Quotes

Travis Bickle: You're only as healthy as you feel.

Travis Bickle: I realize now how much she's just like the others, cold and distant, and many people are like that, women for sure, they're like a union.

Travis Bickle: I first saw her at Palantine Campaign headquarters at 63rd and Broadway. She was wearing a white dress. She appeared like an angel. Out of this filthy mess, she is alone. They... cannot... touch... her.

Travis Bickle: I'll tell you why. I think you're a lonely person. I drive by this place a lot and I see you here. I see a lot of people around you. And I see all these phones and all this stuff on your desk. It means nothing. Then when I came inside and I met you, I saw in your eyes and I saw the way you carried yourself that you're not a happy person. And I think you need something. And if you want to call it a friend, you can call it a friend.

Betsy: Are you gonna be my friend?

Travis Bickle: Yeah.

Travis Bickle: June twenty-ninth. I gotta get in shape. Too much sitting has ruined my body. Too much abuse has gone on for too long. From now on there will be 50 pushups each morning, 50 pullups. There will be no more pills, no more bad food, no more destroyers of my body. From now on will be total organization. Every muscle must be tight.

Travis Bickle: Now I see this clearly. My whole life is pointed in one direction. There never has been a choice for me.

Travis Bickle: Each night when I return the cab to the garage, I have to clean the cum off the back seat. Some nights, I clean off the blood.

Wizard: You get a job. You become the job.

Betsy: You know what you remind me of?

Travis Bickle: What?

Betsy: That song by Kris Kristofferson.

Travis Bickle: Who's that?

Betsy: A songwriter. 'He's a prophet... he's a prophet and a pusher, partly truth, partly fiction. A walking contradiction.'

Travis Bickle: [uneasily] You sayin' that about me?

Betsy: Who else would I be talkin' about?

Travis Bickle: I'm no pusher. I never have pushed.

Betsy: No, no. Just the part about the contradictions. You are that.

Travis Bickle: Loneliness has followed me my whole life. Everywhere. In bars, in cars, sidewalks, stores, everywhere. There's no escape. I'm God's lonely man... June 8th. My life has taken another turn again. The days can go on with regularity over and over, one day indistinguishable from the next. A long continuous chain. Then suddenly, there is a change.

Travis Bickle: I would say he has quite a few problems. His energy seems to go in the wrong places. When I walked in and I saw you two sitting there, I could just tell by the way you were both relating that there was no connection whatsoever. And I felt when I walked in that there was something between us. There was an impulse that we were both following. So that gave me the right to come in and talk to you. Otherwise I never would have felt that I had the right to talk to you or say anything to you. I never would have had the courage to talk to you. And with him I felt there was nothing and I could sense it. When I walked in, I knew I was right. Did you feel that way?

Betsy: I wouldn't be here if I didn't.

Iris: God, you're square.

Travis Bickle: Hey, I'm not square, you're the one that's square. You're full of shit, man. What are you talking about? You walk out with those fuckin' creeps and low-lifes and degenerates out on the streets and you sell your little pussy for peanuts? For some low-life pimp who stands in the hall? And I'm square? You're the one that's square, man. I don't go screwing fuck with a bunch of killers and junkies like you do. You call that bein' hip? What world are you from?

Betsy: Taking me to a place like this is about as exciting as saying to me "Let's fuck."

Travis Bickle: [walks up to Sport] Hey Sport. How ya doin'?

Sport: Okay, okay my man, how... Where do I know you from, man?

Travis Bickle: I don't know. How's everything in the pimp business, huh?

Sport: Do I know you?

Travis Bickle: No. Do I know you?

Sport: Get outta here. Come on, get lost, huh.

Travis Bickle: Do I know you? How's Iris? You know Iris.

Sport: No, I don't know nobody name Iris. Iris? Come on, get outta here, man.

Travis Bickle: You don't know anybody by the name of Iris?

Sport: I don't know nobody name Iris!

Travis Bickle: No?

Sport: Hey, go back to your fuckin' tribe before you get hurt, huh man. Do me a favor, I don't want no trouble, huh. Okay?

Travis Bickle: You got a gun?

Sport: Get the fuck outta here, man.

[flicks his cigarette at him]

Sport: Get outta here.

[kicks him]

Travis Bickle: Suck on this.

[Travis shoots him with a revolver in the stomach and walks away]

Travis Bickle: Let me tell you something. You're in a hell, and you're gonna die in a hell, just like the rest of 'em!

