Vitals

Robert De Niro as Travis Bickle, disturbed taxi driver and Vietnam War veteran

New York City, Spring to Summer 1976

Film: Taxi Driver
Release Date: February 9, 1976
Director: Martin Scorsese
Costume Designer: Ruth Morley

WARNING! Spoilers ahead!

Background

Martin Scorsese’s violent meditation on loneliness, Taxi Driver, was released 50 years ago today on February 9, 1976—one day after its New York City premiere. Fresh off of his Academy Award win for The Godfather Part II, Robert De Niro received a second career nomination for his portrayal of “God’s lonely man” Travis Bickle, a troubled Marine Corps veteran who combats his insomnia by driving a taxi through the decaying streets of 1970s New York.

After his poorly conceived attempts to woo a sophisticated political campaign volunteer are understandably rejected, Travis refocuses his attention on the pre-teen prostitute Iris (Jodie Foster), whom he attempts to dissuade from her current profession. Meanwhile, Travis’ paranoia grows to the point that he drops just under a thousand dollars on a quartet of handguns that range in power and concealment—his scattered plans ranging from political assassination to a brothel massacre, all the while practicing his heavily armed bravado in his disorganiz-ized home:

Paul Schrader drew on his own experiences with depression and isolation when writing the screenplay, while also taking inspiration from would-be presidential assassin Arthur Bremer to craft Travis Bickle’s more violent urges. However, just as Taxi Driver drew from real life, the movie’s influence would later bleed back into reality when John Hinckley Jr. cited the film among his rationale for attempting to assassinate President Ronald Reagan in March 1981.

Having reportedly seen Taxi Driver more than a dozen times in theaters, Hinckley developed an intense identification with Bickle and an erotomaniacal fixation on Jodie Foster, extrapolating the film’s logic to a catastrophic conclusion. Like Travis, Hinckley convinced himself that a spectacular act of political violence would elevate him to national attention and, in his mind, prove his worth to the actress. He fired six shots outside the Washington Hilton Hotel, wounding Reagan, Secret Service agent Tim McCarthy, D.C. police officer Thomas Delahanty, and press secretary James Brady, who would ultimately die from complications related to his injuries in 2014.

Writing in an A.V. Club retrospective earlier that year, A.A. Dowd noted that Martin Scorsese reportedly learned of Hinckley’s obsession at the 1981 Academy Awards—moments after losing Best Director for Raging Bull—and was so shaken by the news that he briefly considered abandoning filmmaking altogether. Thankfully, he did not.

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What’d He Wear?

By the 1970s, Army field jackets had evolved from strictly G.I. gear through countercultural symbol into the mainstream as utilitarian everyman dress, as demonstrated by the nebbish New Yorkers played by the likes of Woody Allen in Annie Hall, Richard Dreyfuss in The Goodbye Girl, and Dustin Hoffman in Kramer vs. Kramer. But when USMC veteran Travis Bickle pulls on his M-65 jacket for the last act of Taxi Driver, he’s resuming his own personal war: a self-informed crusade against the scum of Gotham.

True, the tanker jacket Travis wore during his titular cabbie career was also mil-spec, even festooned with the same service patches. But the field jacket decidedly more bellicose, especially when paired with his newly sculpted mohawk which recalls World War II’s “Filthy Thirteen”—a 101st Airborne squad whose distinctive haircuts were inspired by squad leader Sgt. Jake McNiece’s Choctaw heritage. The detail was reportedly suggested by Martin Scorsese’s friend, Victor Magnotta, who shared with the director from his own service in Vietnam that:

…in Saigon, if you saw a guy with his head shaved—like a little mohawk—that usually meant those people were ready to go into a certain Special Forces situation. You didn’t even go near them. They were ready to kill.”

The U.S. Army introduced this update of the “Coat, Cold Weather, Field” in 1965 as part of the M-65 Equipment System, specifically designed for weather resistance in South Vietnam with its fierce monsoon season. Evolved from the Korean war-era M-1951 field jacket and its WWII-developed M-1943 predecessor, the M-65 field jacket retained the same overall cut and four-pocket design, though the olive-green (OG-107) shell cloth ranged from a densely woven durable cotton sateen to a lower-cost 50/50 cotton-and-nylon blend known as “Nyco”.

