I loved “The Metal Children”!! I couldn’t put the book down once: I read it in one sitting, tuning out the clamor in my house because I was so fascinated by the story.

In the play Vera tells Tobin “the novelist might be the only true cultural revolutionary left in America”. Vera is only sixteen and yet her words display more maturity than many characters in the play.

When first asked to do this assignment I assumed I would compare Vera to Travis of Taxi Driver (even though I know that Vera is not the protagonist of the play).

It just made more sense to me. Both characters are rebellious and are decided on the path with which they will achieve their goals. Tobin on the other hand appears to be so passive that at some points it disgusts me (as when he impregnates Vera). However, I digress. The more I think about it, there are a few similarities between the two characters.

Tobin, the protagonist of “The Metal Children” is a writer who is stuck. When we are first introduced to him we see that he is a liar, indifferent and a mess. Yet when we learn that his wife has left him we begin to pity him. However, Tobin is still very passive and shows little concern for the problems his book has caused. He does not even want to go to Midlothia to defend his book.

Throughout the play Tobin does not take a stand against anything; he is unsure of where he what path his life will take right up until the last scene of the play when he has finished writing a new novel. He has cleaned up his life and lost weight. Tobin’s tears at the end of the play shows that he finally cares for something.

In contrast, in the movie Taxi Driver I felt biased against Travis from the beginning. He was always alone, and the dirty colors and sad music that was supposed to draw me into his world only made me want to separate from it. Like Tobin, at first Travis is indifferent to the crimes he witnesses daily. He later becomes motivated to do what most people find hard to do: take action to better his own life and his environment. He does this by exercising to increase his strength and purchasing guns to make himself feel more powerful. In the movie he changes from passive to active, killing robbers and pimps to clean up the streets. He does not do this to impress Betsey or even for fame. He acts because he feels that he must, that it is his purpose in life.

Tobin reacts to authority by doing what he is good at: he writes. Although he did not write The Metal Children to criticize authority, his writing gives him a voice. His new novel at the end of the play is a criticism on consumerism. In real life Tobin is not out spoken, nor does he take action physically as Travis does. Instead Tobin uses his writing to tackle problems of society.

A common theme displayed by both characters is man’s strong desire to make a difference in the world. Both characters do so in a different way. Tobin makes a difference by writing while Travis helps Iris get her old life back.

Another theme the two works share is that in isolation one views society differently and is able to recognize its flaws. Travis is a loner: no one relates to him or understands him. Tobin is also alone; even though people often surround him they do not appear to understand him.

Also an important theme both works share is in individual’s responsibility of reforming society. As an artist, the author must inform the reader about what needs to be changed in a society. Once a good story impacts them, they are the ones who will take action. This also relates to Travis because he realizes he has a responsibility as he attempts to change his world. It’s like those Salvation Army people used to scream at me when I was younger, “only YOU can make a difference!”

What really is the difference between a movie and play? Both have a text.  Both have themes, symbols, and characters. Both have specific scenes and imagery. I will sometimes watch a movie and analyze it as though it were a book, by paying attention to little nuances or to specific language.  To quote Vera, from “The Metal Children,” as she so wonderfully paraphrases Shakespeare,  “…storytelling’s function, whether is be spoken by the mouths of actors on a stage or discovered in the pages of books, is not to simply entertain…but… to help us understand the complexity and confounding realities of what it means to be human.” Whether it be through writing a play, directing a movie, or acting in one, Adam Rapp, Martin Scorsese, and Robert de Niro each embody this notion of telling a story in order to shed light on the intricacies of reality and the complexities of man.

These ideas are really what make “The Metal Children” and “Taxi Driver” each so raw and filled with reality. Normally in a movie or play, there will be this ideal hero, with all the characteristic, heroic qualities. Shiny hair, great body, gets all the girls, basically a Greek god. What I found interesting about these works is that each of their stories center around a fallible character.  In the “Metal Children,” I see Tobin’s main flaw to be his passivity as a person. His wife left him and he just mopes around instead of getting his life back together. He has a book due to be written; yet he is unable to write it by his deadline because his is completely paralyzed from his own despair. His aggressive manager is merely used as a foil to highlight Tobin’s own passivity. All these things build up to the moment he visits Midlothia, the town that wants to ban his book. Yet, the moment he gets there, instead of having some classic epiphany and becoming a hero, he is, shocker, still passive. He does essentially nothing when he is vandalized and has the same reaction when he gets beat up one night. His response to the authority of this town is no different. He does not make any extra effort to stand up to them. He just does what he came to do. Speak about his book. As a writer all the action is up in Tobin’s head, never materialized.

