Citizen Kane, directed by Orson Welles, debuted in 1941. It is a detective story about the rise and fall of newspaper mogul, Charles Foster Kane. Citizen Kane follows a journalist named Thompson, who conducts a series of interviews to find out what Kane’s last word meant before he died. “Rosebud,” was the last word muttered by Kane and Thompson takes the audience on a journey to find its meaning. Within this voyage, the spectators relive sixty-five years of Kane’s life. Citizen Kane was one of the first films to break away from the classical principles of cinematic storytelling. The film follows a unique and complex structure where the story unfolds in an intricate matter. Citizen Kane was also innovative with its use of visual and sound elements. …show more content…
Where conflicts are resolved and mysteries are solved. However, the ending of Citizen Kane does not offer concrete closure to the story being told. Welles weaves a maze-like story, where the audience becomes a detective and tries to solve the mystery of Rosebud, with Thompson. When the story comes to the end, Rosebud is revealed only to the audience but with no real explanation as to why this word has been driving the story. Conversely, Rosebud is never exposed to Thompson, so it leaves the story of Citizen Kane quite open-ended. Audiences in the 1940’s found this ending leaving them with too much uncertainty. Welles artistic design of Citizen Kane was ahead of its time. His decision to end the film with no clarification of the meaning of Rosebud was deliberate. Welles dares the spectators to question if Rosebud holds the same importance to the story, as they believed it did throughout the film. “Rosebud serves a very important motivating function in the film. It creates Thompson’s goal and thus focuses our attention on his delving into the lives of Kane and his associates. Citizen Kane becomes a mystery story; but instead of investigating a crime, the reporter investigates character. So the Rosebud clues provide the basic motivation necessary for the plot to progress.” Instead of giving audiences an exact answer to the ending, Welles invites spectators to come to their own …show more content…
The film is in black and white so Welles had the opportunity to play with overexposure and shadows to make up the atmosphere of the film. The lighting techniques set a mysterious mood throughout the film, which complements the plot and the sound elements. “By the use of low-key selective lighting and patterns of staging and framing, Thompson is made virtually unidentifiable.” Welles manipulated the lighting in Citizen Kane to enhance the realism that was brought forth by the use of deep focus shots and the use of sound. This was done so the audience would not focus on Thompson but on the action of the scene. Reiterating that Welles wanted the spectators to “become” the detective. “Welles chose to use light and shadow to specifically tell the audience what to focus on.” His dark choice of lighting added a feeling of suspense and realism, which supported his plot and complimented his camera techniques and sound
People are constantly being judged and pressured to change to fit society’s standards. In Tim Burton films, there is always one character that does not fit the mold. These outcast characters in the movies Charlie and The Chocolate Factory and Edward Scissorhands are strange and isolated from the world. Despite the outcast’s difficulties, misfit characters like Edward and Wonka go on to be the hero of the story. Therefore, Burton uses many different cinematic techniques to illustrate that one does not need to conform to society in order to have a happy and successful life.
Mise-en-scène, cinematography and editing are used in all forms of cinema. Within the “Declaration of Principles” scene of Citizen Kane, lighting, blocking and panning are three of the main sub aspects that work in unison to consistently demonstrate important aspects of the film. Welles uses these attributes to portray to the audience how this younger Kane is an important newspaper owner, with an even more important document. He creates a scene that has a heavy emphasis on panning to continuously preserve a frame that centers Kane while also lighting the document so viewers can constantly see the important plot and characters of the movie.
Throughout the course of a lifetime, a common phrase heard is “don’t judge a book by its cover”. This phrase indicates the fact that it is nearly impossible to truly evaluate the life and feelings of a person just by what can be seen about them. This is the case in the film Citizen Kane, directed by Orson Welles. Charles Foster Kane is a man who would appear to the general public as having it all. A very popular man, Kane owns a successful newspaper company for which he is known worldwide. He builds a gigantic mansion for his second wife and himself, surrounded by intricate and expensive statues. Kane seems to be perfect in every single way, and one may think that he is the happiest man alive. However, Charles never had the things that
The film the Corpse Bride is a must see movie. In this movie you will see so many different cinematic techniques used by the director Tim Burton. Victor (played by Johnny Depp) is the main Charter in this movie. Victor was introduced to us using a close-up, establishing shot. For example when the movie starts we see a close up of a had drawing a butterfly, soon the hand is zoomed out to a face of a skinny dark haired young a man who we will soon find out is
Orson Welles ' introduced innovating editing and sound design in the 1940s with Citizen Kane (1941). Welles uses editing and sound to show the audience the passing of time, this is seen the breakfast montage. Welles uses sound bridges during the transitional wipes of fast moving images which fade into the next shot. The sound bridges act as links between the two scenes and make the time difference apparent to the audience. At the beginning of the montage Welles uses a slow zoom combined with romantic music to show the love between Kane and Emily. Both characters appear in the frame together with deep focus and slow paced editing which shows the closeness of the couple in the early years. This is juxtaposed by the end of the montage showing
Orson Wells’ film Citizen Kane received terrific reviews as soon as it opened in 1941. While the average movie buff would not value Citizen Kane as much, for the critics, directors and film students: it provides a technical handbook as to the nuts and bolts of how a film is to be assembled. It has now been chosen as the greatest American film in a number of polls due to the many remarkable scenes and performances, cinematic and narrative techniques and experimental innovations in photography, editing and sound.
