A young family struggles to make ends meet in postwar Italy. The patriarch gets good news - an opportune job opening - but the position demands a bicycle. As theirs was pawned to afford this month’s food, the wife exchanges temporary comfort for the promise of a steady income and swaps it for her dowry bedsheets. On the father's very first day of work, disaster: a thief makes off with the prized bike. The next morning, accompanied by his son and a small group of compassionate neighbors, he sets out on a desperate search for the most essential tool of his new trade.

I went back and forth on this one. _Bicycle Thieves_ (or _The Bicycle Thief_, as it was originally translated) is widely regarded as a landmark film, one of the finest ever made, and was an oft-cited influence for Kurosawa, Scorsese and everyone in between. Far more knowledgeable cinephiles than I heap it with praise; a film student’s ideal. Yet, for much of its running time I was underwhelmed. Gradual and straightforward, the plot quickly settles into a comfortable routine: visit one thinly-veiled fencing operation, browse the wares, increase existential concern, shed a party member, then move on to the next. It wasn’t until the last stop that it hit me. As the father’s visual anxiety grew, so did mine. I’d nearly stopped breathing. The easy pace and slow progress had drawn me in, ripening me for a powerful, climactic turn in the film’s final moments. And, while subdued (why would I expect any less?), that hits hard. Really hard.

So, for me, the question is: are seventy minutes of creeping, spacious neorealism justified by such a weighty payoff? I remain uncertain. It’s a case of heavy emotion, resonant feeling and thick empathy, but the long, narrow road is an essential component to unlocking those riches. A potent display of the medium? Absolutely. The greatest film I’ve ever seen? Certainly not.