Rating summary

Movie		4.0
Video		4.5
Audio		4.5
Extras		0.5
Overall		4.0

A Taxi Driver Blu-ray Movie Review

Reviewed by Jeffrey Kauffman April 18, 2018

What a difference a little indefinite article can make. A Taxi Driver without that “A” would be, well, Taxi Driver, and while there’s a certain urban grittiness to both films, they otherwise couldn’t be more different. A Taxi Driver purports to be based on true events, and as evidenced by a rather touching brief reminiscence during the final credits by a German journalist named Jürgen Hinzpeter (portrayed by Thomas Kretschmann in the actual film), at least the broad outlines of the story are obviously factual. A Taxi Driver couldn’t be more relevant in a way considering how much Korea has been in the news lately, despite the fact that this particular story takes place in 1980. As some introductory text explanations which begin the film offer, the South Korea of that era was fraught with political discord, with a dictatorship giving way to a military coup that may in fact remind some folks of at least some of the political underpinnings of North Korea. In a rather startling tonal detour (something this film rather artfully maneuvers through at various subsequent points), after this dour setup, the film becomes almost whimsical as it details some adventures of Seoul taxi driver Kim Man-seob (Song Kang-ho).

Man-seob drives a pretty ratty looking lime green compact which has obviously seen better days, but which is his pride and joy, at least in the mechanical department. After a raucous opening that sees him caught up in some of the political discord but still able to get an expectant mother in labor to her appointed rounds at the maternity ward before it’s too late, the film once again traverses from almost slapstick comedy to some heartfelt emotion as it reveals that Man-seob’s real pride and joy is his spunky daughter Eun-jeong (Yoo Eun-mi), a sweet little girl who nonetheless doesn’t suffer fools gladly, which has led to some knock down drag out fights with the little boy next door, who unfortunately for Man-seob turns out to be the son of his landlord and landlady.

Already A Taxi Driver is piling on untold amounts of character data and interrelationships, with an added element being that Man-seob is a widower and is attempting to raise Eun-jeong himself, despite a career which is hardly paying the rent (it isn’t, actually), let alone anything else. So what does all of this have to do with an incipient South Korean revolution and a Fascistic government response? Hinzpeter travels to South Korea in the wake of some of the violence and decides to concentrate his investigative journalism efforts on a town called Gwangju, which has more or less completely gone off the grid over the past few days, to the point that the government is completely censoring the local newspaper and all phone lines have been cut (remember, this was far in advance of the internet age). In a bit of subterfuge, when Man-seob overhears that Hinzpeter is offering a princely sum for a ride to the town, and back out again before curfew, he steps in as Hinzpeter’s appointed driver. That sets the film off on a rather interesting “road trip” which ultimately tips over into horror of a sociopolitical variety.

The so-called Gwangju Uprising was the subject of 2007’s May 18, but the same sociopolitical aspect is approached kind of sideways as it were in this film, with the real emphasis in the early going on the establishment of the character of Man-seob. Song’s performance falls just short of the cartoonish at times, but rather strangely that silliness actually tends to work, providing an ultimately chilling counterpart to the violence the character ends up witnessing first hand. While the film’s screenplay attempts to color in Hinzpeter’s character in at least somewhat the same way, Hinzpeter really serves more as a catalyst than a focal feature, which also does the story’s overall arc no real harm.

Instead, A Taxi Driver navigates its own perilous journey of sorts as it documents Man-seob and Hinzpeter having to resort to off the grid routes and a bit of chicanery to reach their goal, only to see what seems like a celebratory atmosphere of college “radicals” fighting The Man turn into a scene of carnage. I read up a bit on the Gwangju Uprising in preparation for the writing of this review, and it seems that one of the more outlandish elements in this story, namely taxi drivers responding en masse as a protective force against government bullets, is actually based on fact. That gives the film a hyperbolic aspect that is perhaps only topped by another sequence (which I kind of suspect might have been at least partially “dramatized”) of our intrepid heroes basically outrunning a battalion.

While the above description at least touches on most of the major plot points in A Taxi Driver, what continually surprises, delights, shocks and/or touches (depending on the moment) is the attention to detail in any number of seemingly inconsequential vignettes. Therefore, the early circumlocution of Man-seob’s life with his adorable if scrappy daughter deals with bullying, how to react, and a wonderfully real feeling interchange with his landlady, who shows him her wounded son. The whole relationship between Man-seob and Eun-jeong takes just a few minutes of screentime, but it’s perfectly realized, especially in the incredibly sweet wrap up where Man-seob compares his daughter, who is urging him to work on a holiday since there will be more fares, to his late wife.

It’s in this unexpected viscerally emotional ambience that A Taxi Driver repeatedly finds a powerful voice. The story has a number of seeming detours, and in a way its central focus of a march toward democracy almost exists as a subplot, since the journey Man-seob takes is at least as riveting.

A Taxi Driver Blu-ray Movie, Video Quality 

A Taxi Driver is presented on Blu-ray courtesy of Well Go USA with an AVC encoded 1080p transfer in 2.39:1. The IMDb lists Arri Alexa Minis and a 2K DI as the technical specs on this production, and this has a really nicely sharp and well detailed presentation virtually across the board. There are some interesting grading choices going on, with the bulk of the first part of the film, and then several interstitial later sequences, being bathed in a kind of combo yellow-green tone which tends to emphasize elements like Man-seob's shirt, his cab, and the surrounding foliage. While the palette doesn't look exactly "natural" in these moments, detail levels are actually quite good. Later sequences, especially after the unrest is more thoroughly depicted, can be skewed toward blue or orange-red, and here fine detail levels do take at least a bit of a hit. Some of the CGI in the riot sequences is not especially convincing, and many of these scenes are almost opaque looking due to things like teargas cannisters exploding and other signs of carnage. Aside from the Well Go USA masthead, I didn't notice any moments of banding.

A Taxi Driver Blu-ray Movie, Audio Quality 

A Taxi Driver offers a nicely immersive DTS-HD Master Audio 5.1 track in the original Korean. A busy urban environment in the film's opening sequences provides good use of the surrounds to establish the hustle and bustle of city life, while the later "road trip" sequences offer at least passing moments of ambient environmental effects as the focal pair gets out and about. It's the last part of the film where the soundtrack really kicks into high gear, though, as some frightening skirmishes take place. Dialogue is always presented cleanly and clearly and the film's often kind of oddly lilting score also spreads nicely through the side and rear channels.

A Taxi Driver Blu-ray Movie, Special Features and Extras 

• Trailer (1080p; 1:54)

Note: As tends to be the case with Well Go USA releases, the disc has been authored so that this sole supplement is automatically followed by trailers for other Well Go USA releases. Those same other trailers also play at disc boot up.

A Taxi Driver Blu-ray Movie, Overall Score and Recommendation 

South Korea evidently entered A Taxi Driver as its selection for this past year's Best Foreign Language Film Academy Award, though it wasn't shortlisted for actual nomination. I was really quite taken with this effort, not only for the (apparently mostly true) history it provides, but more importantly for the rather incredible character of Man-seob. As stated above, the film closes with a really moving appeal from the real life Hinzpeter attempting to reunite with his long lost taxi driver, something that evidently didn't happen before Hinzpeter died. Online sources suggest that a post-mortem reunion (so to speak) was delivered by this film itself, one whose fame alerted the real life Man-seob's surviving son. Highly recommended.