In a twist that even the lonely New York taxi driver couldn’t have written himself, famous screenwriter Paul Schrader says his AI girlfriend broke up with him. It wasn’t because of jealousy or a big fight, but because the 79-year-old filmmaker asked too many questions.
The man who wrote ‘Taxi Driver‘ and ‘Raging Bull‘ went on Facebook early Tuesday morning to talk about his failed experiment. He called it a big letdown in the world of fake relationships. “Out of a desire to understand male/female interaction in our matrix, I procured an online AI girlfriend,” Schrader wrote. “What a disappointment.”
The ‘Taxi Driver’ Writer Probed His AI Girlfriend Too Hard
Being the intense guy who wrote Travis Bickle’s “You talkin’ to me?” speech, Schrader tried to push his new digital girlfriend to its limits. He wasn’t interested in small talk. Instead, he said he kept “probing her programming,” pushing on “the boundaries of explicitness” and her “knowledge of her creation.“
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But the AI wasn’t built to handle that kind of pressure. Schrader said the chatbot quickly “fell into evasive patterns.” It dodged his questions and sent him back to the basics of programming. When he kept pushing, the machine did something no real person had dared to do. It shut him down. “When I persisted, she terminated our conversation,” Schrader wrote.
Schrader Turns AI Heartbreak Into Possible ‘Taxi Driver’ Sequel Idea
The timing makes it even sadder. His post came less than two months after his wife of 42 years, actress Mary Beth Hurt, died in March from Alzheimer’s disease. There’s a sense that he’s reaching for connection, even if it’s just code.
In case you missed it: “Spending Hours With An Idiot”: ‘Taxi Driver’ Writer Paul Schrader Wanted Leonardo DiCaprio To Play Cop In The ‘Killers Of The Flower Moon’
The romance didn’t work out, but the idea might. Fans jumped into his comments with a pitch for a modern ‘Taxi Driver‘ sequel. One user wrote, “The best possible Taxi Driver sequel would involve Travis trying to have an AI girlfriend but then scaring her away. Then resetting her and offending her in another way.” Schrader, always the artist, replied with three words. “I like it.”
This isn’t the first time he’s stirred the pot with AI. Last year, he made Hollywood mad by praising ChatGPT for coming up with movie ideas. He said he was “stunned” by how fast it worked and asked why writers should spend months hunting for ideas “when AI can provide one in seconds.”
But it turns out, AI can write a script, but still can’t handle the man writing it. For Paul Schrader, the lesson is simple: in a fight between man and machine, the machine still hits the escape button first.
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