Bicycle thief
Since the beginning of its existence as a country, Italy has faced enormous challenges in establishing itself as a unified political and social entity. The geographic, economic, and linguistic differences between its various regions and the artificial manner in which they were amalgamated created a legacy of internal divisions that continues to dominate the country's political climate to this day. Italy's numerous historical fiascoes, such as its disastrous involvement in the two World Wars and the rise of fascism, further escalated the domestic problems that had haunted it since the Risorgimento. At first, the anti-fascist Resistance movement, which dominated the end of World War II, seemed to bring Italy a ray of hope, promising a new era of freedom, reform, and democratic representation. However, this hope was quickly extinguished, as widespread poverty, government corruption, and deep divisions between regions and classes persisted and no true social reform was attained. These harsh conditions were depicted by a group of Italian film directors whose neorealist works have since been celebrated as masterpieces of world cinema. One of the most prominent of these is Vittorio De Sica's The Bicycle Thief. This 1948 film discu
Her character seems to serve as another stab at the Christian Democrats, whose efforts of being the blanket party, satisfying as many constituents as possible, brought with it inherent contradictions. Consequently, Italian leaders of the destra storica and sinistra storica (the first two eras of Italian political history) shifted their focus from meaningful governance to the practice of transformismo, permanently shaping the face of Italian political life. Could De Sica be suggesting that the pursuit of religion is a dangerous undertaking that leads to many harmful complications, such as the ones experienced by Antonio? This could certainly be the case, if one considers the Marxist nature of the film. The role of the police comes up again later, when the angry crowd defends the thief from Antonio's accusations. This farcical episode, reminiscent of a scene from Chaplin's tramp films, ends in complete failure, because the individuals focus strictly on the particular goals assigned to them, forgetting the overall objective of their search. This interpretation of the film's position on collective action seems somewhat problematic. As public positions were abused by power-hungry individuals, who refused to take any real actions towards social reform, the populace grew even more resentful of its political "representatives". The theme of religion is definitely present in the sequences involving Signora Santona, the fortuneteller. The increasing disregard for Bruno, who represents Antonio's family, the well being of which is his true goal, is symptomatic of another thematic element prevalent in Italian history -- the self-interested drive for personal benefit, which is the basis of transformismo (Absalom 1995: 59). As the goal becomes more important than the path toward it, Antonio loses perspective. If the bike is recovered, Antonio can go on working and making money in order to support his wife and children. This first manifests itself in the Catholic mission, in which Antonio finds himself after following an accomplice of the thief. This desperate action completes the long descent towards the corruption of true ideals and serves as a final statement of Italy's hopelessness. While Antonio is absorbed in his futile search, he loses contact with Bruno (his conscience), corrupted by the society that surrounds him. Despite their corruption and transformismo, the Christian Democrats succeeded in being the dominant party in Italian politics from the 1940s to the 1980s.
Common topics in this essay:
De Sica,
Bicycle Thief,
Whereas Bruno,
Antonio Riccio,
Peter Bondanella,
Antonio Antonio,
Christian Democrats,
Italy Risorgimento,
War II,
Interestingly DC,
collective action,
bicycle thief,
world war,
de sica,
italian politics,
christian democrats,
social reform,
world war ii,
italian society,
italian political,
political social,
storica sinistra storica,
destra storica sinistra,
understanding collective action,
italian political life,
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Acceptance Essays
