with which modern society grapples in an increasingly secularized and commercialized world. Lacking a mutually agreed upon myth in society, it is difficult for individuals to form meaningful bonds with humanity. It is exactly this dilemma that frustrates and eventually enrages Bickle. As he says in the scene where he prepares himself as a human arsenal, after his efforts to connect with humanity has failed, “Are you talkin’ to me? Well, I’m the only one here.” Travis has a desperate need to make some kind of contact with the social interaction he sees about him, but he fails miserably at ever chance: “He asks a girl out on a date, and takes her to a porno movie. He sucks up to a political candidate, and ends by alarming him. He tries to make small talk with a Secret Service agent. He wants to befriend a child prostitute, but scares her away” (Ebert 1). When Travis asks “Who you talkin’ to” he is, in fact, talking to himself.
We see in Travis’ dilemma a very modern American social dilemma. In an increasingly secularized and commercial society, there are fewer bonds that tie individuals together. The film highlights this individual isolation at the same time it demonstrates the commercial nature of society. There is no question of good or evil, no concern about spiritual ethics and no apparent boundaries of morality. Instead, uniquely American, inhabitants of this particular hell concern themselves with winning or losing and how much what they want costs, regardless of whether or not what they want is moral in a conventional sense. It is a hell where guns, political campaigns, dope, killing and 12-year-old pussy are all had for the right price. Ironically, part of Travis’ inability to connect with others is his desire to clean up this immoral wasteland. He wants to save others, but his desire is based his own idea of values and moral code. If he fails to save anyone, it is largely because mod...