Designated “MIL-C-43455” by early contractors like Alpha Industries, the M-65 replaces the convertible shirt-style collar of its predecessors with a more rounded collar that has a zip-enclosed hood. Covered by a six-snap storm flap, the front zipper was aluminum chrome until the early 1970s, then switched to brass through the ’80s, and finally nylon until this pattern was phased out by 2009. (Bronson Mfg Co. produces a replica of Travis’ unit-patched M-65, identifying Robert De Niro’s screen-worn jacket as a circa 1969 Nyco-shell model with the aluminum zipper.)

The waistband is cinched with an internal drawcord, separating the two bellows pockets over the chest from the two larger set-in pockets over the hips. All four pockets are covered with pointed flaps that have a single covered snap to close. The shoulders feature button-down epaulets where military officers could pin rank insignia, and pleats behind each shoulder allow wearers a greater range of movement. The set-in sleeves are finished with velcro-fastened pointed cuffs.

Travis patches the field jacket with the same badging as his tanker jacket. The olive-brown ovular patch with its yellow-embroidered parachute and wings was issued to Navy and Marine Corps parachutists. The “King Kong Company” embroidered in the round patch over his left upper sleeve was not, as far as I know, an actual unit. When trying to fit in at the rally for presidential candidate Sen. Charles Palantine (Leonard Harris), Travis pins one of the campaign’s large white buttons to his right chest pocket flap, emblazoned with “We Are The People” in red text.

Travis doesn’t always wear a shirt under his field jacket but, when he does, it’s one of his western-styled sport shirts with a snap-up front placket. For his first suspicious stakeout of a Palantine rally, he wears the same cotton shirt he had worn when illegally purchasing his quartet of handguns—with a large-scaled rust-red overcheck against a golden-yellow duo-toned block check. In addition to the snap-front placket, this short-sleeved shirt has a narrow spread collar, pointed western yokes, and two chest pockets with long-pointed single-snap flaps.

Although Travis already clearly has a short-sleeved shirt, he modifies a plain white long-sleeved shirt by cutting off the right sleeve below the elbow so he can accommodate the nickel-plated micro-pistol on sliding holster rigged to his forearm. (It’s possible that Travis may have simply liked the uniformity of a clean white shirt under his field jacket, but I also wouldn’t look for too much logic behind the motives of a sleep-deprived man who pivots his political assassination plans into a brothel melee.)

This white shirt follows a classic western-informed design, with pointed yokes, a snap-front placket, and triple-snap cuffs. The two chest pockets are covered with double-pointed “sawtooth” two-snap flaps.

Travis continues wearing Lee 101 Rider jeans in varying shades of dark indigo-blue denim, with the brand identifiable by the shape of the five-pocket configuration and the small black logo patch sewn along the top of the back-right patch pocket.

Travis holds his jeans up with a dark russet-brown leather belt, substantial enough to balance the weight the double-rigged shoulder holsters he attaches to it on each side of his waistband. The flashy 12-sided buckle features ornate silver scrollwork around the dark burgundy-filled buckle, with a large pearled oval stone in the center.

Cowboy boots stepped from the plains into mainstream men’s fashion by the 1970s, but something tells me Travis Bickle would have worn these boots in the Big Apple regardless of trending status.

The uppers of Travis’ cowboy boots are russet-brown vegetable-tanned cowhide leather: smooth over the plain-toe vamps, diamond-stitched up the shafts that rise to mid-calf, where they have a straight-cut opening with pull tabs on the sides. De Niro’s screen-worn boots were donated by Taxi Driver screenwriter Paul Schrader to the Harry Ransom Center at the University of Texas at Austin in 2006.

