Identity is an essential part of all our lives. Our actions determine our identity, and in turn, our identity structures our actions. One’s desire to seek a self-identity is an essential for the alignment of his or her pursuit of happiness. However, when such desire to fulfill one’s standards grows too strong, one might neglect other parts of his or her life. This neglect could lead to graver consequences, such as one’s sensations of failure and even his own downfall. In movie Citizen Kane, the director Orson Welles presents a complex and pessimistic theme of a spiritually-failed man, Charles Foster Kane, through discovering his life story from several perspective by different characters, to tell a tragic epic story of a “rags-to-riches” child …show more content…
Thompson learns that Kane’s childhood began in poverty in Colorado. His mother sends Kane away, at age of 8, to live with Walter Parks Thatcher, a successful banker, so that he can have a better life and may be better educated. This involuntarily abrupt separation keeps him growing into the petulant, insatiable, and aggressive adolescent he is today. Growing up, Kane never develops any emotionally attachment to Parks Thatcher and he disregards Thatcher’s any attempts at discipline and …show more content…
For citizen Kane, the most important assets of his life are not the political ambitions, successful newspaper business, nor his relationships with the significant others. Judging by his last word, “Rosebud,” the most important piece of his life is memory from his childhood. Although his life is changed for what appears to be better, from a materialistic viewpoint, it actually leaves him vulnerable and alone. Kane’s life is ultimately destructed by his lust to fulfill the American dream of fame, power and wealth. The inevitable struggle of Kane is reflective of the struggle of many must confront in this materialistic world, as one on his or her quest to find the true meaning of
Citizen Kane has long been regarded as a cinematic masterpiece and one of the greatest movies ever made. One look at the scene “Thatcher Taking Young Charles”, and you can see exactly why. The storytelling style of this film is a “successful fusion of the flashier devices of 1930s films, and techniques adapted from radio, theater, and prose narrative. “There is pro not a single device in Citizen Kane that cannot be found in earlier films, but Citizen Kane synthesizes elements of various traditions in a totally original way.” (Carringer,1978) This sequence makes use of various cinematic techniques to employ the auteur’s narrative.
As a child, Kane is fully happy as he plays in the snow outside the family’s home, even though his parents own a boarding house and are quite poor. He has no playmates but is content to be alone because peace and security are just inside the house’s walls. When Thatcher removes Kane from this place, he’s given what seems like the American dream—financial affluence and material luxury. However, Kane finds that those things don’t make him happy, and the exchange of emotional security for financial security is ultimately unfulfilling. The American dream is hollow for Kane. As an adult, Kane uses his money and power not to build his own happiness but to either buy love or make others as miserable as he is. Kane's wealth isolates him from others throughout the years, and his life ends in loneliness at Xanadu. He dies surrounded only by his possessions, poor substitutions for true
The structure in the film Citizen Kane is non-linear in that it does not follow any planned order. The story is well formulated and presented using flashbacks that pertain different times in the life of Kane (Welles). These flashbacks are unplanned search that they offer the viewer an incomplete glimpse of Kane’s life and essentially adding more suspense. It takes the form of the memory when a person tries to remember an event that took place a long time ago. The use of the non-linear structure helps to portray how complicated the life of Kane was. It is vital to note the film uses several narrators. The mystery of Kane’s life is also being put together like a puzzle (Welles). The audience is with the journalist in the quench to find what the mystery word meant to Kane. The layout of the story is also planned with
I believe that the author portrays Charles Kane as sort of an evil man through the things he does, but shows that Kane doesn’t realize how he is behaving is wrong. One example of this would be how he ran his newspaper company the New York Inquirer (Citizen Kane). He presented the news in the best way possible to get as many people as he could to read it. Even if he had to lie a little bit in the title or in the actual stories, all he cared about was being everyone’s main source of news. This however was the opposite of what he originally wanted to do which was to present only honest and true news. One time he lied about the news was in relation to his second wife Susan Alexander. She was not a very skilled opera singer as told by the
Citizen Kane is filled with symbolic imagery. In most of the movie you can pick out scenery, character actions, lighting, camera movement, and the composition within the frame of key shots that help tell the story without the character orally telling the full story. However, because of its new and experimental use of mise-en-scene, the movie did not do well in the box office. In time Orson Welles movie would become one of the best movies of all time and would even come to change filmmaking in
Orson Welles’s Citizen Kane is a revolutionary film. Although it might not look like much to the modern viewer, many aspects of the film were the first of their kind to appear and are still used today.
