In my dreams, Scorsese would be allowed to direct, but only under extreme restrictions set in place by von Trier. This is essentially the premise ofThe Five Obstructions, a film in which von Trier pushed Jørgen Leth to remake his shortThe Perfect Humanagain and again, each time with more challenging conditions limiting how he could shoot or edit the work.
I think it’s abundantly clear that von Trier has a deliberate agenda here and most likely a most amusing end game in mind, and I’d doubt very much if any of this is fuelled by admiration forTaxi Driver.
Sharing a link toEarth Times(who quote print publicationEkko), Jeff Wells ofHollywood Elsewheredescribes the remake idea as “repulsive” and suggests “it’s embarassing to even float it as a joke”. On the contrary, I find even the mildest whiff of possibility here hugely appetising.
I’m definitely not a fan ofTaxi Driver, finding it more like a baby that won’t stop screaming for attention than even just a clumsy toddler that can’t stand up straight. All the same, I can see the greatness of De Niro’s performance no how matter far away the rest of the picture pushes me.
It always seemed to me that Neil Jordan’sMona Lisawas a kind ofTaxi Driverredux already. It was certainly infinitely preferable, with far less pleading and free of embarrassing novelty. The von Trier project would be likely to go in a completely different direction, however, and play more like a deconstruction of Scorsese’s original than a new drama we could expect to reveal itself fully without reference to the original.
