citizen kane
The classic masterpiece, Citizen Kane (1941), is probably the world's most famous and highly rated film, with its many remarkable scenes, cinematic and narrative techniques and innovations. The director, star, and producer were all the same individual - Orson Welles (in his film debut at age 25), who collaborated with Herman J. Mankiewicz on the script and with Gregg Toland as cinematographer. Within the maze of its own aesthetic, Citizen Kane develops two interesting themes. The first concerns the debasement of the private personality of the public figure, and the second deals with the crushing weight of materialism. Taken together, these two themes comprise the bitter irony of an American success story that ends in futile nostalgia, loneliness, and death. The fact that the personal theme is developed verbally through the characters while the materialistic theme is developed visually, creating a distinctive stylistic counterpoint. It is against the counterpoint that the theme!s unfold within the structure of a mystery story. Its theme is told from several perspectives by several different characters and is thought provoking. The tragic story is how a millionaire newspaperman, who idealistically mad
The implied absence of free will in the development of Kane's character is thematically constant with the moral climate of his environment. Aside from the aesthetic dividends of pacing and high lighting, Citizen Kane's sound montag!e reinforces the unnatural tension of the central character's driving, joyless ambition. It also intimidates the audience, since it is in the inferior position of looking up. Sound montage is used extensively with the flashback scenes to denote the interval of time within related scenes. The apparent intellectual superficiality of Citizen Kane can be traced to the shallow quality of Kane himself. The scene gives an added power to the person on the screen. A character will begin a sentence and complete it weeks, months, or years later in a different location. A shrill scream punctuates the argument with a persistent, sensual rhythm. This technique which is highly unusual, tends to dehumanize characters by reducing them to fixed ornaments in a shifting architecture. His booming voice is muffled by walls, carpets, furniture, hallways, stairs the vast recesses of useless space. As the techniques used have not been limited in form, so too, Kane's magnitude unchecked by limiting principles or rooted traditions, become the cause of spiritual. One brilliant use of sound montage, is when Kane and his wife are arguing in a tent surrounded by hundreds of Kane's guests. When the parakeet screams at the appearance of Kane, the sound linkage in tone but not in time, further dehumanizes Kane's environment. It tends to elongate a person, making him seem more important. Toland perfected a deep-focus technique that allowed him to photograph backgrounds with as much clarity as foregrounds.
Common topics in this essay:
Citizen Kane,
Gregg Toland's,
Jedediah Leland,
Citizen Kane's,
Susan's Sound,
Kane Kane,
citizen kane,
Orson Welles,
Gregg Toland,
Herman Mankiewicz,
character begin sentence,
begin sentence complete,
kane's character,
material possessions,
sentence complete,
character begin,
sound montage,
begin sentence,
theme developed,
|
Acceptance Essays
