Gino Saltamerenda Movies

Not long before MGM embarked upon its musical biopic The Great Caruso, the Italian Enrico Caruso, Leggenda di Una Voce made the American distribution rounds. Maurizio di Nardo plays famed tenor Caruso as a boy, while Ermanno Randi takes over the role in adulthood. The film makes no pretense at accuracy; indeed, an introductory title describes the plot as "a poetic interpretation of [Caruso's] youth." When it was released in the U.S., Enrico Caruso was retitled to The Young Caruso and promoted on the basis of one of its leading ladies, the fabulous Gina Lollobrigida. In fact, in some markets, the third-billed Lollobrigida was promoted as the film's above-the-title star. ~ Hal Erickson, Rovi

This landmark Italian neorealist drama became one of the best-known and most widely acclaimed European movies, including a special Academy Award as "most outstanding foreign film" seven years before that Oscar category existed. Written primarily by neorealist pioneer Cesare Zavattini and directed by Vittorio DeSica, also one of the movement's main forces, the movie featured all the hallmarks of the neorealist style: a simple story about the lives of ordinary people, outdoor shooting and lighting, non-actors mixed together with actors, and a focus on social problems in the aftermath of World War II. Lamberto Maggiorani plays Antonio, an unemployed man who finds a coveted job that requires a bicycle. When it is stolen on his first day of work, Antonio and his young son Bruno (Enzo Staiola) begin a frantic search, learning valuable lessons along the way. The movie focuses on both the relationship between the father and the son and the larger framework of poverty and unemployment in postwar Italy. As in such other classic films as Shoeshine (1946), Umberto D. (1952), and his late masterpiece The Garden of the Finzi-Continis (1971), DeSica focuses on the ordinary details of ordinary lives as a way to dramatize wider social issues. As a result, The Bicycle Thief works as a sentimental study of a father and son, a historical document, a social statement, and a record of one of the century's most influential film movements. ~ Leo Charney, Rovi