Travis’ sunglasses are the gold square-framed aviators, following the design of the American Optical Flight Goggle 58 (FG-58) that was developed to meet the U.S. Air Force’s Type HGU-4/P eyewear standard and authorized for service beginning in 1959. In addition to the semi-rectangular shape, this “Original Pilot Sunglass” model is distinguished by the straight “bayonet” temples designed to be more compatibly worn with flight helmets and oxygen masks. In 1982, Randolph Engineering became the prime contractor of Type HGU-4/P sunglasses for the Department of Defense, but the model worn in Taxi Driver would have likely been crafted by its original designer, American Optical.

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The Guns

At the suggestion of his concealed-carrying colleague “Wizard” (Peter Boyle), Travis eventually drops $915 on four handguns and a shoulder holster from the shady gun salesman “Easy Andy” (Steven Prince).

Smith & Wesson Model 29

Travis begins their transaction by asking Andy if he’s “got a .44 Magnum?”, likely attracted to the weapon after hearing the violent fantasies of a cuckolded misogynist in the back of his cab one night. After Travis assures Andy that he’s “got money” for the expensive weapon, Andy explains that:

It’s a real monster. Could stop a car at 100 yards, put a round right through the engine block.

The weapon in question is a Smith & Wesson Model 29, the .44 Magnum revolver immortalized five years earlier by Clint Eastwood’s monologue in Dirty Harry (1971) that proclaimed it to be “the most powerful handgun in the world.” The .44 Magnum cartridge was introduced by Smith & Wesson in tandem with the double-action Model 29 in the mid-1950s, and it was indeed the most powerful production handgun configuration for decades until the commercialization of larger rounds like the .454 Casull and .50 Action Express.

For $350, Travis purchases a blued Model 29 with an 8⅜”-long barrel, at that point the longest factory barrel length available for this weapon. After Andy observes that “only a jackass would carry that cannon in the streets like that,” he spends an extra $40 on a massive tan leather shoulder holster that Andy describes as “handmade.”

Smith & Wesson Model 36

Ever the aggressive salesman, Andy calls out that the .44 Magnum “might be a little too big for practical purposes” and thus recommends Travis look at a Smith & Wesson Model 36 revolver:

It’s nickel-plated, snub-nose, otherwise the same as a service revolver. That’ll stop anything that moves. The Magnum, they use that in Africa for killin’ elephants. That .38, that’s a fine gun. Some of these guns, they’re like toys… that .38, you go out and hammer nails with ‘er all day, come back, it’ll cut dead center on target every time. It’s got a really nice action to it. A heck of a wallop.

Smith & Wesson debuted this easily concealed five-shot double-action revolver during the International Association of Chiefs of Police (IACP) convention in 1950, when the original “Chiefs Special” name was voted on. Later that decade, it was renamed the Model 36 when Smith & Wesson transitioned to numerical nomenclature for its firearms. It was produced in both blued and nickel finishes, with the stainless Model 60 variant introduced in 1965.

Travis purchases the Model 36 for $250. Although he doesn’t purchase his holster from Andy like he did for the .44 Magnum, Travis eventually keeps the Model 36 in a second shoulder rig positioned under his right armpit for a left-handed draw.

During a brief continuity error, it appears to be swapped out with a similarly configured nickel-plated Colt Detective Special when he’s testing it at the firing range, but it’s the canonical Model 36 every other time it appears. Based on the #221316 serial number of the snub-nosed Model 36 that Travis purchases, it was likely manufactured sometime in the late 1950s or early ’60s.

Smith & Wesson Model 61 Escort

You interested in an automatic? It’s a Colt .25 automatic. It’s a nice little gun, it’s a beautiful little gun. Holds six shots in the clip, one shot in the chamber… that’s if you’re dumb enough to put a round in chamber.

Andy surely breaks a gun dealer record for making the most errors in a single sales pitch, flubbing the manufacturer, caliber, capacity, and terminology… really only correctly describing the weapon as a “little gun”. (And he would probably get roasted on the r/CCW subreddit for his commentary against chambering a round as well!)