Citizen Kane, is a 1941 American film, written, produced, and starred by Orson Welles. This film is often proclaimed by critics,filmmakers, and fans as one of the best if not the best film ever made. Citizen Kane is an unbelievable film becuase of how advanced it is compared to other films of its time. In the film, the producer used many different narrative elements to capture the audiences imagination. It truly is astounding how the filmmakers used certain editing techniques, sounds, and different narrative elements to illustrate the story and the plot. Although the plot isnt exactly captivating to the present day audience, this film is still amazing due to how much work and effort went into making it.
Orson Welles’ career took place in the mid-thirties to late eighties in the twentieth century. He began his career at age fifteen, starting in Ireland, making his acting debut in the Gate Theater in Dublin. By eighteen, Welles started to appear in off-Broadway productions. It was then that he also launched his radio career. By age twenty, he had presented alternate interpretations of certain well-known plays and movies. At age twenty-two he was the most notable Broadway star from Mercury Theater and, because of this, BBC radio gave him an hour each week to broadcast whatever he pleased. That’s when, at age twenty-five, he broadcast War of the Worlds, which caused panic due to the “Martian invasions”. By the time he came into Hollywood, Welles could write, direct, cast, star, and edit movies without disturbance from the studios. It was during this time he created Citizen Kane- the only movie he completely finished. He retired from Hollywood at age thirty-three in 1948, but still continued to create his own films.
In your view, how does Welles’ portrayal of the complex nature of happiness contribute to the enduring value of Citizen Kane?
Citizen Kane is a timeless movie that revolutionized the film industry by bringing new techniques and ways to go about making a film that changed the Cinema forever. Orson Welles created a timeless picture by dedicated himself to the Mise-en-scene, he pushed the boundaries and found different ways to utilize what he already knew. The Mise-En-Scene of this narrative creates a film that is ahead of it’s time and a genius innovation to
The highly acclaimed Citizen Kane creates drama and suspense to the viewer. Orson Welles designed this film to enhance the viewer’s opinion about light and darkness, staging, proxemics, personal theme development, and materialism. Creating one of the most astounding films to the cinematography world, Welles conveys many stylistic features as well as fundamentals of cinematography. It is an amazing film and will have an everlasting impact on the world of film.
Sarah Street said, “in Citizen Kane Welles is criticizing fundamental contradictions within monopolistic journalism and political rhetoric.” He wasn’t only showcasing his talents in film he was conveying a real message to the public. He was criticizing the way people’s agenda can truly affect the world as seen through Hearst these individuals have great power, but often lack honesty in the way of doing things. Another critic Armstrong says the script “asks you to ponder the meaning of someone's life. What makes living worthwhile? What makes a person happy: money, love, power? How do we make sense of that life--by what was said, what was done, or by what is left?” This great description entails many of the other elements Welles wanted to face. Although Kane had all he ever wanted what did he accomplish and what was he missing and searching for all his life. This draws back to the main search in the story for Rosebud. Welles while creating a wonderful visual piece also had the thrilling unique story to go along with
'Shawshank Redemption' directed by Frank Darabont is a compelling film about the life of one of its prisoners, Andy. many film techniques were used through out the film as a clever way of conveying main themes. This essay is going to examine how Darabont used camera angles and colour effectively in this film to portray the idea of power.
Most of the film was filmed at night since that’s when Lou went on his crime scene chases. This allowed to keep the dark effect with minimal lighting tools or incorporating other aspects.During the day time shots there were mostly greys and dull colors there was never bright colors that stood out, besides the blood and the police lights which were used to contrast against the bland colors. The setting for the most part was urban industrial L.A which is a typical setting for crime to happen. As the movie progresses the setting starts changing to upper class homes and buildings it portrays how the main character is taking bigger risks and how his drive for recognition is more important than the stakes. There wasn’t really any CGI going on simply because it wasn’t needed for a live action film, and as far as special effects go there was only bloody crime scenes and random car fires used in the
Pro-filmic codes within horror movies have been used to often set the mood for the viewers. The lighting in horror movies is often very dull, most horror movies are sot in the dark so there is not much light in horror movies and I often think the lighting in those type of movies really sets the mood. Although some horror movies work up to the horror element of the movie so it might be very warm happy lighting for the first part of the movie but when it gets to the part that is supposed to scare the audience it often then changes to a darker element of lighting, for example the ...