Master of None (TV Series) The Thief (2017) User Reviews

The Thief

[Draper-Soprano-White · 10/10 · 12 May 2017]

After a long wait, Master of None's season 2 arrives on Netflix. The premiere is a great episode, showing Dev in Italy and how life abroad is going for him.

The black-and-white photography brings an "old European film" vibe to the episode, even paying homage to the 1948 movie "Ladri di biciclette", and I really liked the use of the Italian language, as something different and refreshing in the English-based entertainment world.

Apart from Aziz Ansari, whose quality goes without saying, the rest of the cast perform very well, especially Alessandra Mastronardi and Clare-Hope Ashitey (and Nicoló Ambrosio, of course!).

Really funny and moving scenes give Master of None an excellent start in its second season, my rating is a 10 out of 10.

A lovely 'modenised' pastiche of ladri di bicicletta

[chunkylefunga · 7/10 · 13 May 2017]

Sorry I just had to use that pun :-)

In case you didn't get that this series was going to pay homage to many classic Italian movies, we're nudged in the ribs almost straight away with a long shot of a DVD stack of movies that inspired this series.

It's nice to see Dev soo immersed in Italian culture and language, with nearly all of what's going on around him being a true reflection of life in Modena; his character seems to have really grown and matured since season 1.

This episode is a nice revamp of ladri di bicicletta but with enough twists and turns to keep it fresh and relevant. There's not much I would have change in the way of locations picked or camera angles used.

I suppose what stops this getting a 9 rating, like ladri di bicicletta has from me, is that the stakes are considerable lower than needing a bicycle to support your family during a depression. Having your mobile phone stolen and losing contact with a girl you just met doesn't draw at the heart strings quite as much.

Though I did like the accidental phone stealing revamp, though having lived in Italy, I can tell you that real Italians would have hit first then asked questions later.

The actor playing the boy was also a little bit wooden, especially if you can understand Italian, which takes you out from the scene at times. I'd have boosted my rating to an 8 if we had a kid as good as in ladri di bicicletta in this episode instead.

Cringe fest

[pietrocarponi · 3/10 · 1 December 2021]

As an Italian, I almost died of cringe during this one, I really liked season one and I hope season 2 will get back to NY as soon as possible. A collection of stereotypes which are painfully unfunny. Italy looks like a 1930s country, if this was meant to be a tribute it fell flat and corny. I don't usually write reviews and I usually don't care on how my country is portrait but seeing this abomination in such a great show was depressing.