Why does Charles Foster Kane destroy Susan's room? The film derives its popularity from the marvelous editing f Robert Wise and the competent cinematography of Gregg Tolland. For instance, the Chinese Exclusion Act of and Alien Contract Labor laws of and were intended to prevent workers from specified countries from entering the country Early American immigration policies, Forgot your password? New York: Viking. Other radio techniques include using a number of voices, each saying a sentence or sometimes merely a fragment of a sentence, and splicing the dialogue together in quick succession, such as the projection room scene, citizen kane essay. After dinner every night for about a month, I'd run Stagecoachcitizen kane essay with some different technician or department head from the studio, and ask questions.
Discussion
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Of these I am in an excellent position to discuss what is termed "Pan-focus", as I have been active for two years in its development and used it for the first time in Citizen Kane. Through its use, it is possible to photograph action from a range of eighteen inches from the camera lens to over two hundred feet away, with extreme foreground and background figures and action both recorded in sharp relief. Hitherto, the camera had to be focused either for a close or a distant shot, all efforts to encompass both at the same time resulting in one or the other being out of focus. This handicap necessitated the breaking up of a scene into long and short angles, with much consequent loss of realism.
With pan-focus, the camera, like the human eye, sees an entire panorama at once, with everything clear and lifelike. Another unorthodox method used in the film was the low-angle shots facing upwards, thus allowing ceilings to be shown in the background of several scenes. Every set was built with a ceiling [73] which broke with studio convention, and many were constructed of fabric that concealed microphones. He became fascinated with the look of low angles, which made even dull interiors look interesting. One extremely low angle is used to photograph the encounter between Kane and Leland after Kane loses the election. A hole was dug for the camera, which required drilling into the concrete floor. Welles credited Toland on the same title card as himself. Citizen Kane ' s sound was recorded by Bailey Fesler and re-recorded in post-production by audio engineer James G.
Welles used techniques from radio like overlapping dialogue. The scene in which characters sing "Oh, Mr. Kane" was especially complicated and required mixing several soundtracks together. Welles used an aural technique from radio called the "lightning-mix". Welles used this technique to link complex montage sequences via a series of related sounds or phrases. For example, Kane grows from a child into a young man in just two shots. As Thatcher hands eight-year-old Kane a sled and wishes him a Merry Christmas, the sequence suddenly jumps to a shot of Thatcher fifteen years later, completing the sentence he began in both the previous shot and the chronological past.
Other radio techniques include using a number of voices, each saying a sentence or sometimes merely a fragment of a sentence, and splicing the dialogue together in quick succession, such as the projection room scene. Film critic and director François Truffaut wrote that "Before Kane , nobody in Hollywood knew how to set music properly in movies. Kane was the first, in fact the only, great film that uses radio techniques. A lot of filmmakers know enough to follow Auguste Renoir 's advice to fill the eyes with images at all costs, but only Orson Welles understood that the sound track had to be filled in the same way.
The make-up for Citizen Kane was created and applied by Maurice Seiderman — , a junior member of the RKO make-up department. On an early tour of RKO, Welles met Seiderman in the small make-up lab that he created for himself in an unused dressing room. He made a plaster mold of Welles's body down to the hips. The castings were then fully painted and paired with the appropriate wig for evaluation. Before the actors went before the cameras each day, the pliable pieces were applied directly to their faces to recreate Seiderman's sculptural image.
Over that was applied liquid grease paint, and finally a colorless translucent talcum. The make-up included appliances to age Welles's shoulders, breast, and stomach. You could see how Kane's silk shirt clung wetly to the character's body. It could not have been done any other way. Seiderman worked with Charles Wright on the wigs. These went over a flexible skull cover that Seiderman created and sewed into place with elastic thread. When he found the wigs too full, he untied one hair at a time to alter their shape. Kane's mustache was inserted into the makeup surface a few hairs at a time, to realistically vary the color and texture. The lenses took a long time to fit properly, and Seiderman began work on them before devising any of the other makeup.
The major studios gave screen credit for make-up only to the department head. When RKO make-up department head Mel Berns refused to share credit with Seiderman, who was only an apprentice, Welles told Berns that there would be no make-up credit. Although credited as an assistant, the film's art direction was done by Perry Ferguson. Ferguson would take notes during these discussions and create rough designs of the sets and story boards for individual shots. After Welles approved the rough sketches, Ferguson made miniature models for Welles and Toland to experiment on with a periscope in order to rehearse and perfect each shot. Ferguson then had detailed drawings made for the set design, including the film's lighting design.
The set design was an integral part of the film's overall look and Toland's cinematography. In the original script the Great Hall at Xanadu was modeled after the Great Hall in Hearst Castle and its design included a mixture of Renaissance and Gothic styles. DeMille films and Intolerance. To save costs Ferguson and Welles re-wrote scenes in Xanadu's living room and transported them to the Great Hall. A large staircase from another film was found and used at no additional cost. Still photographs of Oheka Castle in Huntington, New York , were used in the opening montage, representing Kane's Xanadu estate. Walls were built to fold and furniture could quickly be moved.
