 So much has been written about this film that it almost seems pointless to add to the clamour, but this is a landmark film both in cinema history and for filmmakers. In essence, the film covers a retrospective look at the life of mega-tycoon Charles Foster Kane. The plot follows reporters as they scramble round the remains of his life searching for the key to his cryptic last words, “Rosebud.”
Controversial upon release as director, actor and co-writer Orson Welles appeared to model Kane’s life on the real world figure of William Randolph Hearst. Rumour asserted that ‘Rosebud’ was a name given by Hearst to a part of his mistresses anatomy and so upon release, Hearst’s media empire imposed a total blackout on the film. Amazingly, considering the reputation of the film, it was Welles’s first attempt to direct a feature film, his pervious experience being in theatre. His reputation had been made by a radio production of H G Welles’s ‘War of the Worlds’ that was so convincing it sent thousands of Americans fleeing to the hills, believing the production’s fake news reports of an alien invasion. Citizen Kane: The Facts | Director | Orson Wells | | Date | 1941 | | Script | Orson Wells & Herman J Mankiewicz | | Principle Actors | Orson Wells, Joseph Cotten, Dorothy Comingore, Agnes Moorehead, Ruth Warrick |  I was interested to see this film, as I’d heard a great deal about it. Part of me was expecting some kind of artistic revelation and part of me was preparing to be disappointed by the over-hype. However, when the final scene had ended, I was surprised. Surprised as there had been no revelation of the film art and surprised at just how powerful a price of filmmaking it was. In retrospect I should not have expected any serious revelation as part of the reputation of Citizen Kane lies in that it was a great innovator of film technique, what would have been fairly revelatory in 1941 is now a standard technique that has been used over and over. But this is where the very power of the piece comes through. Here, Wells repeatedly shows his genius by delivering the audience shot after shot of stunning visuals. For example, take the early tracking shot where the camera tracks over the gate of Kane’s mansion and heads off, off into the film itself. It’s a textbook example of how to do a tracking shot, I personally have yet to see a finer example of this method in any other film.
 Also of note is the show-reel footage, ‘News on the March’. In the film, this is shown to the aforementioned journalists and is used to introduce the audience to the character of Charles Foster Kane. Here the filmmakers have create a fantastic replica news show-reel, complete with newscaster voice over, variable speed footage and jerky camera work. Apparently the footage was even dragged across the studio floor to add the scratches of age to it.
In summary, what is there in this film that does not offer lessons for a filmmaker? Very little. The camera work is excellent, the lighting fantastic, the stage set are wonderfully created and the acting is superb. Citizen Kane is a film with history and a huge reputation, but if you are prepared to sideline all those aspect and watch it just as a film, you’ll be surprised how much you enjoy it and how much you can learn from it.  Citizen Kane
Directed by Orson Welles
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Citizen_Kane
Arguably the greatest of American films, Orson Welles' 1941 masterpiece, made when he was only 26, still unfurls like a dream and carries the viewer along the mysterious currents of time and memory to reach a mature (if ambiguous) conclusion: people are the sum of their contradictions and can't be known easily.  The Making of Citizen Kane
by Robert L Carringer
https://www.ucpress.edu/books/pages/4349001.html
As Carringer covers each step of the film's production, from conception to final release, he leads readers through the enormously complex process of making a great movie.
 Citizen Kane
by Laura Mulvey http://www.ucpress.edu/books/bfi/pages/PROD0101.html
In depth analysis, The book is an intriguing Freudian analysis of the film It focuses more on an Oedipal analysis, yet it is still a must as an interpretation of this classic. |
