Vittorio De Sica

“I love humanity, I trust humanity, but humanity has a way of disillusioning me.” Vittorio de Sica was an influential film director and actor who belonged to the Italian neorealism movement. In the 1930s, he got his own theater company, moved to Rome and began his career as an actor. In the 40s, he went from being a great interpreter of comedies to being the spokesman of the humble. He turned his gaze to show a country devastated by the Second World War, and the scarcity of means forced the authors to reinvent their profession. He contributed to the cinematographic current that reflected the harsh social and economic situation of Italian society in those years with films such as Shoeshine (1946) and Bicycle Thieves (1948). Years later, he opted for more commercial projects, such as Yesterday, Today and Tomorrow (1963) for which he counted on figures such as Sophia Loren and Marcello Mastroianni. With The Garden of the Finzi-Continis (1970), he began the turn towards a more personal cinema, and during the shooting of The Voyage (1973), his last work, he fell ill. His ability to capture the essence of human experience with sensitivity and authenticity ensured that his legacy lives on in the history of cinema.