Character name: Travis Bickle
Appears in: Taxi Driver
Date(s): 1976
Award(s): NSFC and NYFCC Award for Best Actor
| | Character back story: Travis is a frustrated Vietnam vet who works as a cab driver. He has paranoid delusions of urban decay and has a thirst for violence. He works double-shifts, lives in a shoddy tenement, writes in his diary and otherwise scowls at a world he can barely see through the filth and depravity he's forced to interact with. | | Inspiration for character: Arthur Bremer, who shot U.S Democratic presidential candidate George Corley Wallace on May 15, 1972. | | Age: 26 | | Personality type: | | Occupation: Taxi driver | | Signature look: | | Resides: Manhattan, USA | | Character connections: | | Fun facts/trivia: The scene where Travis Bickle is talking to himself in the mirror was completely ad-libbed by Robert DeNiro. The screenplay details just said "Travis looks in the mirror". Martin Scorsese claims that he got the inspiration for the scene from Marlon Brando mouthing words in front of a mirror "Reflections In A Golden Eye" (1967). | |
| Character Quotes & Catchphrases | - "You talkin' to me? You talkin' to me? You talkin' to me? Then who the hell else are you talkin' to? You talkin' to me? Well I'm the only one here. Who the fuck do you think you're talking to?
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Character name: Jake LaMotta
Appears in: Raging Bull
Date(s): 1980
Award(s): Oscar and Golden Globe Award for Best Actor | Character back story: Jake is a talented and determined fighter from the Bronx, and his brother Joey is his manager. Jake slowly climbs the ladder to the top of the boxing world (due to numerous setbacks mostly involving his personal life and weight problems), and courts Vicki, a 15 year old girl he meets in his neighborhood. After his first wife leaves, he starts a relationship with her which eventually leads to marriage and children.
As a boxer, Jake is promising but headstrong. He takes punches well, and fights with passion, but he refuses to curry favor with the mobsters who control boxing. | | Inspiration for character: Boxer Jake LaMotta | | Occupation: Boxer | | Personality type: | | Signature look: | | Resides: | | Character connections: | | Fun facts/trivia: | |
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Character name: Vito Corleone
Appears in: The Godfather: Part II
Date(s): 1974
Award(s): Oscar for Best Actor in a Supporting Role | | Character back story: Vito appears in 1901 as a young boy in the small Sicilian town of Corleone. His father, Antonio Andolini, is murdered by the local Mafia boss, Don Ciccio, because he refused to pay tribute to him. His older brother, Paolo, swears revenge, but is himself murdered soon after. Eventually, Ciccio's henchmen come to the residence of the Andolini's to take Vito away and have him killed. Desperate, Signora Andolini takes her son to see the mafia chieftain herself. | | Inspiration for character: | | Age: 25-33 | | Personality type: | | Signature look: | | Resides: Corleone, Sicily | | Character connections: | | Fun facts/trivia: | |
| Character Quotes & Catchphrases | - "I make him an offer he don't refuse."
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Character name: Michael Vronsky
Appears in: The Deer Hunter
Date(s): 1978
Award(s): | | Character back story: | | Inspiration for character: | | Age/Occupation: | | Personality type: | | Signature look: | | Resides: | | Character connections: | | Fun facts/trivia: | |
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