Vittorio De Sica is the great master of creating emotions and alluring the
audience to take the side of his protagonists, because he does not idealize
them: his bourgeoisie barks, but his paupers fight and push each other under the
sunshine while those from the first class observe.

Those who have worked in film for 56 years are rare. Vittorio De Sica started as
an actor in 1918, and directed his last film Il viaggio in 1974, the same
year he died in Paris. He was one of the most famous actors from the time of
white telephones and the star of the films by Mario Camerini in which he played
Don Juan characters, but in fact the good romantic guys. In the 30’s he was the
partner to the famous Assia Noris and many called them the perfect couple of
Italian film. Even after twenty years, in the beginning of the 50’s after the
famous neo realist era, De Sica was a popular actor, first of all as the comic
maresciallo in the popular series Kruh, ljubav i... by Luigi
Comencini. The audience loved him in those films, and the critics praised him
for his outstanding role as an unfaithful lover in Madame de... by Max
Ophuls from 1953, and especially for the role in a film by the famous Roberto
Rossellini from 1959, a role that greatly differed from everything he has done
up to that time. It was a role of the crook who turns out to e a hero in the
film Generale Della Rovere.

However, it is very unlikely that any text about De Sica, apart from one
found in encyclopedia, would begin chronologically with his acting career in
theatre or on film. Real, world fame he achieved as a director, primarily of
great screenplays by Cesare Zavattini. Vittorio De Sica marked history when he
became the first non English speaking director to win an Oscar for the film
Čistači cipela - Sciuscia. He won an Oscar three more times for Ladri di
biciclette in 1948, Ieri, oggi, domain from 1963 and Il giardino
dei Finzi-Contini from 1971. So, along with Federico Fellini, he won this
award four times, and probably deserved it for two more of his films:
Miracolo a Milano from 1950 and Umberto D from 1952.

His heroes are children, old people, the crippled and ill, and above all those
whom noone cares or looks after. His kids get into fights with their parents
only to end up in orphanages (I bambini ci guardano from 1943), they get
killed (Čistači cipela), his cripples and the ill embark on pilgrimages
to Loreto (La porta del cielo from 1944), they use sun rays to warm up
and brooms in front of the Duomo to fly into the sky, his retired people, who
look a little like his own father, are left with shame and suicide attempts (Umberto
D), and his poor workers steal only to end up ashamed in front of their own
sons after being robbed themselves (Kradljivci bicikla).

And as much as Cesare Zavattini was crucial for De Sica’s success, I doubt that
his screenplays would ever have been better realized by any other director. For
first of all Zavattini’s characters in his own hands are true heroes, street
actors, those from real life who do not act but rather live out their problems
in front of De Sica’s camera. Secondly, Vittorio De Sica is the great master of
creating emotions and alluring the audience to take sides of his protagonists.
Because he does not idealize them: his bourgeoisie barks, but his paupers fight
and push each other under the sunshine while those from the first class of a
train, that suddenly stopped on the railroad by a slum, observe. His kids, the
shoe cleaners, are friends and enemies at the same time, and Lamberto Maggiorani
slaps his son on the face in a state of total despair, even though he loves him
to death.

Even though many historians think of De Sica as a man without a consistent
style, his films, especially neorealist, won many awards, were watched all over
the world and had a great influence, even on Tadashi Imai in Japan. After all,
Sight and Sound in their survey in 1952 proclaimed Kradljivce bicikla as
the best film of all times. (Dario Marković)