R. Staaf Citizen Kane

 

 

Citizen Kane Blog Entry

I recently viewed Citizen Kane by Orson Welles. Citizen Kane, released in 1941, was an interesting film to me. At times, it was hard to follow and keep track of the storyline. I also sometimes found it difficult to recognize the characters on screen until they were identified for me. However, the plot was interesting enough to keep my attention.

The film is essentially a biography of the character Charles Foster Kane. The film begins with a mysterious scene depicting Kane’s death. Next, we see a newsreel of his life telling all of his accomplishments. Then, we see the people making the biography film. They want to go beyond his public life, and tell the whole story: Who was Charles Foster Kane? The rest of the film follows one of the reporters as he speaks to all the people closest to Kane in his life. The big question they’re trying to figure out deals with his last word: “rosebud”. The reporters think that if they unlock the significance of “rosebud”, they will unlock the truth of who Kane really was.

Charles Kane’s character was actually based on a real person, William Randolph Hearst. Hearst was the biggest name in the newspaper business during the time the film was made. Welles set out to bring down the corrupt newspaper magnate with his film. Hearst found out about the film and tried to buy it from the studio before it was released in an attempt to save his career. His attempt to buy the film failed so he launched a massive smear campaign against Welles. Ironically, neither of these titans fully recovered from the scandal.

Citizen Kane was Orson Welles’ masterpiece. With this film, he seemingly set out to redefine the way people made and viewed movies. He didn’t necessarily bring any new techniques to the table, but the way he used them all together with such artistry had never really been seen before.

Welles’ use of lighting, for example, was genius and most likely influenced the lighting styles of the film noir films that were becoming prominent around the same time. There were two scenes where the lighting caught my eye (pictured above). The first was early in the film when the reporters are in the screening room after working on Kane’s biographical tribute film. One reporter is standing between the camera and the spotlight from the projector. This puts the reporter in silhouette and throws shadows from his arms and head out to the sides and top of the screen. The other scene that caught my eye is later in the film when Susan tells Kane she wants to quit singing. Kane insists that she will continue with her singing, and when she (loudly) refuses he approaches her and casts her in shadow. He threateningly states “You will continue with your singing” as we see her entirely engulfed in his shadow. Then, she sinks down, defeated, and we see her in light again.

Welles was also a master of mise en scene. Every shot seemed to be crafted carefully from the ground up for every scene. He often used a lot of depth in his shots. For example, the caption in our text of the scene where Charles Kane’s mother is signing him away. Kane’s mother and Thatcher are in the foreground signing the document, Kane’s father is in the mid-ground with the parlor room behind him, and finally, Kane is seen through the back window playing in the snow. Welles also uses depth in the scene where Susan Alexander tries to commit suicide. The foreground shows an empty medicine bottle, Susan is passed out on the bed, and Kane is pounding on the door in the background. When shots are put together this way, the shot tells a lot of the story with little need for dialogue or exposition. The medicine bottle, Susan unconscious in the bed, and Kane yelling and pounding on the door tells us something tragic has happened.

After studying the historical context of Citizen Kane as well as reading about how he approached making the film, I can certainly see why it constantly gets voted best picture of all time. Also, it is the perfect film to use to practice looking for film technique since it demonstrates so many techniques and demonstrates them in their most effective context.

Works Cited

Dirks, Tim. "Citizen Kane (1941)." Citizen Kane (1941). American Movies Classics

          Company's LLC., 2013. Web. 13 June 2013. http://www.filmsite.org/citi.html.


Giannetti, Louis D. Understanding Movies. 12th ed. Boston: Allyn & Bacon, 2011. Print.

Citizen Kane. Dir. Orson Welles. Perf. Orson Welles. Released by RKO Radio Pictures,

           1941. DVD.