The film's famous ceilings were made out of muslin fabric and camera boxes were built into the floors for low angle shots. Although neither worked with Welles again, Toland and Ferguson collaborated in several films in the s. The film's special effects were supervised by RKO department head Vernon L. For example, the scene in which the camera in the opera house rises dramatically to the rafters, to show the workmen showing a lack of appreciation for Susan Alexander Kane's performance, was shot by a camera craning upwards over the performance scene, then a curtain wipe to a miniature of the upper regions of the house, and then another curtain wipe matching it again with the scene of the workmen.
Other scenes effectively employed miniatures to make the film look much more expensive than it truly was, such as various shots of Xanadu. Some shots included rear screen projection in the background, such as Thompson's interview of Leland and some of the ocean backgrounds at Xanadu. Optical effects artist Dunn claimed that "up to 80 percent of some reels was optically printed. Welles decided to superimpose snow falling to mask the graininess in these shots. Any time deep focus was impossible—as in the scene in which Kane finishes a negative review of Susan's opera while at the same time firing the person who began writing the review—an optical printer was used to make the whole screen appear in focus, visually layering one piece of film onto another.
In the background, Kane and another man break into the room, while simultaneously the medicine bottle and a glass with a spoon in it are in closeup in the foreground. The shot was an in-camera matte shot. The foreground was shot first, with the background dark. Then the background was lit, the foreground darkened, the film rewound, and the scene re-shot with the background action. The film's music was composed by Bernard Herrmann. The score established Herrmann as an important new composer of film soundtracks [42] and eschewed the typical Hollywood practice of scoring a film with virtually non-stop music. Instead Herrmann used what he later described as "radio scoring", musical cues typically 5—15 seconds in length that bridge the action or suggest a different emotional response.
Herrmann realized that musicians slated to play his music were hired for individual unique sessions; there was no need to write for existing ensembles. This meant that he was free to score for unusual combinations of instruments, even instruments that are not commonly heard. In the opening sequence, for example, the tour of Kane's estate Xanadu, Herrmann introduces a recurring leitmotif played by low woodwinds, including a quartet of alto flutes. For Susan Alexander Kane's operatic sequence, Welles suggested that Herrmann compose a witty parody of a Mary Garden vehicle, an aria from Salammbô.
Music enthusiasts consider the scene in which Susan Alexander Kane attempts to sing the famous cavatina "Una voce poco fa" from Il barbiere di Siviglia by Gioachino Rossini with vocal coach Signor Matiste as especially memorable for depicting the horrors of learning music through mistakes. In , Herrmann said, "I was fortunate to start my career with a film like Citizen Kane , it's been a downhill run ever since! Some incidental music came from other sources. Welles heard the tune used for the publisher's theme, "Oh, Mr. Kane", in Mexico. All of the music used in the newsreel came from the RKO music library, edited at Welles's request by the newsreel department to achieve what Herrmann called "their own crazy way of cutting".
The News on the March theme that accompanies the newsreel titles is "Belgian March" by Anthony Collins , from the film Nurse Edith Cavell. Other examples are an excerpt from Alfred Newman 's score for Gunga Din the exploration of Xanadu , Roy Webb 's theme for the film Reno the growth of Kane's empire , and bits of Webb's score for Five Came Back introducing Walter Parks Thatcher. One of the editing techniques used in Citizen Kane was the use of montage to collapse time and space, using an episodic sequence on the same set while the characters changed costume and make-up between cuts so that the scene following each cut would look as if it took place in the same location, but at a time long after the previous cut.
In the breakfast montage, Welles chronicles the breakdown of Kane's first marriage in five vignettes that condense 16 years of story time into two minutes of screen time. a one-act play, which is a long Christmas dinner that takes you through something like 60 years of a family's life. Welles was influenced by the editing theories of Sergei Eisenstein by using jarring cuts that caused "sudden graphic or associative contrasts", such as the cut from Kane's deathbed to the beginning of the News on the March sequence and a sudden shot of a shrieking cockatoo at the beginning of Raymond's flashback.
Laura Mulvey explored the anti-fascist themes of Citizen Kane in her monograph for the British Film Institute. The News on the March newsreel presents Kane keeping company with Hitler and other dictators while he smugly assures the public that there will be no war. Roosevelt was laboring to win public opinion for entering World War II. Journalist Ignacio Ramonet has cited the film as an early example of mass media manipulation of public opinion and the power that media conglomerates have on influencing the democratic process. He believes that this early example of a media mogul influencing politics is outdated and that today "there are media groups with the power of a thousand Citizen Kanes.