Even though on the outset they may seem like completely different characters, I think Tobin and Travis are actually really similar. The beginning of the movie Travis says in a voice over that he wanted to drive a cab because he wanted long hours. The fact that he just sits in his cab and drives around all days makes him extremely passive. In his taxi he is a people watcher.  When people come in, he does not interact with the people he picks up. The most his does is look in his mirror.

Unlike Tobin, Travis has a rough interior that begins to germinate into something more as the movie progresses. He argues with Betsy’s campaign friend after she dumps him. And he boldly tries to get the 12-year-old prostitute, played by Jodie Foster, to flee her predicament. Unlike Tobin, Travis wishes to emerge from his own shadows and be noticed.

The theme of society vs. individual, of being a loner vs. part of a community, is what unites “Taxi Driver” and “The Metal Children” the most. Both characters are loners in their own right. Each one separated from their immediate surroundings. The Beginning scenes in “Taxi Driver” perfectly depict Travis as a loner. Walking the empty streets on his own, living alone, Travis is isolated. The audience can feel this by the way the camera is always inside the cab. Travis is stuck in his own world.

Tobin also is trapped. The part of the play that depicts his daily life only takes place in his apartment. To me, there is no better isolation that being constantly homebound.  Travis though, ends up taking action. His practice in front of his mirror actually comes to fruition. Tobin’s last action in the play is crying alone in his apartment.

Normally this would be the end of my blog, but last night I watched a really great movie called “A Single Man,” directed by designer Tom Ford. It was really interesting because he used eyes in his film similar to the way Scorsese uses eyes in “Taxi Driver”.  He always narrows in on people’s eyes and when the main character is in the car, Ford focuses on his eyes in the mirror, just like Scorsese does with Travis.

Something else to note, is that I felt a similar pain and excitement about Colin Firth’s performance in “A Single Man,” that I felt while watching de Niro in “Taxi Driver.” When an actor makes his character seem so real, so raw, so fallible, I feel it much deeper than I do with a typical acting performance. These kinds of performances make me want to act myself. They make actors seem like they understand something more about living and about man’s existence.

The Metal Children was an amazing play to read.  I just couldn’t put it down.  And Taxi Driver was equally amazing. I totally understand why its one of the greatest and most influential movies.

The Metal Children and Taxi Driver both have protagonists who are thought of in a positive light- the Metal Children’s Tobin was a Young Adult author whose book was taught in the school curriculum and considered one of the greats.

It was pretty comical because whenever Stacey Kinsella or Vera discussed the intricate symbolism and hidden meanings in his book, Tobin had no idea what they were talking about.  I especially liked this part because in English class throughout high school we would always analyze classics and discuss what hidden meaning the author meant to reveal or what symbolism/ analogies he used and we would always wonder- what if we are reading too much into it?  How do we know the author meant anything by it at all?  Maybe we are wasting our time analyzing this book that wasn’t meant to be analyzed.  And that’s exactly what happened in The Metal Children.  Tobin wrote this book which was interpreted, analyzed, studied and declared one of the greatest pieces of Young Adult literature, when really Tobin had written the book when he was high on drugs and didn’t mean anything deeper in his writing.

Similarly in Taxi Driver, Travis Bickle searched to give his life meaning and a higher purpose than just driving taxis and watching all the scum- the pimps, prostitutes and hustlers who come out at night.  He is not in his right mind and becomes fixated on Senator Palandine, who was running for president, and made it his life purpose to assassinate Palandine.  When the time came to assassinate him, Travis’ plan was thwarted by the Secret Service and he just barely escaped.  He went psycho and started popping pills and drinking alcohol, and transferred his fixation onto a different mission.  He didn’t care- maybe it wouldn’t be Paladine, but he knew he would be killing people tonight.  He went to the prostitute house where Iris worked and killed a few people there (the pimps).  He was written up in the papers and hailed as a hero who killed the bad guys and freed Iris, a helpless twelve year old girl caught up in the prostitute business.

Both of these guys- Travis and Tobin- are perceived as heroes and geniuses, when in reality, they were just two messed up guys with troubled lives.  If they had known Tobin had written the book while high, would they have cared enough to even read it, let alone make it a Bestseller and add it to a high school curriculum?  Of course not- it would have been thought of as garbage.  And if the public had known that Travis wanted and attempted to assassinate Palandine, would he be hailed as a hero?  Of course not.

Both The Metal Children and Taxi Driver show the power of perception and misinterpretation.  Travis is a perceived as a hero because his actions were misinterpreted, and Tobin is considered a literary genius because his intentions were misread, too.