In the middle of post-war Rome, Antonio Ricci, married to Maria and father to his young son Bruno, has barely worked in the last two years, and is desperate find a job and to try to raise some money. When he is offered a job putting up film posters around the city he immedately accepts, even though he needs a bicycle in order to get around, so pawns the family’s linens in order to get the money he needs. But on the first morning of his job the bike is stolen, and Antonio and Bruno follow the thief through the city, desperate to get back his property, and dealing with many dfferent and equally desperate characters as they go from street to street, trying to find the thief, and almost catch up with him several times, but Antonio knows that should he fail he will be losing more than just his bicycle; he will also lose all respect in the eyes of his son. A truly remarkable piece of work, awarded a special Oscar in 1948, since the Best Foreign Film category had not yet been established, Vittorio De Sica’s Bicycle Thieves largely ushered in the Italian neo-realism cinema movement, being filmed on the genuine locations, as Rome tried to get over the depravations of the war, and using largely non-professional actors, De Sica, who combined a career with an actor with his work on the other side of the camera, often chosing people he literally saw passing in the street because their appearence suited what he wanted to capture. The result is an almost documentary approach, as would be continued by directors such as Roberto Rossellini, making the plight of Antonio (Lamberto Maggiorani, an amateur actor who went onto have a professional career) almost painfully poignant as his one hope, the job which is offered to him like a lifeline, seems to be gone after the loss of the all-important bicycle, and with it would seem to finally evaporate all hope. De Sica almost ruthlessly ramps up the pain of the situation by having Antonio’s plight being constantly seen by his son Bruno (the young Enzo Staiola, who would also go onto a sporadic acting career), and the devotion of the young boy to his father, even as everything starts to collapse around him, is truly touching. A very affecting and important piece of work, made before some of De Sica’s subsequent films, such as Miracle in Milan and The Garden Of the Finzi-Continis, became uncomfotably sentimental, it still has the power today to captivate and move.