Comparisons have also been made between the career and character of Donald Trump and Charles Foster Kane. To ensure that Hearst's life's influence on Citizen Kane was a secret, Welles limited access to dailies and managed the film's publicity. A December feature story in Stage magazine compared the film's narrative to Faust and made no mention of Hearst. The film was scheduled to premiere at RKO's flagship theater Radio City Music Hall on February 14, but in early January Welles was not finished with post-production work and told RKO that it still needed its musical score. Gossip columnist Hedda Hopper an arch-rival of Louella Parsons, the Hollywood correspondent for Hearst papers showed up to the screening uninvited.
Most of the critics at the preview said that they liked the film and gave it good advanced reviews. Hopper wrote negatively about it, calling the film a "vicious and irresponsible attack on a great man" and criticizing its corny writing and old fashioned photography. Friday magazine ran an article drawing point-by-point comparisons between Kane and Hearst and documented how Welles had led on Parsons. The magazine quoted Welles as saying that he couldn't understand why she was so nice to him and that she should "wait until the woman finds out that the picture's about her boss.
Welles apologized to Parsons and assured her that he had never made that remark. Shortly after Friday ' s article, Hearst sent Parsons an angry letter complaining that he had learned about Citizen Kane from Hopper and not her. The incident made a fool of Parsons and compelled her to start attacking Welles and the film. Parsons demanded a private screening of the film and personally threatened Schaefer on Hearst's behalf, first with a lawsuit and then with a vague threat of consequences for everyone in Hollywood. On January 10 Parsons and two lawyers working for Hearst were given a private screening of the film.
Stewart was present at the screening and said that she walked out of the film. Soon after, Parsons called Schaefer and threatened RKO with a lawsuit if they released Kane. When Schaefer did not submit to Parsons she called other studio heads and made more threats on behalf of Hearst to expose the private lives of people throughout the entire film industry. Hearst began preparing an injunction against the film for libel and invasion of privacy, but Welles's lawyer told him that he doubted Hearst would proceed due to the negative publicity and required testimony that an injunction would bring. The Hollywood Reporter ran a front-page story on January 13 that Hearst papers were about to run a series of editorials attacking Hollywood's practice of hiring refugees and immigrants for jobs that could be done by Americans.
The goal was to put pressure on the other studios to force RKO to shelve Kane. Once RKO's legal team reassured Schaefer, the studio announced on January 21 that Kane would be released as scheduled, and with one of the largest promotional campaigns in the studio's history. Schaefer brought Welles to New York City for a private screening of the film with the New York corporate heads of the studios and their lawyers. The cuts satisfied the corporate lawyers. Hearing about Citizen Kane enraged Hearst so much that he banned any advertising, reviewing, or mentioning of it in his papers, and had his journalists libel Welles.
The reviews for this screening were positive. A Hollywood Review headline read, "Mr. Genius Comes Through; 'Kane' Astonishing Picture". The Motion Picture Herald reported about the screening and Hearst's intention to sue RKO. Time magazine wrote that "The objection of Mr. Hearst, who founded a publishing empire on sensationalism, is ironic. For to most of the several hundred people who have seen the film at private screenings, Citizen Kane is the most sensational product of the U. movie industry. When Schaefer rejected Hearst's offer to suppress the film, Hearst banned every newspaper and station in his media conglomerate from reviewing—or even mentioning—the film.
He also had many movie theaters ban it, and many did not show it through fear of being socially exposed by his massive newspaper empire. The film did decent business at the box office; it went on to be the sixth highest grossing film in its year of release, a modest success its backers found acceptable. Nevertheless, the film's commercial performance fell short of its creators' expectations. Hearst's attacks against Welles went beyond attempting to suppress the film. Welles said that while he was on his post-filming lecture tour a police detective approached him at a restaurant and advised him not to go back to his hotel. A year-old girl had reportedly been hidden in the closet of his room, and two photographers were waiting for him to walk in.
Knowing he would be jailed after the resulting publicity, Welles did not return to the hotel but waited until the train left town the following morning. In March , Welles directed a Broadway version of Richard Wright 's Native Son and, for luck, used a "Rosebud" sled as a prop. Native Son received positive reviews, but Hearst-owned papers used the opportunity to attack Welles as a communist. Welles described his chance encounter with Hearst in an elevator at the Fairmont Hotel on the night Citizen Kane opened in San Francisco. Hearst and Welles's father were acquaintances, so Welles introduced himself and asked Hearst if he would like to come to the opening.
Hearst did not respond. That was his style—just as he finished Jed Leland's bad review of Susan as an opera singer. In , Hearst journalist Robert Shaw wrote that the film got "a full tide of insensate fury" from Hearst papers, "then it ebbed suddenly. With one brain cell working, the chief realized that such hysterical barking by the trained seals would attract too much attention to the picture. But to this day the name of Orson Welles is on the official son-of-a-bitch list of every Hearst newspaper. Despite Hearst's attempts to destroy the film, since references to his life and career have usually included a reference to Citizen Kane , such as the headline 'Son of Citizen Kane Dies' for the obituary of Hearst's son. Radio City Music Hall 's management refused to screen Citizen Kane for its premiere.
