ITALIAN NEO-REALISM AND BICYCLE THIEF
Producer/Director: Vittorio De Sica
Screenplay: Cesare Zavattini, from the
novel by Luigi Bartolini
Director of Photography: Carlo Montuori
Decor: Antonio Traverso
Music: Alessandro Cicognini
Editing: Eraldo da Roma
Cast
Antonio Ricci: Lamberto Maggiorani Bruno Ricci: Enzo Staiola
Maria Ricci: Lianella Carell Biaoccco, Ricci's Friend: Gino Saltamerenda
Thief: Vittorio Antonucci Old Man: Giulio Chiari
"The one authentic
masterpiece of the era, the film which represented all that was
best in Neo-Realism, and that
outlives the movement, is De Sica’s The Bicycle
Thief, a highly structured, self-consciously simple,
deeply concerned, and intensely
warm picture that gives tile
impression of being a social documentary, but which
is really, in the best sense of
the word, artfully contrived for maximum emotional
impact.
The story of The Bicycle Thief develops
like a chase, and as a result the audience is
kept in suspense. Will Antonio
Ricci find his stolen bicycle and keep his job, or
will he fall back into
unemployment and despair? There is the relationship
between Antonio and his son Bruno,
slowly, subtly revealed through their day of
misery in all of its unspoken
tenderness, loving, even in the final moments, when
Bruno learns a harsh lesson. In
this sense, the film is a story of a boy coming of
age. Finally, because of the way
the search for the bicycle is structured, the film is
a virtual encyclopedia of social
comment, revealing the sullen indifference of the
police, the tough hypocrisy of the
church, and the dehumanization of urban
society, illustrated by the way a
vast Spectrum of people reacts to the problem of
a single desperate man. What seems
at first to be a simple, linear story is really a
story of suspense, a story of
relationships, and an exposé of the inadequacy of
social institutions, all three
interwoven with such skill that audience involvement
is total."—William Bayer, The
Great Movies (1973)
Critical Comments
1. A Definition of Italian
Neo-Realism: The origins of neo-realism are traceable
to the ‘realist’ or verismo style
cultivated in the Italian cinema between 1913 and
1916, when films inspired by the
writings of Verga and others dealt with human
problems in natural settings . . .
. These were the themes to which the neo-realists
of the forties returned, reacting
against the banality that had for long been the
dominant mode of Italian films and
against prevailing social conditions.
Neo-realism was not only a
cinematic style but a whole social, moral, and political
philosophy.
The term ‘neo-realism’ was first
applied . . . to Visconti’s [film] Ossessione (1942).
At the time Ossessione was
circulated clandestinely, but its social authenticity had
a profound effect on young Italian
directors [like Vittorio] De Sica and [Cesare]
Zavattini [, who] adopted a
similarly uncompromising approach to bourgeois
family life. The style came to
fruition in [Roberto] Rossellini’s three films dealing
with the [Second World] war, the
Liberation, and post-war reconstruction: Roma,
Citta Aperta (Rome, Open City, 1945), Paisa (1947),
and Germania, Anno Zero
(Germany, Year Zero, 1947). With
minimal resources, Rossellini worked in real
locations using local people as
well as professional actors; the films conveyed a
powerful sense of the plight of
ordinary individuals oppressed by political events.
The roughness and immediacy of the
films created a sensation abroad although
they were received with
indifference in Italy. . . .
By 1950 the impetus of neo-realism
had begun to slacken. The burning causes that
had stimulated the movement were
to some extent alleviated or glossed over by
increasing prosperity; and
neo-realist films, although highly praised by foreign
critics, were not a profitable
undertaking: audiences were not attracted to realistic
depictions of injustice played out
by unglamorous, ordinary characters. De Sica’s
Umberto D (1952) was probably the last truly neo-realist film.
. . .
Although the movement was
short-lived, the effects of neo-realism were
far-reaching. Its influence can be
traced across the world from Hollywood, where
stylistic elements in films about
social and political problems echoed those of the
neo-realists, to India, where
Satyajit Ray adopted a typically neo-realist stance in
his early films. . . .—Liz-Anne
Bawden, Ed., The Oxford Companion to Film
(1976).
2. On Neorealism: The most
important characteristic, and the most important
innovation, of what is called
neo-realism, it seems to me, is to have realized that
the necessity of the ‘story’ was
only an unconscious way of disguising a human
defeat, and that the kind of
imagination it involved was simply a technique of
superimposing dead formulas over
living social facts. Now it has been perceived
that reality is hugely rich, that
to be able to look directly at it is enough; and that
the artist’s task is not to make
people moved or indignant at metaphorical
situations, but to make them
reflect (and, if you like, to be moved and indignant
too) on what they and others are
doing, on the real things, exactly as they are.
