Most Helpful Customer Reviews
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19 of 19 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
Sort out your pension plan!!, 10 Dec 2005
One of the most poignant and moving stories ever told on film, with an unusual theme - what happens to an old man who is left destitute by circumstances (war, inflation) in post-war Italy. Terribly sad and sentimental, yet filled with the visual poetry for which De Sica (Bicycle Thieves) is deservedly famed. A superb film - withering in its critique of uncaring capitalism - that can be watched time and time again.
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6 of 6 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
A charming, moving, completely convincing masterpiece, 6 Aug 2007
This is a charming film, one that could be very sentimental but is not, in my view, and certainly one that stays in the memory. Umberto is an old man in post-War Rome who has no money. His plight is shared by many - the film opens with a demonstration by the elderly against the unfeeling treatment they face. He has a dog - Flike - who is his constant companion. His rented room is needed by his heavily painted, uncaring landlady, and he can no longer afford her unreasonable rent. He has a strong bond with the chambermaid, a naive, uneducated but very pretty girl, pregnant by one of two soldiers - she doesn't know which. Her situation is in many ways as unsure as his. Neither soldier seems to care about her and her family she says, will beat her if she returns to her village. Umberto does all he can to hold on to his lodgings, but in the end to no avail and, facing death on the streets, he desperately tries to find a future for Flike. This final fifteen minutes or so of the film is wonderfully poignant. He tries to 'board' Flike with people who in take dogs ... he will give all his money to them ; but clearly they are not to be trusted, and Flike senses that, cowering and whimpering, so they leave. He gives the dog to a little girl whom he knows, but the adults with her will not allow this. Finally, he walks beyond a level crossing barrier with the dog as a train approaches. Will he throw the dog under the train, to end it all quickly? Will he dive under the train, holding the dog? Neither happens, What does happen has to be seen, and my words will not do it justice. The film is wonderfully directed and acted, and the little terrier mongrel is astonishing in its 'role'. It is hard-edged - there is no solution to Umberto's plight, and the depiction of War-damaged Rome is completely convincing. Umberto's relationship with the girl is very moving. I saw the film first in a Glasgow cinema when I was 17 - that was in 1963. Now, renting it from Amazon and seeing it again after all these years, it is every bit as good.
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4 of 5 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
A masterpiece of neorealism, 20 Jun 2007
Having seen the film I read a bit about it. The Criterion Collection provides a booklet with an excellent review by Stuart Klawans and a bit of an interview with director Vittorio De Sica. What I learned was the Umberto D. was a big flop at the box office in Italy primarily because the Italian government didn't like the film because they thought it was insulting since it made Italy seem so unfeeling, poverty-stricken, and mercantile. I was struck by this because, yes, poor Umberto and his dog are pretty much set out to pasture without so much as some grass and a bone. But to say that such a film reflects upon an entire people is perhaps to protest too much.
Italy was devastated by the failure of fascism and was just beginning to recover from the war when this film was made, and nobody wanted any downers. Vittorio De Sica's film is perhaps not so much of a downer as the early critics thought. The ending is ambiguous and while not hopeful for Umberto is somewhat inspiring in the youthfulness of his dog and in the sweet humanity of the maid Maria who shoulders her situation with alacrity while showing affection and kindness toward a bitter old man.
I was not moved to tears as some have been in watching this. Umberto's troubles seem to me (from my privileged vantage point in time and place) somewhat of his own doing. I imagined that he supported the fascists, and I saw his poverty in his old age as a direct result of that support. Barring that, I imagined that he had planned poorly for his old age, and at any rate his values, represented by his always wearing a suit and tie and hat and his inability to beg or to take some kind of job, disqualified him for tears. Of course I was unfair.
Even so my sympathy was with him, and I respected the decision he finally makes--although whether he will be able to carry it out is unclear. I respect his dignity, and identify with him in his struggle with the Teutonic and utterly bourgeois landlord who holds sway over him, played with a deliberately heavy presence by Lina Gennari, whom De Sica photographs up close and low to her large body to emphasize her strength and to make it clear to us that Umberto has no chance in his struggle with her.
Both Carlo Battisti who played Umberto and Maria Pia Casilio who played Maria, were considered amateur actors, very much in keeping with the neorealistic school of film; yet for me they were both excellent and natural, whereas Gennari, who was a professional, seemed artificial. But that impression is an artifact of the neorealist school (which they say died with this film). The very fact of no flourishes and no modeling and certainly no flights of creativity by the actors, it was believed, helped to make the film realistic, about real people in real situations.
Today of course this is a celebrated film, considered one of De Sica's best. He himself believed from the very beginning that it was one of his best even though he knew it would be hard-pressed to make any money for its producers.
A word about the dog (the other professional actor in the film). Flike is extraordinarily well-trained, so much so he becomes part of the psychology of the film and is at the very heart of the denouement. The scene near the end where Umberto dips under the rail guard as the train approaches, Flike held close to his chest--and the scene after--is of one of the great sequences in cinema, and, ironically, as in a commercial film, stars a dog! Umberto D. is in fact one of the greatest dog films ever made. All dog lovers will appreciate the love that Umberto feels for his dog and the love that is returned AND the gutty realism that the dog displays.
The DVD includes a documentary about De Sica that I didn't have a chance to view, excellent subtitles, and a video interview with Maria Pia Casilio.
I would almost say, see this for the dog, but do see this for Vittorio De Sica, one of cinema's greats, here at his best, and for Cesare Zavattini who wrote the compelling script.
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