A possible factor was Parsons's threat that The American Weekly would run a defamatory story on the grandfather of major RKO stockholder Nelson Rockefeller. Schaefer stood by Welles and opposed the board of governors. Schaefer managed to book a few theaters willing to show the film. Hearst papers refused to accept advertising. Kane opened at the RKO Palace Theatre on Broadway in New York on May 1, , [8] in Chicago on May 6, and in Los Angeles on May 8. RKO still had problems getting exhibitors to show the film. For example, one chain controlling more than theaters got Welles's film as part of a package but refused to play it, reportedly out of fear of Hearst.
Overall it lost money in New York, Boston, Chicago, Los Angeles, San Francisco and Washington, D. Citizen Kane received acclaim from several critics. New York Daily News critic Kate Cameron called it "one of the most interesting and technically superior films that has ever come out of a Hollywood studio". Mosher of The New Yorker called the film's style "like fresh air" and raved "Something new has come to the movie world at last. The day following the premiere of Citizen Kane, The New York Times critic Bosley Crowther wrote that " it comes close to being the most sensational film ever made in Hollywood. Count on Mr.
Welles: he doesn't do things by halves. Upon the screen he discovered an area large enough for his expansive whims to have free play. And the consequence is that he has made a picture of tremendous and overpowering scope, not in physical extent so much as in its rapid and graphic rotation of thoughts. Welles has put upon the screen a motion picture that really moves. In the UK C. Lejeune of The Observer called it "The most exciting film that has come out of Hollywood in twenty-five years" [] and Dilys Powell of The Sunday Times said the film's style was made "with the ease and boldness and resource of one who controls and is not controlled by his medium. A few reviews were mixed. Otis Ferguson of The New Republic said it was "the boldest free-hand stroke in major screen production since Griffith and Bitzer were running wild to unshackle the camera", but also criticized its style, calling it a "retrogression in film technique" and stating that "it holds no great place" in film history.
More power to Welles! Some prominent critics wrote negative reviews. In his review for Sur , Jorge Luis Borges famously called the film "a labyrinth with no center" and predicted that its legacy would be a film "whose historical value is undeniable but which no one cares to see again. Modern critics have given Citizen Kane an even more positive response. The site's critical consensus reads: "Orson Welles's epic tale of a publishing tycoon's rise and fall is entertaining, poignant, and inventive in its storytelling, earning its reputation as a landmark achievement in film. It was widely believed the film would win most of its Academy Award nominations, but it received only the award for Best Original Screenplay.
Variety reported that block voting by screen extras deprived Citizen Kane of Best Picture and Best Actor , and similar prejudices were likely to have been responsible for the film receiving no technical awards. Citizen Kane was the only film made under Welles's original contract with RKO Pictures, which gave him complete creative control. In the new contract Welles was an employee of the studio [] and lost the right to final cut, which later allowed RKO to modify and re-cut The Magnificent Ambersons over his objections. During World War II , Citizen Kane was not seen in most European countries. It was shown in France for the first time on July 10, at the Marbeuf theater in Paris. The film is in the past tense, whereas we all know that cinema has got to be in the present tense.
In his essay "The Evolution of the Language of Cinema", Bazin placed Citizen Kane center stage as a work which ushered in a new period in cinema. He has enriched his filmic repertory with new or forgotten effects that, in today's artistic context, take on a significance we didn't know they could have. Bazin's praise of the film went beyond film theory and reflected his own philosophy towards life itself. It portrayed the world as ambiguous and full of contradictions, whereas films up until then simply portrayed people's actions and motivations. The world of Citizen Kane , that mysterious, dark, and infinitely deep world of space and memory where voices trail off into distant echoes and where meaning dissolves into interpretation, seemed to Bazin to mark the starting point from which all of us try to construct provisionally the sense of our lives.
Bazin went on to co-found Cahiers du cinéma , whose contributors including future film directors François Truffaut and Jean-Luc Godard also praised the film. By Citizen Kane had run its course theatrically and, apart from a few showings at big city arthouse cinemas, it largely vanished and both the film's and Welles's reputation fell among American critics. In critic Richard Griffith in his overview of cinema, The Film Till Now , dismissed Citizen Kane as " tinpot if not crackpot Freud. In the United States, it was neglected and forgotten until its revival on television in the mid-to-late s. Three key events in led to its re-evaluation in the United States: first, RKO was one of the first studios to sell its library to television, and early that year Citizen Kane started to appear on television; second, the film was re-released theatrically to coincide with Welles's return to the New York stage, where he played King Lear ; and third, American film critic Andrew Sarris wrote "Citizen Kane: The American Baroque" for Film Culture , and described it as "the great American film" and "the work that influenced the cinema more profoundly than any American film since The Birth of a Nation.
