Bicycle Thieves
The streets of Val Malaina in Rome in the post-war depression, the men queued up in hopes of finding employment; Antonio Ricci is fortunate to have been chosen but there is a condition upon which the offer is contingent. Engaged to hang posters around the city, in order to get around swiftly he will have to use a bicycle, and his own was pawned to pay for food for his family.
The choice between destitution and a chance to redeem themselves, Antonio’s wife bundles up the bedclothes, her precious dowry, and offers them to the pawnbrokers, securing sufficient funds for Antonio to redeem his bicycle but on his first day on the job it is stolen right before his eyes, the thief making off into the labyrinth of the city faster than Antonio can pursue.
One poor man in a city of the desperate and hungry, what can Antonio do? A single bicycle is of no interest to the police, so instead he uses what contacts he has to try to track down the stolen bicycle upon which the future of his family lies, searching the city in the company of his young son Bruno as the skies rain down upon them.
Adapted by Cesare Zavattini from a story by Luigi Bartolini, Bicycle Thieves (Ladri di biciclette, sometimes translated in the singular as The Bicycle Thief) saw director Vittorio De Sica coaching non-professional actors through the precise emotions and gestures of the performances he required, casting them for their appearance to match how he imagined the characters, Lamberto Maggiorani bringing dignity and resignation to Antonio.
Described as a neorealist drama, the focus of Bicycle Thieves is the poverty of the characters and their helpless plight, innocents caught in circumstances which are not of their creation and over which they have no control, a father trying to provide for his family and set an example but finding he is insufficient, a shame which he does not wish his son to witness.
Predominantly a film of men, Antonio’s wife playing only a cursory role, there are representations of Italian life and culture which have persisted through the ages, the omnipresent Catholic Church, the centrality of food and shared meals as part of Italian culture, the superstition which thrives in times of hardship, offering hope when there is nothing else, the communist groups who rose up in the wake of fascism tie it to the era it was produced.
Released in late 1948 in Italy, Bicycle Thieves received American release and in 1950 won an Academy Honorary Award as the best foreign language film, the category for Best International Feature not being fully introduced until 1955; consistently regarded as an important and influential film, it has now been restored in 4K for Blu-ray by Arrow Academy from the original negatives where possible, with additional sources used where sections were significantly degraded.
Accompanying the new edition are two insightful video essays, with David Cairns offering an overview of Italian cinema through De Sica’s lifetime and his evolving relationship to it, a matinee idol turned director whose life off camera was as turbulent as his films, while Kat Ellinger offers a more positive view of De Sica as she focuses in detail on the he time spent in Hollywood, perhaps unproductive but certainly colourful.
Bicycle Thieves is available on Blu-ray now from Arrow Academy
