THE LOOP — DePaul University will hold a screening of the '70s film classic "Taxi Driver" on its Loop campus Friday, followed by a talk by screenwriter Paul Schrader.
Schrader will be in town as part of DePaul's 2017 Visiting Artist Series.
"Paul Schrader is part of the 1970s film-school generation of filmmakers who revolutionized modern American cinema,” said Gary Novak, associate professor and director of the School of Cinematic Arts in DePaul’s College of Computing and Digital Media.
Not to limit Schrader's conversation with the audience to religion, but it provides a strong current in his work. Raised a strict Calvinist, Schrader didn't see a movie until he was 17, but went on to study film in college.
He wrote "Taxi Driver" for director Martin Scorsese, and they went on to work together on "Raging Bull" as well as "The Last Temptation of Christ."
Schrader tried his hand as a director with the class-conscious workplace drama "Blue Collar" and "Hard Core," about a Calvinist played by George C. Scott searching for his lost daughter in the pornography industry. Schrader discussed the film and his career in a 1978 interview with Roger Ebert.
Interestingly, Jodie Foster's character of Iris in "Taxi Driver" is also a runaway child.
"Taxi Driver" starts at 5 p.m. Friday in the CDM Theater, 247 S. State St., Lower Level Room 105, immediately followed by Schrader's onstage conversation with the audience. The event is free, but sold out.
But Schrader's "Affliction" runs at 7 p.m. Thursday in the CDM Theater, also free as part of the Visiting Artist Series. His Yukio Mishima biopic "Mishima" ran earlier in the week.