During Expo 58 , a poll of over film historians named Kane one of the top ten greatest films ever made the group gave first-place honors to Battleship Potemkin. When a group of young film directors announced their vote for the top six, they were booed for not including the film. In the decades since, its critical status as the greatest film ever made has grown, with numerous essays and books on it including Peter Cowie's The Cinema of Orson Welles , Ronald Gottesman's Focus on Citizen Kane , a collection of significant reviews and background pieces, and most notably Kael's essay, "Raising Kane", which promoted the value of the film to a much wider audience than it had reached before.
The rise of art house and film society circuits also aided in the film's rediscovery. The film has also ranked number one in the following film "best of" lists: Julio Castedo's The Best Films of the Century , [] Cahiers du cinéma's films pour une cinémathèque idéale, [] Kinovedcheskie Zapiski , [] Time Out magazine's Top Films Centenary , [] The Village Voice ' s Greatest Films, [] and The Royal Belgian Film Archive 's Most Important and Misappreciated American Films. Roger Ebert called Citizen Kane the greatest film ever made: "But people don't always ask about the greatest film. They ask, 'What's your favorite movie?
In Time Out conducted a reader's poll and Citizen Kane was voted 3rd best film of all time. postage stamps marking the 75th anniversary of the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences. Art director Perry Ferguson represents the behind-the-scenes craftsmen of filmmaking in the series; he is depicted completing a sketch for Citizen Kane. Citizen Kane was ranked number one in the American Film Institute 's polls of film industry artists and leaders in [] and In , the Motion Picture Editors Guild published a list of the 75 best-edited films of all time based on a survey of its membership.
Citizen Kane was listed second. The website's critics consensus states: "Orson Welles's epic tale of a publishing tycoon's rise and fall is entertaining, poignant, and inventive in its storytelling, earning its reputation as a landmark achievement in film. Citizen Kane has been called the most influential film of all time. The cinematography influenced John Huston 's The Maltese Falcon. Cinematographer Arthur Edeson used a wider-angle lens than Toland and the film includes many long takes, low angles and shots of the ceiling, but it did not use deep focus shots on large sets to the extent that Citizen Kane did. Edeson and Toland are often credited together for revolutionizing cinematography in Other films influenced include Gaslight , Mildred Pierce and Jane Eyre. American filmmakers in the s combined these two approaches by using long takes, rapid cutting, deep focus and telephoto shots all at once.
The film's structure influenced the biographical films Lawrence of Arabia and Mishima: A Life in Four Chapters —which begin with the subject's death and show their life in flashbacks—as well as Welles's thriller Mr. Arkadin , as well as the theme of nostalgia for loss of innocence throughout Welles's career, beginning with Citizen Kane and including The Magnificent Ambersons , Mr. Arkadin and Chimes at Midnight. Rosenbaum also points out how the film influenced Warren Beatty 's Reds. The film depicts the life of Jack Reed through the eyes of Louise Bryant, much as Kane's life is seen through the eyes of Thompson and the people who he interviews. Rosenbaum also compared the romantic montage between Reed and Bryant with the breakfast table montage in Citizen Kane.
Akira Kurosawa 's Rashomon is often compared to the film due to both having complicated plot structures told by multiple characters in the film. Andrews also compares Charles Foster Kane to Michael Corleone in The Godfather , Jake LaMotta in Raging Bull and Daniel Plainview in There Will Be Blood for their portrayals of "haunted megalomaniac[s], presiding over the shards of [their] own [lives]. The films of Paul Thomas Anderson have been compared to it. Variety compared There Will Be Blood to the film [] and called it "one that rivals Giant and Citizen Kane in our popular lore as origin stories about how we came to be the people we are.
Many directors have listed it as one of the greatest films ever made, including Woody Allen , Michael Apted , Les Blank , Kenneth Branagh , Paul Greengrass , Satyajit Ray , [] Michel Hazanavicius , Michael Mann , Sam Mendes , Jiří Menzel , Paul Schrader , Martin Scorsese , [] Denys Arcand , Gillian Armstrong , John Boorman , Roger Corman , Alex Cox , Miloš Forman , Norman Jewison , Richard Lester , Richard Linklater , Paul Mazursky , Ronald Neame , Sydney Pollack [] and Stanley Kubrick. Above all, the performances are worthless. The amount of respect that movie has is absolutely unbelievable! William Friedkin said that the film influenced him and called it "a veritable quarry for filmmakers, just as Joyce 's Ulysses is a quarry for writers.
Carlos Fuentes 's novel The Death of Artemio Cruz was partially inspired by the film [] and the rock band The White Stripes paid unauthorized tribute to the film in the song " The Union Forever ". Welles's Oscar for Best Original Screenplay was believed to be lost until it was rediscovered in In , Mankiewicz's personal copy of the Citizen Kane script was auctioned at Christie's. The leather-bound volume included the final shooting script and a carbon copy of American that bore handwritten annotations—purportedly made by Hearst's lawyers, who were said to have obtained it in the manner described by Kael in " Raising Kane ".