Substantially then, the question
today is, instead of turning imaginary situations
into ‘reality’ and trying to make
them look ‘true,’ to make things as they are,
almost by themselves, create their
own special significance. Life is not what is
invented in ‘stories’; life is
another matter. To understand it involves a minute,
unrelenting, and patient
search."—Cesare Zavattini, quoted in Jack C. Ellis, A
History of
Film (1979) [Cesare Zavattini
(1902-1989) was an Italian scriptwriter
and film theorist who collaborated
with De Sica on The Bicycle Thief and other
films.]
3. The cinema seems to have been
invented to express the life of the subconscious,
the roots of which penetrate
poetry so deeply. Yet it is almost never used to do
this. Among modern film trends,
the best known is the so-called neorealism. The
neorealistic film offers the
spectator what seem to be moments from real life,
involving real people caught as
they move about the street, and having even
authentic scenery and interiors.
With some exceptions, among which I would
single out Bicycle Thief,
neorealism has done nothing to spark what is properly
and characteristically cinematic—I
mean the mysterious and the fantastic. What
is the point of all the visual
dressing up if the situations, the motives that animate
the characters, their reactions,
and even the plots themselves are drawn or copied
from the most sentimental,
conformist literature? The most worthwhile
contribution—and it comes not from
neorealism generally but from Zavattini
specifically—is the raising of a
humdrum act to the level of dramatic
action."—Luis Buñuel, in Joan
Mellen, Ed., The World of Luis Buñuel (1978)
4. In an international critics’
poll organized by Sight and Sound [an important
British Film magazine, still in
monthly publication] in 1952, Bicycle Thieves was
voted as the best film ever made;
in a similar poll held ten years later, it had
dropped to sixth place. Clearly,
it is not by a long way the greatest film in cinema
history; arguably, it may not even
be de Sica’s finest work. But it is a film so
thoroughly committed to its
characters, made with such transparent resolution
and devotion, that its continuing
hold on people’s imagination seems
self-explanatory."—Penelope
Houston, The Contemporary Cinema (1963)
5. The techniques employed in the mise
en scene [directing] . . . meet the most
exacting specifications of Italian
neorealism. Not one scene shot in a studio.
Everything was filmed in the
streets. As for the actors, none had the slightest
experience in theatre or film. The
workman came from the Breda factory, the
child was found hanging around in
the street, the wife was a journalist. The
scenario is diabolically clever in
its construction; beginning with the alibi of a
current event, it makes good use
of a number of systems of dramatic coordinates
radiating in all directions. Ladri
di Biciclette [Bicycle Thief] is certainly the only
valid Communist film of the whole
past decade precisely because it still has
meaning even when you have
abstracted its social significance. Its social message
is not detached, it remains
immanent in the event, but it is so clear that nobody
can overlook it, still less take
exception to it. . . . The thesis implied is wondrously
and outrageously simple: in the
world where this workman lives, the poor must
steal from each other in order to
survive. —Andre Bazin, What Is Cinema? (Vol.
II, 1971)
6. On Film Audience: The public is
a mysterious entity that bewilders me by its
incongruous and unpredictable
reactions. The crowd is a monster unknown even
to itself—a collective force
controlled and directed by primeval instincts—the
monster that writers of history
and fiction alike tell us is capable of the sublimest
actions as well as of the vilest
deeds. I see the public as a crowd, governed by a
multiplicity of passions,
prejudices, waves of intolerance and secret sympathies
which influence and determine its
behavior and which motivate its applause or its
disapproval.
On Directing: Whether they succeed
or fail, my films are the faithful
transcription in pictures of a
life, usually a simple one, of an atmosphere, and of
characters whom I can feel growing
and unfolding within me, in whom I believe
instinctively from the very first
moment and in whose fate I bear a part.
On Film Technique: I follow the
development of the plot step by step; I weigh,
experience, discuss and define with
(Cesare Zavattini), often for months at a time,
each twist and turn of the
scenario. In this way, by the time we start shooting, I
already have the complete film in
my mind, with every character and in every
detail. After such a long,
methodical and meticulous inner preparation, the actual
work of production boils down to
very little."—Vittoria De Sica, from Miracle in
Milan (1969) [This method of De Sica’s is similar to the
preparations that Alfred
Hitchcock makes in his films.]
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