Bicycle Thieves (1948)

Director Vittorio De Sica

The second time I’ve seen this film. It is still powerful: the depiction of lives constrained by poverty and uncertainty is salutary, and the shots of Rome are fascinating. But on a second viewing I missed the lack of artifice of this most famous film of Italian neo-realism. The dour tone of Antonio’s odyssey to recover his stolen bicycle (and his long face) was fairly unrelenting; thank heavens for little Bruno, even if it does smack of easy sentiment to add an amusing child to the mix.