The composited camera negative of Citizen Kane is believed to be lost forever. The most commonly-reported explanation is that it was destroyed in a New Jersey film laboratory fire in the s. However, in , Nicolas Falacci revealed that he had been told "the real story" by a colleague, when he was one of two employees in the film restoration lab which assembled the "restoration" from the best available elements. Falacci noted that throughout the process he had daily visits in from an unnamed "older RKO executive showing up every day — nervous and sweating". According to Falacci's colleague, this elderly man was keen to cover up a clerical error he had made decades earlier when in charge of the studio's inventory, which had resulted in the original camera negatives being sent to a silver reclamation plant, destroying the nitrate film to extract its valuable silver content.
Falacci's account is impossible to verify, but it would have been fully in keeping with industry standard practice for many decades, which was to destroy prints and negatives of countless older films deemed non-commercially viable, to extract the silver. Subsequent prints were derived from a master positive a fine-grain preservation element made in the s and originally intended for use in overseas distribution. RKO kept the non-broadcast television rights to its library. In , when home video was in its infancy, entrepreneur Snuff Garrett bought cassette rights to the RKO library for what United Press International termed "a pittance".
In The Nostalgia Merchant released the film through Media Home Entertainment. It was a hobby with me which became big business. In , The Criterion Collection released the film as its first LaserDisc. It was made from a fine grain master positive provided by the UCLA Film and Television Archive. This version had an improved transfer and additional special features, including the documentary The Legacy of Citizen Kane and Welles's early short The Hearts of Age. Turner Broadcasting System acquired broadcast television rights to the RKO library in [] and the full worldwide rights to the library in unit had distribution rights for the film.
In , Warner Home Video released a 60th Anniversary Collectors Edition DVD. The two-disc DVD included feature-length commentaries by Roger Ebert and Peter Bogdanovich , as well as a second DVD with the feature length documentary The Battle Over Citizen Kane It was simultaneously released on VHS. In , Welles's daughter Beatrice Welles sued Turner Entertainment, claiming the Welles estate is the legal copyright holder of the film. She claimed that Welles's deal to terminate his contracts with RKO meant that Turner's copyright of the film was null and void.
In she was allowed to proceed with the lawsuit, overturning the decision in favor of Turner Entertainment on the issue of video rights. In , it was released on Blu-ray and DVD in a 70th Anniversary Edition. A 70th Anniversary Ultimate Collector's Edition added a third DVD with RKO , an award winning TV movie about the making of the film. Its packaging extras included a hardcover book and a folio containing mini reproductions of the original souvenir program, lobby cards, and production memos and correspondence. This was partially rectified in with the release of the 75th Anniversary Edition in both the UK and US, which was a straight repackaging of the main disc from the 70th Anniversary Edition.
On August 11, Criterion announced their first 4K Ultra HD releases, a six-film slate, would include Citizen Kane. Criterion indicated each title was to be available in a combo pack including a 4K UHD disc of the feature film as well as the film and special features on the companion Blu-rays. However, the release was recalled because at the half-hour mark on the regular blu-ray, the contrast fell sharply, which resulted in a much darker image compared to what was supposed to occur. In the s, Citizen Kane became a catalyst in the controversy over the colorization of black-and-white films. One proponent of film colorization was Ted Turner , [] whose Turner Entertainment Company owned the RKO library. I'm thinking of colorizing it.
Criticism increased when filmmaker Henry Jaglom stated that shortly before his death Welles had implored him "don't let Ted Turner deface my movie with his crayons. In February , Turner Entertainment President Roger Mayer announced that work to colorize the film had been stopped due to provisions in Welles's contract with RKO that "could be read to prohibit colorization without permission of the Welles estate. In one minute of the colorized test footage was included in the BBC Arena documentary The Complete Citizen Kane. The colorization controversy was a factor in the passage of the National Film Preservation Act in which created the National Film Registry the following year.
ABC News anchor Peter Jennings reported that "one major reason for doing this is to require people like the broadcaster Ted Turner, who's been adding color to some movies and re-editing others for television, to put notices on those versions saying that the movies have been altered". From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia. For the band, see Citizen Kane band. Theatrical release poster Style B by William Rose. Herman J. Mankiewicz Orson Welles. Orson Welles Joseph Cotten Dorothy Comingore Everett Sloane Ray Collins George Coulouris Agnes Moorehead Paul Stewart Ruth Warrick Erskine Sanford William Alland.
RKO Radio Pictures Mercury Productions. Release date. May 1, Palace Theatre September 5, United States. Running time. Favored to win election as governor, Kane makes a campaign speech at Madison Square Garden. The affair between Kane and Susan Alexander Dorothy Comingore is exposed by his political opponent, Boss Jim W. Gettys Ray Collins. Harry Shannon , George Coulouris and Agnes Moorehead. Joseph Cotten , Orson Welles and Everett Sloane. Ray Collins, Dorothy Comingore, Orson Welles and Ruth Warrick.
