Citizen Kane

1) Relate what was discussed in class or the text to the screening.

In class, we discussed the movie Citizen Kane. We spoke about the story, its plot, themes present in the movie, and also we discussed its importance in the film industry.  From all of the information I was given from my professor, I understood early on that this was a very special film.  In fact, we were even told that this film was regarded as the best motion picture ever to be made.  This, of course, had me intrigued and I began to wonder why it was regarded as such.  As we talked more and more about Citizen Kane, I began to find out a little bit more about this “Orson Welles” fellow.  I had thought he was just a name on a popcorn box!  I soon found out that this was the man who brought us the famous radio program “War of the Worlds”.  Although his career was very prosperous in all aspects, he only ever walked away with one academy award.  Nevertheless, his work and brilliance proved to be self-evident in his work as I watched the screen and took notes on the interesting aspects. 

2) Find a related article and summarize the content. (on the film, director, studio, actor/actress, artistic content, etc.) You can use the library or the internet. Cite the article or copy the url to your journal entry. Summarize in your own words the related article but do not plagiarize any content.

http://www.tcm.com/tcmdb/title/89/Citizen-Kane/articles.html

                In this article posted by Turner Classic Movies (TCM), writer Scott McGee goes over some of the behind-the-scenes information about the movie.  He talks about some of the pre-production challenges as well as post-production.  We also are given a brief review by Roger Fristoe who goes on to tell us about some of the writing discrepancies about due credit.

3) Apply the article to the film screened in class. How did the article support or change the way you thought about the film, director, content, etc.?

                Reading the articles TCM posted on its site is always helpful and informative.  They give me more insight on what actually took place when making Citizen Kane.  It was very interesting reading about the negative reaction from William Randolf Hearst, who felt that the film was based on his life.  The truth of this has never been uncovered, but Orson Welles denied it time and time again.  Thinking about everything that the character Charles Kane goes through, I wonder how much of it actually is an accurate representation of Hearst.

4) Write a critical analysis of the film, including your personal opinion, formed as a result of the screening, class discussions, text material and the article. I am less interested in whether you liked or disliked a film, (although that can be part of this) than I am in your understanding of its place in film history or the contributions of the director.

                I am told to be as honest as possible when writing critiques of movies so I will try to do my best with this one, although it is a bit tricky.  Last week, I was fortunate enough to watch Citizen Kane for the first time in my life.  Prior to watching this film, I had always heard, read, and been told of how great of a movie Citizen Kane was.  I was told that this movie was “The greatest movie ever made”.  Even my professor had referred to it as such in her presentation informing us on how AFI had named it so. 

With all that being said, I’m sure it is easy to imagine how my hopes and expectations for this particular movie were absolutely through the roof.  I try as hard as I can not to have such high expectations for any movie because of the chance of disappointment.  Unfortunately, I feel that is exactly what happened. 

I would be absolutely lying to say that Citizen Kane was not a masterpiece and an incredible work of art, BUT I will not say that this was the best movie ever made.  When one hears those words, they may begin to expect that they will be blown away; that they will leave the screen rethinking their whole life; that they might never want to watch another film again for fear of the inevitable disappointment they are destined for.  As I sat watching this movie for almost 2 hours, I found myself waiting for this big moment in the movie where my whole outlook on life would change.  Unfortunately it never did come.  Unfortunately I left class that day, quite disappointed with the movie and with myself for buying into such hype. 

I found that the movie was very good, even when compared with today’s pictures.  However, that sense of disappointment still loomed above me.  What Orson Welles did with his technical work in Citizen Kane was phenomenal given the time period.  The depth of his shots, the cinematography used, and even the camera movements were crisp, such as the beginning of Susan’s nightclub scenes as we track in through the roof.  This movie earned its Oscar nominations and even deserved to win more. However, the cloud of disappointment still loomed over me. 

The themes in this movie were very courageous and even the mystery of rosebud, which was solved at the end, served this movie very well.  We find out that Rosebud was actually the name of his sled when he was a kid.  The sled was a representation of his childhood and his time with his actual family, something that he had loss.  He continued to lose things in his life, things that he held very close to him.  No matter how much wealth, fame, and success he accumulated, he could not fill the void that was inside of him.  Now, I understand the relevance of the sled and what it meant to him, but I felt that it didn’t do as much justice as I thought it would. 

It is very tough to communicate why I am so let down by the movie, but I know it has to do with being told of its greatness.  Maybe if I knew exactly why this movie was considerate the best of the best, I could understand it better.  Maybe if I lived in 1941 and I had been able to see this movie as it was shown in theatres at that time, maybe then I would feel differently and the impact of its themes would affect me more.  

 

Grades:

 

Journal assignments are given individual points. Each journal assignment is worth 10 points.

9-10 points reflect excellent content, excellent article source, excellent thorough summary, excellent thoughtful analysis and creative, interesting content.

7-8 Points reflect good work in all areas above

5-6 Points reflect that you adequately met all the requirements

1-4 Missing or poorly presented content

0 No journal posted or posted beyond due date

 

Pages: You can create separate pages on your blog or simply do them as continuous posting.

 

Note: You do not have to resubmit your blog after you initially create one. If you post your journal content, I will see it. Just make sure it is posted on time.

Plagiarism Statement: Attach this to the end of every journal assignment.

 

CHECKLIST FOR PLAGIARISM

1) ( ) I have not handed in this assignment for any other class.

2) ( ) If I reused any information from other papers I have written for other classes, I clearly explain that in the paper.

3) ( ) If I used any passages word for word, I put quotations around those words, or used indentation and citation within the text.

4) ( ) I have not padded the bibliography. I have used all sources cited in the bibliography in the text of the paper.

5) ( ) I have cited in the bibliography only the pages I personally read.

6) ( ) I have used direct quotations only in cases where it could not be stated in another way. I cited the source within the paper and in the bibliography.

7) ( ) I did not so over-use direct quotations that the paper lacks interpretation or originality.

8) ( ) I checked yes on steps 1-7 and therefore have been fully transparent about the research and ideas used in my paper.