"all the arts are based on the presence of man"

I guess we mostly agree that realism is nothing more and nothing less than a style. I wouldn't be so hard on Bazin as some others. Although he surely commits the same logical fallacy as Kracauer by trying to think through "only the final and complete form of the photographic cinema" (FTC 164), he does admit that "cinema has not yet been invented!" (166). This is the real strength of his argument in "The Myth of Total Cinema" - showing, by an inversion of causality, how the proclaimed "origin" of cinema, the total and totally faithful representation of reality, is at the same time a goal towards which cinema is constantly moving.

The idea holds for cinematic techniques in the sense of linguistics or semiotics as well ("cinema is also a language", from "Ontology of the Photographic Image"), 163. This language, however, did not spring forth fully formed from the lens of the camera. That concept ("the objective character of photography" [161], etc), already so well worked-over by previous posters here, is worth repeating. The photographic image of an object is NOT the object -- it is another thing-in-itself, the material photograph (or the material film, or the material DVD, or the material silicone chip...). Therefore, its meaning rests not in its fidelity to the reality it claims to represent, but in the USES and EFFECTS of the image itself. This is, of course, why editing is such an integral part of the cinematic language, and precisely why Bazin and Kracauer insist that the editing and composition of shots follow certain aesthetic rules in order to remain "valid". But it seems I am belaboring points already made more fully and fluently.

Taking "Umberto D." as an application of these theories of (neo)-realism, then, and setting aside the consideration of plot-spoiling, there is a particular cumulative effect of De Sica's focus for much of the film on the minutia of Mr. Umberto's trials and tribulations. There are few "artistic" liberties taken throughout the film (notably, though, the tilted camera angles for authority figures, the digressive shots of the closing roof seen from Umberto's window, the zoom into the trolley tracks, shots of shadows behind doors and on the stairs, and the cat walking over the roof as the maid, Maria, cries and grinds coffee), so that overall straightforwardness becomes a motif which builds and builds over the course of the narrative. This makes the final sequence much more powerful, because it leaves even the basic questions about Mr. Umberto's future raised but unanswered. In this way, ambiguity and inevitability combine to demand a strong emotional reaction from the viewer.

Most importantly, the editing and composition are subsumed within the narrative, from lighting and close-ups and the use of mirrors and windows, to the cuts and the soundtrack. All these techniques fit the story, almost well enough to become invisible, or for the viewer not to notice many of them -- thus, they are all the more effective. As Umberto tells Maria: "Everyone takes advantage of the ignorant." Only if the viewer is ignorant of the language of cinematic techniques will Umberto D. and realism in general appear a perfectly faithful reproduction of reality.