Citizen Kane (1941)

Kane is amazing on so many levels.  It's seems to have become common in recent years to dismiss it because its aesthetic values outweigh its narrative/entertainment values, but I've never really agreed with that.

KANE is a film worthy of tremendous admiration, and I have never agreed with its detractors. That said, I can't help but somewhat dislike the cult that has built up around it somewhat. It is a tragedy that Welles' great, rich film career--one of the very best of any filmmaker--is swallowed up by it, which contains many films that are as accomplished, and arguably even more fascinating, than KANE. Had he released it later in its career, rather than as his first major motion picture, I suspect that it would not be treated with the same level of reverence; the legend of CITIZEN KANE is, in some sense, part of why it holds such irrevocable canonical status.

All the technical achievements aside, It's one hell of a story.

I'm not sure if it's cliche to have "the best film of all time" be one of your all time favorites, but I'd be lying if I said it wasn't. Love it, love it, love it. I have a framed photo of Orson Welles hanging over my desk right now.

 

The scene where we first meet the adult Kane gives me chills every time.  "You know Mr. Thatcher, at a million dollars a year I'll have to close this place in...60 years..."

 

Like most classic movies, alot of it's majesty & power is lost in the home viewing setting. I was lucky enough to catch it on the big screen, having never seen it, & hoooly shite is it a jaw-dropping work. The way that forbidding, mysterious opening fills a dark theater & draws you in just before grabbing you with that energetic newsreel intro is an entrancing experience.

 

I'm always blown away how, visually, CK plays like a prescient amalgam of the dynamic energy of Scorsese/Spielberg & the scope of Coppola.

I have had the great pleasure of seeing this film on the big screen twice. And I am really looking forward to the blu ray release later this year, I'm just hoping that the restoration can rival what was accomplished with The Third Man and Casablanca.

I'm hoping to see it in Theaters one day. Are there any actual 35mm reels left of it, or is it all digital projection?

There are definitely reels still around. But I would definitely pay to see the restoration on the big screen, if it was an option.

Great point.  Discussion of the film has moved so far into near deification over the technical achievements that it's impossible for anyone to watch it simply as a movie. 

 

Love the film dearly (I blurt out "Gettys, I'm gonna send you to Sing Sing...SING SING!!!" any chance I can), have had it in every possible format and never get tired of watching and praising it.  But, the story is so nuanced and wonderfully acted that I could enjoy a short film simply about Kane and Jed Leland's relationship alone. 

 

Also, one of my favorite aspects of the story is the scene where Kane meets Susan Alexander outside the drugstore and he's so smitten by her child-like demeanor (something he never experienced) he gets derailed from where he was headed to begin with...storage to see recently delivered belongings from Colorado - in search of his youth...including his sled.  His whole melancholy existence pivots on that meeting.

 

 

NICE.

 

Just watched the film for the first time in a long while.  This is definitely a film where its reputation hasn't made it easy to simply sit down and enjoy a story, but I was able to do that tonight on a nicely projected screen at home.  I still don't think it's a story that fully draws me into Kane emotionally, but it's still a damned engrossing one.

 

It was interesting to have seen this within a day of seeing the trailer for J. Edgar.  In terms of portraying old age in prosthetic make-up, Welles flies so many circles around DiCaprio that he goes back in time.  DiCaprio's Hoover ends up coming across as more of a joke than it already did.  Welles simply gives an incredible performance at every stage of Kane's life.  It's just criminal how talented the man was.  At 26... directing his debut film.  Jesus.