Taxi Driver was only Schrader’s second script, after a never-produced Robert Bresson-style piece called Pipeliner. The first step towards getting it produced came while Schrader was writing freelance film criticism in Los Angeles.

“I did a review of Brian De Palma’s Sisters, which I liked,” he remembers. “I went to interview De Palma for an article and we struck up a friendship. I let him read Taxi Driver and he liked it a lot and wanted to do it.”

De Palma introduced Schrader to his producer neighbours, Michael and Julia Phillips. They'd just won the Oscar for The Sting, but still, progress was initially slow.

“At that time we couldn’t put the film together because we didn’t have the clout,” says Schrader. “There was a chance to do it with another actor – Jeff Bridges – but we just held out, and a year went by.”