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Bicycle Thieves

Original title: Ladri di biciclette · Turkish title: Bisiklet Hırsızları

“The Prize Picture They Want to Censor!”

1948 · 1 h 29 min
Directed by Vittorio De Sica
Drama

Cast

Lamberto Maggiorani Enzo Staiola Lianella Carell

Credits

Written by: Cesare Zavattini

Plot

In postwar Rome, the unemployed Antonio Ricci finally gets a job pasting posters, but it requires a bicycle, which his wife has pawned the family's bed sheets to redeem. On his first day the bicycle is stolen. With his young son Bruno, Antonio searches the streets and markets of the city, and his desperation leads him to a moral choice. Vittorio De Sica's 1948 film uses real locations and non-professional actors to build a simple story into a portrait of poverty and dignity, and it is a keystone of Italian neorealism.

Sinekatalog’s take

A father needs his stolen bicycle to keep a job. De Sica shoots on Rome's streets with non-actors, and the simple story grows into a devastating portrait of postwar poverty and dignity.Sinekatalog’s own editorial review – not a user or critic quote.

Ratings

IMDb: 8.2 / 10 (193,774 votes)
Rotten Tomatoes: 99% (67 critic reviews)
IMDb rating and vote count from the IMDb ratings dataset; Rotten Tomatoes snapshot from October 2026. Scores change over time.

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