FILM SCREENING - Bicycle Thieves
The opening shots of Bicycle Thieves show a social environment of unemployed men with families and children to support. Antonio gets job hanging movie posters that requires a bike. Antonio’s wife pawns her wedding sheets so that Antonio can get his bike out of hock. While hanging posters, Antonio’s bike is stolen. The majority of the film is Antonio and his son Bruno (Enzo Staiola) roaming the streets looking for the stolen bike. In the process, the father and son drift further apart. In desperation, Antonio steals a bicycle himself. Bruno sees his father’s ultimate degradation. Despite the terrible social humiliation, the affection between the father and son is restored. One essential theme of neorealist films is the conflict between the common person and the immense social, economic, and political forces that determine his or her existence.
Notes from class:
Opening shots shows an environment of unemployed men with families to support.
Antonio gets a job but needs a bike - his wife sells her wedding sheets. His bike is stolen.
Most of of the time Antonio and son Bruno are looking for the stolen bike. Antonio finally
steals a bike.
A neorealism theme is the conflict between common person and "the immense social, economic,
and political forces that determine his or her existence."
A review characteristics of Neorealism include:
location shooting with postdubbing
a mixture of actors and non-actors
plots based on chance encounters, ellipses, open endings, and microactions of life
extreme mixtures of tone"
to show things as they are, not as they seem, nor as the bourgeois would prefer them to appear
to write fictions about the human side of social, political, and economic conditions
to shoot on location wherever possible
to use untrained actors in the majority of roles
to capture and reflect reality with little or no compromise
to depict common people rather than overdressed heroes and fantasy role models
to reveal the everyday rather than the exceptional
and to show a person’s relationship to the real social environment rather than to his or her romantic dreams
"In the tradition of Marxist thought, the neorealist films do repeatedly show the unjust social structures that threaten human values"
Has psychological action
A Blog Analysis of Bicycle Thieves Click Here
Post movie discussion assignment
·
Please identify and analyze one of the elements of neorealism
covered in the reading and Module (e.g. Zavattini's principles of neorealism).
You also may wish to discuss if Bicycle
Thieves made an impression on you and if you had seen the film
prior. You should embed a still from the scene or YouTube clip from Bicycle Thieves in
your post to illustrate your points. Please choose a scene that someone from
your group has not already discussed.
My answer:
Ida Z. daRoza - Module 3 - 9/11/20
I had seen The Bicycle Thief before about a decade ago and remember that it strongly affected me emotionally. I didn't remember too much of the movie but I was not looking forward to seeing it again and going there emotionally.
When I watched it this time, I did see it in a different light with the background from the class. Instead of focusing on the story, I looked at it objectively with the characteristics that we studied in class.
I enjoyed the outside views of Rome around so many parts of the city. I've been to Rome and it was interesting seeing some scenes around the river Tevere. It's sides are undeveloped, not built up at all around the shores. It has muddy sides and unstructured landscape around it.
I was interested in the people they came upon by chance through the story showing what people were doing to get by with the huge unemployment after the war. They pawned their belongings, stole items, sold bike parts and used items in the piazza, were clairvoyants, some prostitutes and some destitute getting their meals from the church. This was the real everyday economy of the poor getting by. Not a glossy Hollywood looking film.
The scene that I chose was one I remembered of Antonio finally finding the thief that stole his bicycle. He and his son Bruno chase him through Rome and find him first running through a whore house and then off to his mama's house. I love the line where the madam of the whore house says we can't have this behavior here in the best house in Rome.
Other than the whore house scene and mama's house, the action is filmed outside which is a characteristic of neorealism. Also in this scene he encounters the neighborhood gang which is going to defend their thief. These are not polished performers but non-actors in ordinary street clothes to play this scene. Just as the lead Antonio is not an actor but was a factory worker in real life. This is also a characteristic of neorealism.
