Bicycle thieves is a Italian film which was made in 1948 Directed by De Sica and . After the end of World War 2 Antonio Ricci who was unemployed and is struggling to support his family is given a job hanging up posters around the war torn of Italy Rome He was happy at that time because he was given a chance to have a job and support his family. His wife, Maria had to sell the family's bed linens so Ricci bike could be reclaimed and he could use it. The bike was gotten from a pawnshop so he could take the job. But, tragedy occurs when his bike that he would use for transportation to get to his job is stolen on his first day at work, and his new job is condemned and he loses the only way he can maintain this job and be able to provide for his family unless he can find out who the thief is and regain his bike so he will not get fired from his newly job that he got. So he had to drop what he was working on at that time to go after the person who has stolen his bike …show more content…
It tells a worldwide and still very sad narrative and it does so in a heart wrenching and touching way.
In this film De Sica preferred using real people in his film instead of actors Lamberto Maggiorani, who plays Antonio Ricci, was originally a factory worker Lianella Carell, who plays Ricci's wife, was originally a journalist whom De Sica met when she asked him for an interview Enzo Staiola, who plays the son Bruno, was found watching the shoot.
"In his fine essay for the gorgeous new two-disc reissue of Bicycle Thieves, Godfrey Cheshire claims that Vittorio De Sica’s neo-realist classic and Orson Welles’ Citizen Kane are the “twin fountainheads” of modern cinema. From Welles came a cinema of egotism and personal expression; from De Sica, a cinema of collective conscience and social concern. "
Examples of Neo-Realism Cinematography in the Film
Long static shots- allow the viewer to see the impact of the time period on the whole community instead of just the main
My Cousin Vinny (1992) is a perfect way to show Italians in Hollywood movies. It gives the gangster stereotype, the family sticks together, names that people associate with Italians, and the defensive attitude. The main characters that are Italian are Billy Gambini, Stan Rothenstein, Vincent LaGuardia "Vinny" Gambini, and Mona Lisa Vito. These characters all carry some sort of stereotype that corresponds with being Italian. Although some have a more dominant presence of the stereotype, it can still be found during the movie.
I Cento Passi (one hundred steps), written by Marco Tullio Giordana in 2000, is a film of an explosive story of betrayal, murder, intrigue and the Mafia, set in Cinisi, a small Sicilian seaside. The town is run and controlled by head of the mafia, Don Tano. Peppino Impastato, a real character in history, fought against the mafia, despite his family’s connection and finally became a martyr for his cause. At a young age he became very aware of the harsh reality of the Mafia when his uncle, who he dearly loved, was blown up by a car bomb. He becomes a very active member of the Communist party in Sicily and fought back against the Mafia, which few Italians would ever do at the time or even in the present.
In the film The Bicycle Thief the audience is able to witness all the elements of neorealism. The use of non professional actors, to low class working characters, the flattening of scenes, and the location where it was shot at; are just a few of the essential elements that can be found in this film along with copious neorealist films. It is clear that the director used a variety of shots, angles, and set-ups in order to create certain emotions at very specific scenes in the film. From the start we are able to obtain a feel about the film’s tone as a result of the lack of color. The use of black and white truly helped the audience experience what Italy was like during the post World War 2. As a result of the depressing post war we are able to detect how the act of trying to improve oneself can sometimes lead to desperation.
Article Three – Author: David Bordwell / Title of Article: The Art Cinema as a Mode of Film
Likewise, bike theft is a huge problem for many metropolitan cities in the U.S.. Literature to support this claim is the 2015 Crime Prevention Program in Portland, Oregon. “Thousands of bicycles are stolen in the City of Portland each year… Places with high concentrations of parked bicycles such as college campuses are especially vulnerable to theft” (Office of Neighborhood Involvement Crime Prevention Program, Bicycle Theft Prevention, 2015). This article also identifies many preventative techniques to make a bike harder to steal; for example, “Proactively register your bike and include its serial number and photos with the bike registration services bikeindex.org and project529.com” (2015). Moving on, it is imperative to attack any problem
Alfred Hitchcock is widely regarded as a prime example of an auteur, a theory that emerged in the 1950s by Truffaut, in the ‘politique des auteurs’ of Cahiers du Cinema (Tudor 121). The auteur theory, as defined by Andrew Tudor, is premised on the assumption that “any director creates his films on the basis of a central structure”(140) and thus, if you consider their films in relation to each other, commonalities can be found within them. These commonalities work to demonstrate the view of the director as “the true creator of the film” (Tudor 122). Evidence of an auteur can be found in examining a director’s creative tendencies, in their distinctive themes and motifs, stylistic choices,
This movie was sorrowful and some parts terrifying, for example, when the Jews getting killed for no reason, just because they were Jewish. These aspects were affective in the movie because it helps the movie look more realistic and more historical. The creators do a good job capturing empathy because the audience knew who were the characters and knew what was going on, most of the audience were hooked on it.
