Bicycle Thief

Pros: Realistic portrayals, emotion and direction
Cons: None

As far as classic movies go there can be few less disputed than The Bicycle Thief. In 1952, Sight & Sound’s poll of filmmakers and critics chose it as the greatest movie of all time. More recently in 2002 the same poll voted it #6. It appears ...

Pros: everything
Cons: few to none

The gentle yet subversive fluidity of its somber cadence and melancholic tone furnish Vittorio De Sica’s The Bicycle Thief with a lambaste commentary on post-WWII Italy, its populace’s misfortune at whole, and its system’s...

Pros: A great snapshot of the times.
Cons: People suck and life isn’t fair.

Film #3 of my World Arts: Film class (#2 being Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon which I really didn’t feel inclined to review) is Bicycle Thieves - at least, that’s what we’ve been calling it. Set in post-war Italy, 1948, Antonio Ricci has ...

Pros: A simple, universal story directed with visual skill and attention to honest emotional investment.
Cons: Nothing but the usual, superficial quibbles about black-and-white foreign films.

The Italian style of filmmaking known as neorealism feels more like a moment in time than a genuine movement (some accredit merely 20 movies in the span of seven years), but it was one that proved essential in international cinema. Much like the French ...

Pros: A simple but touching story of hardship in post-World War II Italy
Cons: Viewer must have tolerance for black-and-white and subtitles

The Bicycle Thief (1948), directed by Vittorio De Sica, is widely regarded as a classic masterpiece. It won an Oscar in 1949 in the category equivalent to what is now called Best Foreign Film. It also won awards at the time of its release from ...

Pros: Bustling post-war streets of Rome, clever son, earnest mother, Clint Eastwood-faced father
Cons: Male idleness and aggressiveness, poverty, packed streetcars - all too real neorealism!

A native of Italy, aged 72, invited me to the Istituto Italiano in San Francisco for this screening of neorealistic, poverty-stricken Roman families in post-war Italy. In a very genteel setting we enjoyed seeing the past unroll before our eyes,...

Pros: cinematography, casting, direction, story
Cons: protagonists are too earnest and naive

Ladri di Biciclette is the most famous example of 'neo-realism', a style associated with a handful of Italian films made between 1945 and 1952. The title was translated as The Bicycle Thief in America, where the film was an immediate...

Pros: Uncluttered filmmaking packs a wallop; amateur actors add to the realism
Cons: Ending is a downer (but that's the point)

Winner of the Oscar for Best Foreign Film in 1949, "The Bicycle Thief" is one of those films that everyone has heard about, but few have actually seen. It’s constantly popping up on critics’ top film lists and it’s generally hailed as one of...

Pros: One of my very favorite movies
Cons: None

The Bicycle Thief, directed by Vittorio DeSica, is usually noted for being the quintessential Italian Neo-realist film. Italian Neo-realism was a short movement that is little known about outside of its masterwork, The Bicycle Thief. The movie is...

Pros: EVERYTHING
Cons: NONE

To consider a film to be a classic has become passé over years. Now just about any film older than 25 is considered to be a classic, and often critics and theorists, myself included, apply the oxymoron "modern classic" to new films. Look at...

Pros: The Neo-Realist movement at its best.
Cons: The colorized version destroys the integrity of the film.

The film Bicycle Thieves resists conventional narrative structure by using a non-grandiose plot line with humble working class characters, sweeping eye-level camera movements, and an inundation of scenes that show the micro-actions of daily life. The...

Pros: The Greatest Neorealist Film of All Time
Cons: Nothing

Much has been said about this film, so I dare not to elaborate on what makes this film a classic. All I can say is that this is the best film I have seen in my life, and I don't really know why, it just is.

Directed by Italian director,...

Pros: Simple, humanistic, powerful, clean!
Cons: Old film, subtitles might be challenging to read!

Imagine your family’s livelihood depending on a bicycle. In post-war Italy, you compete with hundreds for a job where twenty-five percent of the work force is unemployed. You beat out other desperate men for work and land a job that requires you to...

Pros: Italian history, morals, good for children
Cons: Sad, Black and white

It is no mystery that Italy has had many different economic difficulties and the gap between the peasant and the well-off is wide. This film is about the life of one man trying to support his wife and 2 young kids in one of these hard economic times. ...

Pros: Amazing
Cons: None

The Italian Film, the bicycle thief is a masterpiece. The entire story takes place in post-war Rome. There were very few available jobs and the main character, a husband and father in his late thirties gets a job opportunity working for the city.
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