Citizen Kane begins the movie with an interesting opening of a man dying while saying his last words. This began the mystery of who was this man and what did he mean by his last words “rosebud”. In the next scene it jumps to a news article
The debate over Casablanca and Citizen Kane has been a classic argument between film critics and historians alike, and this is because both of these pieces are timeless pictures that have managed to captivate audiences well after their era. On a broad spectrum analysis this is an apples and oranges debate as the two films both have great cinematographic value but for different reasons. However, the real question at hand is which film is the greatest? Which film transformed the future of American film making? It is these questions that I as many others have, will attempt to answer in the following essay as I explain why I believe Citizen Kane is the greatest film ever made.
Mr. Kane exclaims, “I can fight this all alone…I’m Charles Foster Kane! I’m no cheap crooked politician trying to save himself from the consequences.” (Citizen Kane) Though Mr. Kane was by no means a perfect character, up until this point he could be viewed as the “good”, slightly above average, citizen. But as this scene plays out, he begins to show his darker side to the audience.
Citizen Kane is set at a time in American History where the world is changing and money is at the center of that world. For example, during this period of time wealth has become more important in America has more new money arrives. Kane is a part of this new money sweep across America and like everyone else is stretching his power and wealth. He stretches it so much that he loses sight of his objection, which is replaced by his obsession to be in control and make all the decisions, a power which he finds through wealth. But it is because of this obsession that his idealistic world is corrupted. Furthermore, the film revolves most around a newspaper. A newspaper reaches everyone and during this time one of the only few mass media. It is through the newspaper that Kane stretches his wealth and influence. He is corrupted by the power that the newspaper gives him. In addition, Kane is constantly surrounded by beautiful things and people, until the end of the movie when
Since the beginning of the Industrial Age, Americans have idealized the journey towards economic success. One thing people do not realize, however, is that that journey is not the same for every individual. For Charles Foster Kane (Orson Welles), the main character of Citizen Kane, directed by Orson Welles, the path towards riches and a fulfilled life is being well liked. He serves to please others. He strives for that attention. This view cost him his happiness in the end. In this man’s rise and fall through prosperity, Welles shows the futility of striving solely for likeability.
When discussing the greatest films of all time, Citizen Kane, directed by Orson Welles, usually comes up. It’s influence in American cinema can still be felt today, but at the time the film was not released without controversy. The main character in the movie, Charles Foster Kane, is undeniably based of the real life figure of William Randolph Hearst, a famous American newspaper publisher. Hearst was very aware of this fact and tried to hinder the success of Welles’ picture by denying it any sort of press in his newspapers. Despite the smear campaign Kane’s influence lives on through Welles’ revolutionary filmic techniques and its presence in pop culture.
The absolutely stunning film, Citizen Kane (1941), is one of the world’s most famous and highly renowned films. The film contains many remarkable scenes and cinematic techniques as well as innovations. Within this well-known film, Orson Welles (director) portrays many stylistic features and fundamentals of cinematography. The scene of Charles Foster Kane and his wife, Susan, at Xanadu shows the dominance that Kane bears over people in general as well as Susan specifically. Throughout the film, Orson Welles continues to convey the message of Susan’s inferiority to Mr. Kane. Also, Welles furthers the image of how demanding Kane is of Susan and many others. Mr. Welles conveys the message that Kane has suffered a hard life, and will
No one can sum up a man 's life into one word. This was a thought--intriguingly an idea in the film that still resonates today in our society. Citizen Kane (1941) is an important film that reflected society 's false belief of the American Dream during its time. The film was directed and starred by Orson Welles and tells a story of a man name Charles Foster Kane, who had everything and who lived an ideal life that everyone wanted to have. However, having many fine possessions of things and a great deal amount of money at his disposal, did not make him happy. The film reflects on Mr. Kane 's life before his death and his legacy. Citizen Kane shows how during the era, people wanted to have financial security, happiness and to gain material success. Although the American Dream is still something people want today, Citizen Kane shows how attaining the American Dream was something less of a dream during its era. The film also show the changes of the American Dream from 'dream ' to 'myth ' and explores the dark side of the held belief.
Because of the content of this film, Hearst tried to prevent it from being released. Kane, who was based on Hearst, was a very controversial newspaper tycoon. This makes the film more dramatic people there are characters that either love Kane or hate him. When Kane is caught in a love nest with s ainger, many more people disapprove of him.