A masterpiece of neorealist Italian filmmaking, Shoeshine is a haunting story of young boys trying to survive in post-war Italy. Inevitably, they become involved with the black market and end up in reform school. De Sica, who made this film and the subsequent The Bicycle Thief (1947) with nonprofessional actors, together with Robert Rossellini revitalized Italian film production following its domination by Fascists since 1934. Dedicated to stories of social significance, with real people enacting their own lives, neorealist films portrayed the ordinary, the worker, and the poor in search for truth, and were immediately and widely influential.