smallwoods cinema: citizen kane

orson welles' citizen kane (1941) consistently ranks among the best movies ever made. at the age of 25, welles directed, produced, and starred -- it was his first movie.

orson welles as charles foster kane
source: blogs.phillynews.com

in 1941, welles was known for his radio direction and narration in the war of the worlds -- and, of course, he is remembered for that program even today. in making citizen kane, welles wanted to have actors never before seen on screen. so, he brought along many of his fellow radio actors. in fact, all of the actors -- saved for one, who makes a brief appearance as a waiter -- had never been in a movie before.

welles and cotten
source: dgaquarterly.com

one of those actors is joseph cotten, who went on to star in hitchcock's shadow of a doubt (1943), previously reviewed on this blog. i had noted that cotten didn't make any other big films; however, both he and welles played the leads in hitchcock's the third man (1949), which i highly recommend.

the prideful and selfish character of charles foster kane was based loosely on a handful of real people, including a person named mccormack, who built the chicago opera house for his girlfriend. the most famous real-life comparison to kane is american newspaper tycoon, william randolph hearst. when the movie came out, hearst was enraged and blacklisted the film. this meant that major newspapers were forbidden to mention it -- so, many major theaters were afraid to screen it for fear that they would likewise be blacklisted.

upon watching the movie for the first time, i was struck by the dramatic, unique lighting, as well as the carefully and beautifully choreographed frames. at times, it felt a bit like a play rather than a movie. i couldn't put my finger on why, until i watched the movie again with commentary by welles' lifelong friend, peter bogdanovich.

xanadu
source: titrangi stroyteller

bogdanovich points out a couple of things -- first, the use of "deep focus" which captures everything from the foreground to the distant background in sharp focus. cameraman gregg toland developed this technique, and it remains to be a very difficult thing to do, even today. second, many of the scenes are shot with one take -- with little or no camera cut-aways. for example, when two people are in conversation in the movie, welles often decides to show only one person instead of cutting the cameras back and forth to show each actor. welles, of course, was quite comfortable portraying characters completely off-screen because of his background in radio.

an older kane and susan alexander
source: doctormacro1.info

bogdanovich also notes that welles himself was nothing like the prideful character he plays: charles foster kane. welles' performances of the young, middle-aged, and elderly kane are really amazing -- especially for such a young actor.

with citizen kane, welles set a number of technical precedents in the way movies are made today -- for one, the way the scenes dissolve into one another. toland observed that welles' inexperience with movies "didn't tell him what one couldn't do" -- so welles' creativity was uninhibited in this way.

welles went on to make more movies, and many argue that he never topped citizen kane. but bogdanovich says that welles himself didn't feel that way. they both, for example, felt that chimes at midnight (1965) was a better film -- and if anyone knows of a way that i could watch that movie, i'd absolutely love to see it.

and so concludes my little review with no mention of the plot.

cheers!