Bicycle Thieves
Introduction
This week, I am going to introduce a film that is called
“Bicycle Thieves”. It’s a film that brought me to discover about the theory
Italian Neorealism throughout the whole film. Bicycle Thieves is an Italian
film that has been recorded in year 1948 which directed by an Italian director
and actor Vittorio De Sica.
Theory Discussion
Italian Neorealism is a film theory that has been used by
national film to divide the poor and working class throughout the story in
film. It is always filmed on certain qualified venues, which is also always filmed
by hiring non-professional actors. Italian Neorealism films basically are
stories that facing a lot of difficulties in economy and moral values, which
reflects the condition of Italy after the World War II.
I will break the genre part into two parts. Semantic which
as known as visual, and syntax which as known as them. To make sure a certain
kind of genre of films, both of this aspect must be used complimentarily as
both in front of screen and behind of the screen is very important.
As for the evolutionary part that we have discussed in
class, I guess every genre also need to know where and how each genre should be
at and stay, but production teams must have extremely creative ideas even if
they are making the same genre kind of movies again and again to attract and
lock the audiences. No matter how time changes, the genre will only increase
but not decrease and the ideas must be keep being innovative and unique unless
films these days will have no improvement at all. There are always universal
traits for each genre to be passed down generations by generations because they
are to keep the origin and meaning of each genre.
Synopsis
The story began by introducing an unemployed guy, Antonio
Ricci, who finally got a job by searching jobs from the posters that pasted
around the destroyed Rome. Antonio’s wife, Maria, helped her husband to get
that job by getting back his bicycle from the pawnshop. By this, Maria sold
their bed linen to gain the money for getting back the bicycle. Anyhow, bicycle
was stolen very soon after they had it back, which also brought disaster to the
family as the job is definitely lost. The story then continued with how Antonio
and his son search back the bicycle and the incidents some after that.
Analysis
This film showed that the sadness of characters about
incidents that lingered around and happened to him. For instances, Antonio is
depressed as he was unemployed at first, then we got his job because he had
back his bike for a while, after that his bike got stolen and his opportunity
for work get doomed again. As this film is trying to portray that a real life
story of an employee, so by this film we understand that losing a bicycle for
him is not only a small issue because by that it means that he had lose his
job. Even at the end, Antonio became too desperate and then decided to do back
the same thing to other, which is steal other’s bicycle. The story happened in
three days consecutively which represents that in real life we do look for our
missing stuffs desperately especially when we need them for work.
In this film, the actors are classified into professional
actors and social actors. Professional are those who are doing their jobs in
film for daily basis such as the employer that works in employer office. This
is to show the reality and also to be more convenient for them to do what they
do daily. Social actors are the normal actors in film such as the character
Antonio Ricci, he is a social actor as the term of ‘social actor’ has the
meaning of always consciously 'stage-manage’ their actions.
The music and soundtrack used in this film is also great in
expressing feelings and pacing that the scenes want to give to the audiences.
When Antonio lot his bicycle, the music shows depressed and anxious pacing to
the audiences. It able to create the surrounding and emotions that losing a
bike is really a big deal to Antonio.
Besides, this film also created and presented a useless
father character which is presented by Antonio Ricci, the main lead. For
instance, as a father he did not take really good care of his own son as he
thought bringing his son out and search for his stolen bicycle together is a good
idea but throughout the whole trip he did not even notice that his son went
into the middle of the road and nearly had an accident there. This showed that
Antonio did not well plan out thoroughly.
Conclusion
I think that since this film is to divide the poor and
working class throughout the story in film and also to reflects the condition
of Italy after the World War II, it make audiences to have this thinking about deciding
the moral value through this film. I honestly find this movie too normal as this
film is to portray real life event to the audiences and my preference is just
not this type of movie.
Reference:
Comments
Post a Comment