Travis Bickle: May 10th. Thank God for the rain which has helped wash away the garbage and trash off the sidewalks. I'm workin' long hours now, six in the afternoon to six in the morning. Sometimes even eight in the morning, six days a week. Sometimes seven days a week. It's a long hustle but it keeps me real busy. I can take in three, three fifty a week. Sometimes even more when I do it off the meter. All the animals come out at night - whores, skunk pussies, buggers, queens, fairies, dopers, junkies, sick, venal. Someday a real rain will come and wash all this scum off the streets. I go all over. I take people to the Bronx, Brooklyn, I take 'em to Harlem. I don't care. Don't make no difference to me. It does to some. Some won't even take spooks. Don't make no difference to me.

Sport: Well, take it or leave it. If you want to save yourself some money, don't fuck her. Cause you'll be back here every night for some more. Man, she's twelve and a half years old. You never had no pussy like that. You can do anything you want with her. You can cum on her, fuck her in the mouth, fuck her in the ass, cum on her face, man. She get your cock so hard she'll make it explode. But no rough stuff, all right?

Sport: I once had a horse, on Coney Island. She got hit by a car.

Passenger: Have you ever seen what a .44 Magnum will do to a woman's pussy? Now that you should see. What a .44 Magnum will do to a woman's pussy that you should see?

Personnel Officer: So what is it? Why do you want to be a taxi driver? Do you need a second job? Are you moonlighting?

Travis Bickle: I... I just want to work long hours. What's moonlighting?

Travis Bickle: Now I see it clearly. My whole life is pointed in one direction. I see that now. There never has been any choice for me.

Street drummer: Now back to Gene Krupa's syncopated style

Travis Bickle: You got a .44 magnum?

Andy, Gun Salesman: It's an expensive weapon.

Travis Bickle: That's all right. I got money.

Andy, Gun Salesman: It's a real monster. It'll stop a car at a hundred yards. Put a round right through the engine block.

Travis Bickle: Loneliness has followed me my whole life. Everywhere. In bars, in cars, sidewalks, stores, everywhere. There's no escape. I'm God's lonely man.

Travis Bickle: Dear Father and Mother: July is the month I remember which brings not only your wedding anniversary but also Father's Day and Mother's birthday. I'm sorry I can't remember the exact dates, but I hope this card will take care of them all. I'm sorry again I cannot send you my address like I promised to last year. But the sensitive nature of my work for the government demands utmost secrecy. I know you will understand. I am healthy and well and making lots of money. I have been going with a girl for several months and I know you would be proud if you could see her. Her name is Betsy but I can tell you no more than that... I hope this card finds you all well as it does me. I hope no one has died. Don't worry about me. One day, they'll be a knock on the door and it'll be me. Love Travis.

Doughboy: Sometimes, I like to hold a midget.

Travis Bickle: All my life needed was a sense of someplace to go. I don't believe that one should devote his life to morbid self-attention. I believe that someone should become a person like other people.

Travis Bickle: You're a young girl, you should be at home. You should be dressed up, going out with boys, going to school, you know, that kind of stuff.

Passenger: [to Travis] You see that window with the light? The one closet to the edge of the building? you know who lives there? Of course you don't know who lives there, but I'm saying "Do you know who lives there?" A Nigger lives there, and that isn't my apartment. My wife is in there and... I'm gonna kill her.

[laughs]

Passenger: I'm gonna kill her with a .44 Magnum.

Travis Bickle: Twelve hours of work and I still can't sleep. Damn. Days go on and on. They don't end.

Sport: See ya later, copper!

Travis Bickle: I'm no cop, man.

Sport: Well, if you are, then it's entrapment already.

Travis Bickle: I called Betsy again at her office and she said maybe we'd go to a movie together after she gets off work tomorrow. That's my day off. At first she hesitated but I called her again and then she agreed. Betsy, Betsy. Oh no, Betsy what? I forgot to ask her last name again. Damn. I got to remember stuff like that.

Travis Bickle: June 29th. I gotta get in shape now. Too much sittin' is ruinin' my body. Too much abuse has gone on for too long. From now on, it will be fifty push-ups each morning, fifty pull-ups. There'll be no more pills, there'll be no more bad food, no more destroyers of my body. From now on, it will be total organization. Every muscle must be tight.

Travis Bickle: Dear Iris: This money should be used for your trip. By the time you read this, I will be dead. Travis.

Senator Charles Palantine: We meet at a crossroads in history. No longer will the wrong roads be taken.