Very very predictable, including the post credit scene !!!

Sadly Over-hyped

It’s fine. It's literally the definition of a fine movie. You’ve seen it before, you know every beat and outcome before the characters even do. Only question is how much escapism you’re looking for.

Very good movie overall, highly recommended. Most of the negative reviews don't have any merit and are all pollitically based. Give this movie a chance at least, and it might give you a different perspective.

The principle characters in this drama are a couple of poor children. These are kids to dig and scrap for a little happiness. One has not parents; the other's parent has her own problems. These kids seem to thrive on their own hard work. The war is on and the soldiers for whom they shine shoes continually put them off instead of paying them. They are also susceptible to money-making schemes and are sometimes victimized by bad people. After committing a petty crime, they are put in a boy's detention center because the police think they have done way more. Now the rules change. Where they had relative freedom, despite poverty, they are now at the mercy of a disinterested constabulary. The authorities need a confession. When none is forthcoming, evil manipulation comes into play. DeSica in this film and others of the time, show the natural destruction of the future of a culture, lying in the wake of Mussolini's fascist comedown. This is quite a wonderful film but very hard to watch.

Vittorio Di Sica's Shoeshine (1946) is a very well thought out, and well executed film.But I'm just sick of seeing Continental European WWII films and post-WWII films that are filled with despair, hopelessness, and an eradication of meaning in life. I know that the people on Continental Europe suffered a lot during WWII, but across decades, and across national boundaries, EVERY WWII film, and post-WWII film that I've seen from Continental filmmakers is just filled with despair, hopelessness, and an eradication of meaning in life. Even as late as 1992, Lars von Trier's Europa is yet another really negative and downer film about post-WWII. I mean SOMEONE on the Continent must have emerged from WWII with a a relatively happy story. Yet, you wouldn't think so if you watched as many of these negative, downer, depressing WWII films from Europe as I have. It's really a distinct genre: "WWII films and post-WWII films from Continental Europe that are filled with despair, hopelessness, and an eradication of meaning in life".

Since the review the movie has been re-released from a new Italian Print. http://eurekavideo.co.uk/moc/catalogue/shoeshine/ That should cure the grainy problem mentioned by the reviewer. I just got it so I can't give a review rating. The Masters of Cinema Series is a well done project so I'm sure I'll be satisfied with their work. To quote from their web site "Shoeshine is widely regarded as one of the finest films to have emerged from the Italian neo-realist cinema." They have released many silent films and from what I've watched so far, the quality of their releases is amazing. They have extra bonus material on their DVDs as well and the project is well worth you looking at if you are interested in old films. This film comes with a 24 page booklet as does many of the other films.

Since I enrolled in International Cinema at my university, I've had the opportunity to see classic foreign films in the theatre, and it's really opened me up to the genre. I'd have to say that this movie (Shoeshine, in English) struck me as one of the most powerful I've seen yet, a sad, bleak commentary on children's lives in postwar Italy. Shoeshine dealswith a pair of children living on the street, best friends who shine shoes for a living and whose greatest dream is to buy a horse, something they could actually take care of and call their own. Pasquale, the older boy, and Giuseppe, the younger, are drawn into a situation they don't quite understand the weight of. Not knowing that the Italian society is chaotic after the war (when children under ten years old are put into prison for crimes like vagrancy), Pasquale and Giuseppe are coerced into doing a favor for Giuseppe's brother, Attilio Filipucci -- they are to bring and sell smuggled American blankets to a lady fortune-teller for the Filipucci family's profit.Without warning, police appear at the fortune-teller's house, and question her. The boys are paid not to say anything, and are paid just enough to pool their money and buy the horse. Unfortunately, the fortune-teller has the boys taken from the street and into police custody, where, though claiming not to know anything, are fingerprinted and thrown into a juvenile prison. The prison and events that occur in it force the best friends apart, and the previously light-hearted story turns ugly. The boys' environment corrupts them, and innocence is quickly lost.Directed by the famous Vittorio De Sica, and with Cesare Zavattini doing his trademark poetic screenplay, Shoeshine definitely deserves its place as one of the first foreign films to with the Oscar of the same name. The Neo-realist De Sica does include some comic relief in the movie, and it's not all serious and depressing... The line from Giuseppe to Pasquale as they're walking up a flight of stairs, "Elevators sure are great," and Pasquale's answer of "Yes, I slept in one for quite a while," is one example.To say any more would give away the story, and you simply must experience this classic for yourselves. My rating: 9/10.