Vitterie De Siea has grown in distinction as a director of Italian films until he now ranks with pre Stromboli Rossellini. De Siea's "The Bicycle Thief" comes to Boston after being honored as the best foreign film of 1949 by the New York critics, and receiving several other American and European awards. "The Bicycle Thief" is an excellent, occasionally brilliant document of the plight of "the little man." In all the noise about "the world's most acclaimed motion picture," however, one is apt to forget that it has short comings, like most other films.

De Siea's plot is supremely simple. An unemployed man is offered a job posting bills, provided he can supply his own bicycle. To get the bicycle, his wife has to sell the family's sheets. During the first day on his new job the bicycle is stolen. The rest of the film follows the worker and his young son as they tramp through the streets of Rome in a futile search for it.

Critics have praised De Siea for his realism in scenes which occur as the trail leads the father and son to an open-air bicycle market, a medium's home, and a bordello. Unlike the forthright realism of his "Shoeshine," however De Siea's treatment here is often contrived. At one point the boy falls into a puddle while running after his father, an incident which seems injected for the sole purpose of proving the film's spontaneity of detail. The photography is consistently fine, but at times it also appears too forced for true dramatic impact.

The greatest triumph of "The Bicycle Thief" is in its lucid picture of the relationship of father and son. Much, perhaps the greatest part of this success, is due to the superb acting of Lamberto Maggiorani as the tight -lipped, over whelmed father, and Enzo Staiola as his spirited boy. Both these non-professional actors are amazingly sure and penetrating in their characterizations.

"The Bicycle Thief" is not a great motion picture. It does have two of the qualities of a great motion picture, however-magnificent acting and a warm, perceptive treatment of humanity.