Main article: Screenplay for Citizen Kane. Mankiewicz co-wrote the script in early He and Welles separately re-wrote and revised each other's work until Welles was satisfied with the finished product. Pauline Kael 's controversial essay " Raising Kane " was published in The New Yorker and in The Citizen Kane Book Main article: Sources for Citizen Kane. Although various sources were used as a model for Kane, William Randolph Hearst was the primary inspiration. Hearst was disturbed by the film's supposed depiction of Marion Davies , but Welles always denied that Susan Alexander Kane was based on Davies.
Main article: Citizen Kane trailer. Welles and cinematographer Gregg Toland prepare to film the post-election confrontation between Kane and Leland, shot from an extremely low angle that required cutting into the set floor. Welles placed Toland's credit with his own to acknowledge the cinematographer's contributions. Bazin, André. The Technique of Citizen Kane. Paris, France: Les Temps modernes 2, number 17, Biskind, Peter ed. My Lunches with Orson: Conversations between Henry Jaglom and Orson Welles. New York: Metropolitan Books, ISBN Bogdanovich, Peter and Welles, Orson. This is Orson Welles. HarperPerennial ISBN X Bogdanovich, Peter and Welles, Orson uncredited. Citizen Welles: A Biography of Orson Welles. New York: Charles Scribner's Sons, Callow, Simon. Orson Welles: The Road to Xanadu.
London: Jonathan Cape, ISBN Carringer, Robert L. The Making of Citizen Kane. Berkeley and Los Angeles: University of California Press, ISBN hardcover; revised and updated edition ISBN paperback Carringer, Robert L. A History of Narrative Film. Norton Company, ISBN Gottesman, Ronald ed. Focus on Citizen Kane. Englewood Cliffs, N. Perspectives on Citizen Kane. New York: G. ISBN Heylin, Clinton. Despite the System: Orson Welles Versus the Hollywood Studios , Chicago Review Press, ISBN Howard, James. The Complete Films of Orson Welles. New York: Carol Publishing Group, Kael, Pauline, Welles, Orson and Mankiewicz, Herman J.
The Citizen Kane Book. Boston: Little, Brown and Company, Orson Welles, A Biography. New York: Viking Press, Meryman, Richard. Mank: The Wit, World and Life of Herman Mankiewicz. New York: William Morrow and Company, Mulvey, Laura. Citizen Kane. London: British Film Institute, ISBN Naremore, James ed. Orson Welles's Citizen Kane: A Casebook in Criticism. Oxford: Oxford University Press, ISBN Nasaw, David. The Chief: The Life of William Randolph Hearst. New York: Houghton Mifflin, ISBN Rippy, Marguerite H. Orson Welles and the Unfinished RKO Projects: A Postmodern Perspective.
Southern Illinois University Press, Illinois, ISBN Rosenbaum, Jonathan. The Brothers Mankiewicz: Hope, Heartbreak, and Hollywood Classics. Jackson: University Press of Mississippi, We designed every camera setup and everything else—did enormous research in aboriginal, Stone Age cultures in order to reproduce what the story called for. I'm sorry not to have got the chance to do it. He's in the pilot house and he can see himself reflected in the glass through which you see the jungle. So it isn't that business of a hand-held camera mooching around pretending to walk like a man. He wrote that many biographers may wrongly assume that Carringer included all of its facts in his later book, The Making of Citizen Kane. I drew a lot from that from my Chicago days.
And Samuel Insull. that Marion was a failed and pathetic alcoholic that he was by any unflattering references to himself. Everybody in the movie is in it. Yes, I'm there. Years later Welles thanked David Lean for the article. These included interviews by Welles and the publication of Toland's article "The Motion Picture Cameraman" in the January issue of La Revue du Cinéma. Bordwell believes that Bazin was aware of the legend of film's innovations before having seen it. Discovering Orson Welles. Berkeley: University of California Press, , ISBN British Board of Film Classification. August 1, Archived from the original on March 6, Retrieved December 23, October 24, The Making of Citizen Kane, Revised Edition.
University of California Press. Archived from the original on November 14, Retrieved May 3, — via Google Books. Box Office Mojo. Archived from the original on September 2, Retrieved January 16, Library of Congress. October 31, Archived from the original on October 31, Archived from the original on April 19, Retrieved April 16, Los Angeles Times. Washington, D. September 19, Archived from the original on May 5, Retrieved April 22, Warner Bros. Home Entertainment. March 2, The American Film Institute Catalog of Motion Pictures Produced in the United States: Feature Films, — Archived from the original on October 25, Retrieved April 14, The Magic World of Orson Welles 2nd ed.
Dallas: Southern Methodist University Press. ISBN X. Navhind Times. June 16, Archived from the original on August 3, Retrieved July 27, February 22, Archived from the original on July 27, The Saturday Evening Post : 27, 28, 40, Archived from the original on September 24, Retrieved December 5, New York: Charles Scribner's Sons. Berkeley and Los Angeles: University of California Press. New York: Viking Press. New York: HarperCollins Publishers. New York: William Morrow and Company , Inc. New York: Viking. Jackson: University Press of Mississippi. Orson Welles: The Man Who Was Magic. ASIN BHEHQ7E. Archived from the original on December 22, Retrieved December 21, The Bakersfield Californian.
