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Waiting for Bike-o: Father and son search in vain in war-torn Rome |
Cast: Lamberto Maggiorani (Antonio Ricci), Enzo Staiola (Bruno Ricci), Lianella Carell (Maria Ricci), Gino Saltamerenda (Baiocco), Vittorio Antonucci (Alfredo Catelli), Giulio Chiari (Beggar), Elena Altieri (Charitable Lady)

Sometimes
the simple stories are the best, and I don’t think you can get much simpler
than this: Man loses bike. Man searches for bike. Man doesn’t find bike. This
film is a perfect little fairy tale, a wonderfully moving family story, perhaps
one of the best “father-son” films placed on film. Who could resist the
patience and understanding the son has for the father – and who can fail to be
moved by the son’s disappointment with the father, or his eventual forgiveness
for the father’s failings. Because the father himself is a failure – yes he is
a victim of the economic system, but he is also a strangely passive,
ineffectual man barely able to help himself.
In post-war,
recession-hit Rome, jobs and income are at an absolute premium. Antonio
(Lamberto Maggiorani, an amateur actor who barely worked again, unable to
escape the shadow of this role) is offered a job pasting up Rita Hayworth
posters (could there be a bigger contrast between glamour and squalor in the
movies?). There is one condition: he must have a bike. With a sign of his later
ineffectiveness, Antonio claims he cannot accept the vital job due to pawning
the bike. Not standing for this, his wife pawns all the bedding in the house to
reclaim the bike. Antonio heads to work but within less than half a day his
bike is stolen. Accompanied by his son Bruno, Antonio searches for the next two
days through Rome for the bike.
De Sica’s
film is the most famous of the films from the neo-realist movement. This
movement aimed to make films entirely on location, using only non-professional
actors, aiming to present the real world on camera within the framework of the
stories told by cinema. De Sica certainly manages to capture the sense of
post-war Rome: a parade of dingy streets and untidy squares, with debris and
rubbish at almost every turn, weeds punching through steps, and crowds of
working class Romans a constant presence.
The beauty
of using De Sica’s realism is that we get a real sense of how important this
bicycle is – the presence of so many people almost begging for this job means
the audience knows that this bike is absolutely crucial. De Sica even teases us
– we know the bike is going to get stolen, it’s in the title – by having
Antonio leave the bike unattended at least three times before the thing is
stolen. Personally, I felt very tense whenever Antonio let that bike out of his
sight, practically begging De Sica to allow at least the camera to keep an eye
on it. The documenting of poverty before this is beautifully done – not
overplayed I hasten to add, but a gentle, uncommented-on present. There is a
beautiful shot of the pawnbrokers, where the bedding is deposited – the
pawnbroker literally climbs up a mountain of pawned bedding, a quiet visual
testimony to the fact that this is a story that has been told several times
over away from the movie camera.
The heart of
the film, though, is the relationship between Antonio and his son Bruno, both
beautifully played. De Sica keeps the visual poetry of this relationship
throughout – Bruno is clearly full of love for his father, as his father is for
him, but their relationship is not completely easy. At one point Bruno falls in
a puddle – Antonio literally doesn’t notice. This is a neat shadowing for their
argument later in the film, and Bruno’s tearful reaction to a slap. Later when
Antonio fears Bruno drowned after a separation (he’s not!) his despair and
panic speaks volumes for his love – but even their reconciliation is undermined
by Antonio being sucked back into self-pitying despair, Bruno patiently setting
his meal aside to listen (and perform some mental arithmetic) for his father.
The final
sequence of the film brings all these themes to the fore brilliantly: Antonio
finally considers stealing to replace his long lost bike. Carefully he sends
his son away, too ashamed to have his crime witnessed – but like everything
else in the film he attempts, Antonio bungles it. As our heroes depart and
disappear in the crowd, Antonio is distracted and fighting tears – but Bruno
takes his hands in a perfect moment of acceptance and forgiveness.
This is a quest film, very moving but in a way
almost a slight of hand. A policeman tells Antonio from the start his search is
hopeless – and the audience know it must be hopeless (finding a bike in Rome?
Come on!) – but De Sica makes us hope, makes us believe it might be possible.
It’s a tribute to how real the characters feel that the viewer is desperate for
them to find this precious bike. And a testament to the beauty of the film that
they can fail to find it and still be very moved by the film.
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