De Sica was one of the great Italian directors of the neorealism era. He directed one of my favourite films, Bicycle Thieves (1948), and the stunning and heartbreaking Umberto. D (1952) (some say the last true neorealism film). Both those films pull at the heartstrings, but De Sica knew when enough was enough and was never over-sentimental. He directed The Roof in 1957. It contains many of the elements of neorealism. But it sits outside of the dates that most film historians and scholars agree that true neorealism exists. In The Roof, the main protagonists struggle to survive, struggle to get ahead. It is a simple premise. A young married couple just trying to get not only find a house to live in but one that will afford them some privacy. They start off sharing a house with his parents, his younger sister and his elder sister, her husband and their family of several children. They share their bedroom with his parents and his younger sister. Eventua...
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