Orson Welles 1941 film, Citizen Kane, depicts the American dream through the protagonist Charles Foster Kane. In the film, Orson Welles relies heavily on his understanding of the audience by using pathos and ethos in order to convince them of his purpose for writing the film.
There are many things that make “Citizen Kane” considered as possibly one of the greatest films every made; to the eyes of the passive audience this film may not seem the most amazing, most people being accustomed to the classical Hollywood style, but to the audience with an eye for the complex, “Citizen Kane” breaks the traditional Hollywood mold and forges its own path for the better.
The Film Citizen Kane was a groundbreaking film in the 1940’s, the way Orson Wells depicts his film with different lighting, cinematography, choice of camera shots and mise-en-scene throughout this movie truly showed the masterpiece that this film is. In the Film Citizen Kane, it was the first movie that went against true Hollywood cinema by introducing flashbacks throughout the movie to show us how Charles Foster Kane changes throughout the movie. Throughout this movie the audience can see how Charles Foster Kane undergoes a variety of physical and emotional changes from when he was just a young boy all the way until his unfortunate death.
Citizen Kane tells the story of Charles Foster Kane, a millionaire newspaper tycoon, who had recently passed away. The story unfolds in a sequence of overlapping narratives told by different narrators, all with different views of Kane. Their opinions of Kane give the audience different perspectives of the man thought to be one of the most powerful figures in America. The events recalled are told by the narrators to reporters trying to decipher Kane’s famous last words “rosebud”, but because of their advance older age they seem to be contradictory and unreliable. Their accounts are out sequence and often coincide with themselves. Kane brings together non-linear and composite storytelling from multiple points of view unlike traditional Hollywood
Citizen Kane by Orson Welles is a cinematic classic, released in 1941. Citizen Kane challenged traditional narrative and technical elements of classic Hollywood cinema. Kane was narrated by several people that include their take on Kane’s life. The story unfolds by many flashbacks and is told by different perspectives over the years through different narrations. Charles Foster Kane was a millionaire, head of newspapers and died saying “rosebud”. The story focuses on telling about Kane but is about a reporter trying to seek what and why his last words meant. A reporter, Thompson was trying to seek why Kane’s last words were rosebud and what it was. The reporter interviewed people such as Mr. Jedediah Leland who was his friend until he was fired from the newspaper after transferring to Chicago to take care of that newspaper. Jedediah was fired after he was found to be face down on his typewriter writing a review of Susan and her horrific performance. Kane’s
(Citizen Kane, 1941) Kane’s parents used the power of money as an accessory for giving him away to a billionaire. Since that day, the protagonist went through a traumatizing experience, insecurity and redisposition due to his parents’ actions, which marked the beginning of his tortuous need, to be loved. This unreturned love created a sense of fear and mistrust to love something or someone, only to experience abandonment again was something Kane never got a chance to learn. Citizen Kane broke all the rules because of Welles, there were no
Kylie Mawn Professor Rodais CINE 121 Midterm 4 March 2018 Question 1: Citizen Kane (Orson Welles, 1941) is a film that is well known for pushing cinematic boundaries in many ways. One commonly recognized technique in Welles’ film is deep focus photography. Deep focus photography is used in films to allow everything in a shot to be in focus at once. Typical, only specific characters or objects are in focus in any given frame in order to guide the audience’s attention in a scene, but deep focus can bring a new level of sophistication to a shot.
The play Macbeth by William Shakespeare and 1941 film Citizen Kane possess many similarities in themes and characters, despite the completely different settings and plots. Both main characters are ambitious and determined to achieve a goal, even to a certain point where they lose everything truly meaningful to them. While Macbeth strives to become king of Scotland, Charles Foster Kane attempts to become popular and influential. Both Macbeth and Citizen Kane desire to be powerful members of their respective societies and receive respect and recognition from their acquaintances. In both works, they acquired everything they thought they wanted, yet realised they could not have what they truly desired, essentially ending up with “nothing of value”.
Citizen Kane (Welles, 1941) challenged traditional narrative and technical elements of classic Hollywood cinema through techniques in cinematography, mise-en-scene and lighting. The mise-en-scene build of Citizen Kane is the pivoting point of the narrative forthcoming and Welles uses every technical element encompassed in this build to span his narrative across 60 years of Charles Foster Kane, the main character 's life. The beginning of this build is founded on the black and white shooting choice which sets an ominous almost 'film noir ' lighting and feel of the opening scene of the castle in Xanadu. This where we see end of Kane 's life, but every aspect of the film 's narrative will revolve around these frames and including the questions of 'who has died '?, 'what was the significance of the snow globe? ', and 'Who is rosebud? '. The camera angle in the deathbed scene is deliberately shot from a low angle, which further implies the importance of the person lying in the bed as well as providing mystery as the viewer is not yet privy to whom has just
Directed by Orson Welles, the 1941 motion picture “Citizen Kane” is the story of the rise and fall of a great, influential man. The opening scenes of “Citizen Kane” are quite different from what follows during the rest of the film. Fading in and out of different landscapes instilled mystery. This mysterious vibe was carried on during Charles Foster Kane’s death through the use of shadows, quiet music, and close up shots. Isolated in his vast empire of a home, Kane uttered only one word before he passed: “rosebud.”
Charles Foster Kane, who was he really? By Thompson ... (1941) Charles Kane was a man that some of us hated or some us loved. He was a mysterious man, we know nothing of him, however we have heard of him. From friends, family, or especially in the newspaper, but who was he really?
The lighting in Donnie Darko movie is a key component of composition which creates our sense of illuminating for people and things. This movie uses two sources of lighting; natural light, such as daylight, when the scene is in an outdoor area for example, walking from school, at home, waiting at bus stop, or playing outside of the school on sunny days. Another source of light is artificial spotlight which is used in the movie indoors to cut and shape the light at the dining table, in the classroom or in the psychotherapist's house. Also, distinct shadows are used as an essentially smooth surface that reflects hard light in the Halloween party to feature deep shadows and scary areas in function of the plot. Three-points of lighting create ominous shadows in the horror genre for all the actors at Donnie and Elizabeth's Halloween party with lighting from below the cast to create monstrous objects in real life.
In the movie, Edward Scissorhands, Tim burton uses low-key lighting when Peg meets Edward for the first time in a castle. Edward was sitting in a dark corner and there was just enough light to see his face but not his clothes. This shows the amount of loneliness of Edward and that he was sad and frightened but also willing to make a friend when he approaches Peg. Also, in the movie, Charlie in the
In this essay I will be comparing the themes and the narrative techniques used in both films. Starting off with the film “Citizen Kane” as mentioned it is a story of a millionaire, Charles Foster Kane. It begins with Kane’s death and speaks a single word: “Rosebud”. The reporters in the hunt to know
The use of background light was an important focus in this picture, there was less attention to lighting the actors faces but in almost every frame there is well placed background light often combined with a moving light source. Repetition was also evident within the visual composition of the frame, the actors were rarely positioned within the center of the frame but always to the left or the right with a light source covering them from behind. Ridley Scott perfectly matches colorful high key light with low key lights creating impeccable contrast, this lighting used could be described as a modern Citizen Kane style. Although this is overall a very dark and low light film, the motif of shadows and darkness allows the beauty of light to truly be