   #copyright

Bicycle Thieves

2007 Schools Wikipedia Selection. Related subjects: Films

                              Bicycle Thieves
     Directed by   Vittorio De Sica
     Produced by   Giuseppe Amato
     Written by    Vittorio De Sica
                   Cesare Zavattini
                   Suso Cecchi D'Amico
                   Gerardo Guerrieri
                   Cesare Zavattini (story)
                   Luigi Bartolini (novel)
      Starring     Lamberto Maggiorani
                   Enzo Staiola
      Music by     Alessandro Cicognini
   Cinematography  Carlo Montuori
     Editing by    Eraldo Da Roma
   Distributed by  Flag of Italy Ente Nazionale Industrie Cinematografiche
                   Flag of United States Arthur Mayer & Joseph Burstyn
   Release date(s) Flag of Italy November 24, 1948
                   Flag of United States December 12, 1949
    Running time   93 min
       Country     Italy
      Language     Italian
                                IMDb profile

   Ladri di biciclette is a 1948 Italian neorealist film directed by
   Vittorio De Sica. It was released as The Bicycle Thief in the USA and
   as Bicycle Thieves in the UK. It tells the story of a poor man
   searching the streets of Rome for his stolen bicycle, which he needs to
   be able to work. The film is based on the novel of the same name by
   Luigi Bartolini and was adapted for the screen by Cesare Zavattini. It
   stars Lamberto Maggiorani as the father and Enzo Staiola as the son.

Title

   Spoiler warning: Plot and/or ending details follow.

   The original Italian title of the film is literally translated into
   English as Bicycle Thieves, but the film has also been released in the
   USA as The Bicycle Thief. According to critic Philip French of The
   Observer, this alternate title is misleading, "because the desperate
   hero eventually becomes himself a bicycle thief."

Plot summary

   The film tells the story of Antonio Ricci, an unemployed worker who
   gets a job posting flyers in the depressed post-World War II economy of
   Italy. To keep the job, he must have a bicycle, so his wife Maria pawns
   her wedding sheets to get the money to get his bicycle from the
   pawnbroker. Early in the film, the bike is stolen, and Antonio and his
   son Bruno spend the remainder of the film searching for it. Antonio
   manages to locate the thief (who had already sold the bicycle) and
   summons the police, but with no proof and with the thief’s neighbors
   willing to give him a false alibi, he abandons this cause. At the end
   of the film Antonio, desperate to keep his job, attempts to steal a
   bicycle himself. He is caught and humiliated in front of Bruno, but the
   owner of the bicycle declines to press charges, realizing that the
   humiliation is punishment enough. Antonio and his family face a bleak
   future as the film ends, coupled with Antonio's realization that he is
   not morally superior to the thief.
   Spoilers end here.

Style

   Bicycle Thieves is the best known neorealist film, a movement begun by
   Luchino Visconti's Ossessione ( 1943), which attempted to give a new
   degree of realism to cinema. Following the precepts of the movement, De
   Sica shot only on location in Rome, and instead of professional actors
   used ordinary people with no training in performance; for example,
   Lamberto Maggiorani, the leading actor, was a factory worker. The
   documentary-style camera work helped convey the feeling that the film
   is truly about real people.

Awards

   The film won an honorary Academy Award for Foreign Language Film, and
   the BAFTA Award for Best Film from Any Source, in 1950. It was heavily
   awarded by the Italian National Syndicate of Film Journalists, and is
   commonly considered a film classic. It also won Best Foreign Language
   Film award from New York Film Critics Award for 1949

Influence

     * Italian director Ettore Scola's film C'eravamo tanto amati (We All
       Loved Each Other So Much) ( 1974) utilizes Bicycle Thieves as a
       major point of admiration as well as criticism. One of the
       characters, Nico, becomes obsessed with the film. Scola's film is
       dedicated to De Sica.
     * The plot of Pee-wee's Big Adventure ( 1985), which features Pee-wee
       Herman trying to find his stolen bike, is loosely based on Bicycle
       Thieves.
     * In 1990, Italian director Maurizio Nichetti produced a spoof of
       Italian neo-realist cinema, named The Icicle Thief.
     * Robert Altman's Hollywood satire The Player ( 1992) uses Bicycle
       Thieves as an emblem of the perfect non-Hollywood movie, with an
       unhappy ending of the kind that would not be permitted in
       Hollywood.
     * In an episode of My So Called Life Angela attempts to have her
       first date with Jordan be a screening of "The Bicycle Thief". Brian
       however mocks her plans, asking "Do you think Jordan Catalano will
       understand one word of The Bicycle Thief? You only understand it
       because I explained it to you!"

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