June 6, On Oct. Boston: Little, Brown and Company. OCLC Archived from the original on June 20, Retrieved August 18, Archived from the original on January 12, Retrieved January 7, The Guardian. Archived from the original on January 7, Retrieved January 6, The New York Times. Archived from the original on August 25, In Naremore, James ed. Orson Welles's Citizen Kane: A Casebook. Oxford University Press. Berkeley, CA: University of California Press. Run-Through: A Memoir. Orson Welles: Interviews. Jackson, Mississippi: University Press of Mississippi. Archived from the original on December 16, Retrieved January 14, In My Father's Shadow: A Daughter Remembers Orson Welles. Chapel Hill, North Carolina: Algonquin Books.
Pfau, Pamela; Marx, Kenneth S. The Times We Had: Life with William Randolph Hearst. Foreword by Orson Welles two pages preceding unpaginated chapter index. Indianapolis and New York: Bobbs-Merrill Company , Inc. Archived from the original on October 30, Retrieved October 30, Archived from the original on October 29, Retrieved October 29, Young Orson. New York: Harper. Chicago Sun-Times. Archived from the original on June 10, Retrieved June 2, Toronto Star. Catalogue for exhibition October 28 — December 3, New York: The Museum of Broadcasting. Orson Welles: A Bio-Bibliography. Westport, Connecticut: Greenwood Press. London, UK: BFI Publishing. Archived from the original on December 9, Retrieved January 22, Orson Welles: The Rise and Fall of an American Genius.
New York: St. Martin's Press. May 4, The San Bernardino County Sun. Archived from the original on September 11, Retrieved January 16, — via Newspapers. New York: Metropolitan Books. New York: Carol Publishing Group. The Magnificent Ambersons: A Reconstruction. Directors in Action: Selections from Action, The Official Magazine of the Directors Guild of America. Indianapolis: The Bobbs Merrill Company, Inc. The Complete Citizen Kane. BBC Two. Wellesnet: The Orson Welles Web Resource. September 15, Archived from the original on September 17, Retrieved September 16, The Hollywood Reporter. Archived from the original on March 9, Retrieved March 10, Archived from the original on March 30, Retrieved August 31, World Film Directors, Volume 1. New York: The H.
Wilson Company. Searching for John Ford: A Life. New York: Macmillan Publishers. HarperAudio, September 30, ISBN Audiotape 1A. Citizen Kane: The Fiftieth Anniversary Album. New York: Doubleday. Paramount Pictures. Archived from the original on August 12, San Diego History Center. Archived from the original on May 21, Retrieved April 6, Spring Retrieved December 13, The New Yorker. Archived from the original on April 25, Retrieved December 18, July 5, Archived from the original on October 18, Retrieved December 11, Paris, France: Les Lettres Françaises , number Cardullo, Bert ed. Minding Movies.
Observations on the Art, Craft, and Business of Filmmaking. Notable is the use of metaphors and excellent time selection linking all the scenes in the film. Another interesting scene in the film, which employs editing techniques, is when Kane dies. The scene starts with the presence of snow leaving the viewer to think that Kane is already dead. The editor zooms the cameras revealing that the snow is in the entire film remaining the outstanding event using significant effects. The film employs a deep-focus camera, which is part of editing techniques in filmmaking Citizen Kane: A Synthetic Approach , n.
Shots were taken with this kind of camera permit everything within the film frame, whether in the front, middle, or background, to be central Citizen Kane: A Synthetic Approach , n. This was quite innovative in adding an aspect of further depressed to the already dark genre film noir is. Angling shots are a procedure known to illustrate a character, situation, or power. Also, editors use deep-focus shots when Mrs. Kane signs papers allowing her son to leave home and be brought up by the bank Citizen Kane: A Synthetic Approach , n. Another perfect example of this technique happens in the scene after Kane lost his trial for the governorship.
This is an observation that can be linked to Kane being continuously displayed from a low-shot in the post-election scene. The presence of too much information in a shot forces the editor to hold his shots for a long period. These long takes allow viewers to absorb all the undertakings on the screen. The film Citizen Kane displays a less dramatic script but exhibits skillful editing techniques of the era. The use of the continuity editing technique marks the beginning of editors to employ conventional ways of film editing. Multifaceted editing techniques enable the film to divert from close-ups shots to long and low shots.
Also, the application of lighting to emphasize the mood and surroundings was extensively available throughout the film. From the editing perspective, Citizen Kane was and will always be a masterpiece of its time. Barsam, R. Looking at movies: an introduction to film 3rd ed. New York: W. Brown, B. Cinematography: Image making for cinematographers, directors, and videographers. Oxford: Focal Press. Dixon, W. A short history of film. New York : Rutgers University Press. Need a custom Essay sample written from scratch by professional specifically for you?
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