The “Colt .25 automatic” that Andy sells Travis for $125 is actually a Smith & Wesson Model 61 Escort, a subcompact semi-automatic pistol produced in the early 1970s, adapted from the much older design of the Bayard 1908 pistol in response to the Gun Control Act of 1968 that banned the importation of small, easily concealed handguns. The blowback-operated single-action pistol takes five rounds of .22 Long Rifle (.22 LR) in the magazine—not the six rounds of .25-caliber as described by Andy, who may also note that I said “magazine” instead of the more colloquial “clip”.

Around 65,000 were produced across the early ’70s in both blued- and nickel-plated finishes, though the Model 61 Escort gained a reputation for poor reliability and Smith & Wesson attempted to improve the design four times across its three-year production timeline—not a promising indicator of success. Most Escorts produced were blued, so Travis scored one of the approximately 6,600 finished in nickel.

Weighing less than a pound, the Model 61 Escort measures 4.69 inches long overall, with a barrel length just over two inches. Travis capitalizes on this compactness by eventually rigging his Escort to a sliding mechanism mounted to his forearm under the sleeve of his field jacket.

Yet another firearm-related continuity error shows a stainless Galesi-Brescia Brevetto 5 pistol when Travis lays out his handguns at the firing range, though he’s back to using the canonically correct Escort when firing it down range.

Astra Constable

The fourth and final handgun that Travis buys is described by Andy as a “.380 Walther, holds eight shots in the clip… a nice gun, a beautiful little gun… during World War II, they used this gun to replace the P38. Just gave it out to officers. Isn’t that a little honey?”

Sigh, Andy. We’ll cut him a break here, as the Astra Constable was at least designed as a Spanish-made clone of the Walther PPK, which Andy was actually describing and what was surely meant to be the weapon depicted on screen. (And, in yet another continuity error, actually is seen when Travis is at the shooting range.)

Though it may look like a Walther PPK at first glance, note the slightly different silhouette as well as “Astra Unceta y Cía—Guernica, Spain” clearly etched on the slide. Like the Walther PP and PPK, the Astra Constable was offered in .32 ACP, .380 ACP, and a limited run in .22 LR. The overall aesthetic, blowback operation, and traditional double-action trigger closely follow that of the older Walther design.

Travis purchases his Constable for $150, and it’s the only weapon he doesn’t have an intentional carry system for as he just chooses to keep the pistol in the waistband of his jeans, covered by his shirt. He uses it to shoot a convenience store robber, handing it to the owner to get rid of when he realizes he would get in trouble for his illegal possession of it, so he doesn’t still have it by the time he storms into Matthew’s brothel during the finale.

You can read more about the weaponry of Taxi Driver at IMFDB.

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What to Imbibe

Travis’ concerns about his dietary intake never exclude beer, as he downs plenty of Budweiser in his shabby apartment.

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How to Get the Look

Travis Bickle establishes his frontier-meets-fatigue image across the violent final act of Taxi Driver in his well-worn and authentically patched M-65 field jacket with mil-spec aviators, dark denim jeans, and cowboy boots, all concealing his one-man arsenal as he takes on the scum of the city.

• Olive-green (OG-107) cotton/nylon M-1965 U.S. Army-issue field jacket with rounded collar (with integrated zip-in hood), straight-zip closure with snap-front storm flap, four flapped pockets (with covered snaps), epaulets/shoulder straps, back shoulder pleats, and drawstring-cinched waist
• White poplin western shirt with point collar, pointed yokes, snap-up front placket, two double-snap “sawtooth”-flapped chest pockets, and triple-snap cuffs
• Dark indigo denim Lee 101 Rider jeans
• Dark russet-brown leather belt with silver 12-sided ornately detailed buckle with large pearl-like center-mounted stone
• Russet-brown leather cowboy boots with diamond-stitched shafts
• Gold square-framed Type HGU-4/P aviator sunglasses

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Do Yourself a Favor and…

Check out the movie.

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The Quote

Listen, you fuckers, you screwheads. Here is a man who would not take it anymore. A man who stood up against the scum, the cunts, the dogs, the filth, the shit. Here is a man who stood up!