While Rossellini’s Rome Open City portrays the struggle for freedom, De Sica’s Bicycle Thieves tries to find the human face. He discovered it not in the exceptional sorrow of war but in the misery of daily life where war is just one aspect of the human lot. Bicycle Thieves takes place at a specific time under a unique series of social conditions that shape both its narrative and its embrace of the Neorealist style.
It 's about people feeling 'hopeless ' and 'helpless ' and living in fear every second of their lives. A lot of people are living 'one month from homeless ' and have been for a few years now. People are living their lives afraid and desperate. Nobody cares about that, but they sure care when a tragedy like this happens.
When discussing the greatest films of all time, Citizen Kane, directed by Orson Welles, usually comes up. It’s influence in American cinema can still be felt today, but at the time the film was not released without controversy. The main character in the movie, Charles Foster Kane, is undeniably based of the real life figure of William Randolph Hearst, a famous American newspaper publisher. Hearst was very aware of this fact and tried to hinder the success of Welles’ picture by denying it any sort of press in his newspapers. Despite the smear campaign Kane’s influence lives on through Welles’ revolutionary filmic techniques and its presence in pop culture.
Set in the depression times of post-World War II Italy, Graziadei and De Sica’s (1948) The Bicycle Thief narrates the story of Antonio Ricci (Lamberto Maggiorani), who, after finding a job as a bill poster, loses his bicycle to a young thief. He tries to look for it with his son Bruno (Enzo Staiola); however, despite seeing the thief, he fails to recover his bicycle. Desperate, he tries to steal a bike himself but is easily thwarted by a group of bystanders. They plan to bring him to the police station until the owner notices the weeping Bruno and, in an act of compassion, ask others to release the thief. In this paper, I argue that The Bicycle Thief
The absolutely stunning film, Citizen Kane (1941), is one of the world’s most famous and highly renowned films. The film contains many remarkable scenes and cinematic techniques as well as innovations. Within this well-known film, Orson Welles (director) portrays many stylistic features and fundamentals of cinematography. The scene of Charles Foster Kane and his wife, Susan, at Xanadu shows the dominance that Kane bears over people in general as well as Susan specifically. Throughout the film, Orson Welles continues to convey the message of Susan’s inferiority to Mr. Kane. Also, Welles furthers the image of how demanding Kane is of Susan and many others. Mr. Welles conveys the message that Kane has suffered a hard life, and will
In Citizen Kane, Welles is attempting to expose the great influential political and social power that someone has as the head of many newspaper chains. This narrative drama explains the life of Kane and how different people viewed it. From the way the way the characters were telling the story to the way shadows, lighting and the laco of color was used, this film fits into the drama genre. Being the “greatest film of all time”, Citizen Kane brings the the world of newspaper tycoons to
In Italy, directors focused on the moral and economic conditions that came with the postwar generation quickly after the war and addressed the war instead of not acknowledging as German cinema did for so long. Unlike Alice in the Cities and The Bitter Tears of Petra von Kant, films such as Bicycle Thieves depicted dislocation during the postwar period in the Neorealist style, made in 1948, this film differs greatly from the two former films discussed. In Bicycle Thieves, Vittorio De Sica delivers a political message regarding the difficulty of survival in postwar Italy, but also conveys a sense of psychological dislocation through the character development of Antonio Ricci. In many ways, Italy’s economy is much to blame for Ricci’s two-year unemployment in which the film begins, however, Ricci has as many internal struggles as he does externally. Neorealism lies heavily on the depiction of real life problems depicting common people and often used people from the street as actors, in this film the man who played Ricci, Lamberto Maggiorani, actually was a factory worker, which helps solidify the film’s authenticity. Towards the end of Bicycle Thieves, Ricci’s efforts to retrieve his stolen bicycle fail when the people that live near the boy who stole it side with the epileptic boy as he has a
When it comes to movies, many directors are good at their jobs. However, other directors are great in the art of film making. There is no doubt such statement is considered utterly subjective, but what would life be without subjectivity, for it is our differences that make us thrive against a monotonic existence. By the same token, Alfred Hitchcock and Christopher Nolan utilize their singularities to create films that for decades have impacted the movie making universe. In fact, it is their differences that provide us with a high contrast to compare and scrutinize their job and find what made them great at it.