Antonio corners the thief finally and his son even gets a policeman to come assist in the situation. We think that there might be justice for Antonio at this point. Mast and Kawin note that "The Neorealist films repeatedly show that unjust and perverted social structures threaten to pervert of destroy essential human values." Antonio is clearly in the right here and the policeman tries to help him to a point. They cannot find the bicycle in mama's house and the thief has made a scene on the street by passing out. All the neighbors, who seem to know he is criminal and seem criminal themselves, come and form a protective ring around their friend and mama get's involved yelling to everyone about her poor boy.
Another reason why I liked this scene is because of the Italian mama. I had an Italian grandmother and she looked the same from the back with her hair rolled up and working over a big, big pot. I could visualize my grandmother running out in the street to fight against the police and putting a pillow under her son's head. I'm sure knowing he would have done this but with her loyalty always to her poor bambino.
The policeman finally makes Antonio realize that this is a tough situation because he doesn't have proof and unsaid is that he thinks this mob will destroy both of them if they try to take the kid from his thieving neighborhood. He can't get justice in this situation and needs to move on.
After all the running around town to find his bike or the thief, the reality sets in that he cannot get his bike back or get justice from the thief. He is ruined.
On a side note, I mentioned in the introduction of class that a neorealist film that was one of my favorites was Nights of Cabiria. Compared to Bicycle Thief, Cabiria comes off sometimes lighthearted and not as a hard, rough and gritty as life of those in Bicycle Thief. I appreciated being able to see this strong example of neorealism that I can hold as a model when I see other Neorealist films.
Italian Neorealism
Citlaly Silva Hernandez
One of the elements that defines the Italian Neorealism movement, and is a part of Zavattini´s principles as Mast and Karwin put it, is “to depict common people rather than overdressed heroes and fantasy role models”. This principle appears to be one of the strongest elements of the movement, and it served to show how the war affected Italian society in different sectors or ideas. Ultimately, this becomes one of the elements that makes possible the portrayal of the working class in neorealist films, and helps to unveil the desolation and necessity Italians had to suffer. In Bicycle Thieves (1948) by Vittorio de Sica, Zavattini’s principle is the component that creates the astonishing, yet disheartening story. They present a simple working class man who is joyful about being able to finally provide a better quality of life for his family and suddenly his hopefulness is gone after having his bicycle stolen, a crucial item to not only have the job, but to obtain the better life that he so much desired. Most of the film is based on this idea of showing common people and the struggles they face, and every scene is remarkable with the classic exteriors in Italy or the compelling camera movements and composition. But one scene that captured my attention was the one where Lamberto takes his son Enzo to eat to a restaurant. There´s certain awkwardness when Enzo starts comparing himself to the wealthy kid sitting next to him, but there is music on the background, and for a moment father and son forget about all their troubles as the audience does too; suddenly Lamberto realizes what their life could have been if the bicycle had not been stolen and the scene ends with a zoom in on Lamberto willing to do anything in order to keep the job. Overall the scene contrasts different social status, it portrays poverty and it makes you feel empathy for the characters. I had seen the film before, but not with much context of the Italian Neorealism movement, so now that I have watched it before the experience was completely different and I was able to realize the value of this film.
Christopher Nathan:
One element of Neorealism used in Bicycle Thieves is that it was shot on location in ordinary spaces. Coming from a time of Hollywood glamorization of Italy, this gives the viewer a chance to see how Italy was affected by the war from an average person's perspective. In the opening scene, you don't see a country celebrating the end of the war - you see what seems to be a sense of helplessness and longing for the past. The viewer sees windows with missing glass, dirty buildings, streets with no cars and no open businesses, and people walking around seemingly without direction.
My Response to a student's post: You're right Christopher about how lucky in a sense, since there was little funding for film, they were able to create this film during the time period after the war and capture the look of the city during that time.
I read somewhere that he purposefully did not choose the grand monuments or famous parts of Rome but as you say, the city as it was affected by the war and missing glass and dirty buildings. Another reason I read that they did not use any of the grand monuments of Rome is that Mussolini had made garish monuments and architecture to try to show the glory of Rome during his regime. The Foro Italico for example . Architecture to glorify himself and Fascism.
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