Hezo Kittie

We watched Citizen Kane in film yesterday. It was interesting but didn't make me immediately go, "Wow!" I expected a lot from what is voted by many as the greatest American film. I guess if the greatest American film was the movie that made you go, "Wow!" then it'd probably be Spy Kids 3D. Which isn't a bad alternative.

I'm assuming the beauty of Orson Welles' directorial debut lies in its overall strangeness and the significance of every cut, sound effect, transition, and montage. However, there is no way I can make any sort of credible statement about this movie when I don't even know how four-fifths of the film contributed to the movie as a whole.

For example, in the scene where Kane is a child and about to be adopted, it shows his parents talking inside the cabin, and in one complete shot the mother opens the window, the camera flies through the window and, without one cut, follows them as they walk outside to talk to their son. If there's one thing I learned from writing a seven-page research paper on the contributions of two directors of the silent film era, it's what F.W. Murnau said in a 1927 interview: "There should be no such thing as 'an interesting camera angle'. The angle in itself has no significance, and if it does not intensify the dramatic effect of the scene it can even be harmful."

I'm sure one of the primary reasons for this movie's status as the greatest of all time is all the fun the film critics and historians have in the theater, picking apart each scene one by one, because it's saturated with all kinds of unusual details.

The progression of the story is interesting as well; we get a five minute recap of everything Kane did in his life, but without knowing why. The rest of the movie is dedicated to the pursuit of the meaning of Rosebud, which is not only common knowledge but also "duh". However, it's not as simple as I originally thought. One of the characters near the end says that a man's life can't be revealed by just one word, so just as quickly as we think back through the movie to figure where Rosebud fits in, we also realize that it tells us almost nothing about the rest of his life.

Kane's true character is slowly revealed through a series of non-chronological accounts from his former associates. The pacing and succession of these events probably have significance to the previous and next events, but, again, I don't know what the importance is. After one viewing, Kane just seems contradictory on the surface, and his purpose is distant.

What I do know is that it's an amazing feat to have this much creative freedom in a big budget Hollywood production, especially in 1941. There's probably films of greater depth somewhere else, but only Hollywood could give such a young and imaginative man all the resources at his disposal.

My one "Wow!" moment was when the young Kane was about to be adopted. The framing of the shot is meticulous, with a close up of the parents pondering the decision of giving up their son while in the background you can see him through the window playing in the snow. As they're talking, Kane is crying out little kid sing-song nonsense, and says, "The Union Forever!"

I thought, "Hey, that's a White Stripes song." At first I couldn't tell if it was an intentional reference, because I didn't know what one had to do with the other. The Union Forever could be from a child's song. I remember listening to the White Stripes' song regularly a couple of summers ago because it's really eerie and mesmerizing.

A couple of scenes later, the wealthy Kane buys out the Inquirer, and he brings along with him an entire marching band to celebrate his acquisition. Then the band plays a song, and the exact same lyrics and beat are used in the bridge of the Union Forever. These are always fun.

Listening to the song again, the lyrics are pulled from the movie, such as "What would I liked to have been? / Everything you hate."

Still, I'd rather watch Goodfellas or Adaptation.