Citizen Kane feels like a Scorsese picture

  Blender Dumbass
July 31, 2025

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#citizenkane #orsonwelles #film #review #movies #cinemastodon #martinscorsese

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Orson Welles ( born in 1915 ) being a 25 - 26 year old flipped the cinematic landscape upside down with his 1941 black and white film Citizen Kane. A film that feels like a mandatory watch for anybody who is even remotely interested in cinema. People say that Citizen Kane is the best film ever made and stuff. Almost forcing that film onto people in an uncomfortable way. Making you be sure that it is some sort of experimental, black and white extravaganza that you will not understand. And that it is way too old, for today's audience, to enjoy. And that to appreciate the qualities of the film, one needs to learn some academic bullshit and pay very strong attention, to try to understand why back in 1941 critics specifically, might have liked what they saw. The thought of watching Citizen Kane feels like homework. But then you actually watch it.

The beginning of the film is a form 1940s extravaganza film-making. First there is a moody death scene. The iconic first line "Rosebud" is spoken. A mysterious figure that spoke it, dies. It feels somewhat pretentious, almost. It feels like Welles is trying too hard to make an art picture. And it seems Welles was trying to make an art picture after all. But even by today's standards, the opening of Citizen Kane is artsy. Making you confirm the feeling that it will be like homework.

It doesn't help the film, that the next section of it, is a spoof documentary mixing a lot of styles. It both has sound and silent parts. It moves fast. The narrator is speaking with this very funny old accent that makes him sound like a slightly drunk person trying to be intimidating. This part is, as far as I understand, a parody on documentaries. But it also serves as a quick way to dump a lot of exposition onto the audience. We learn the history of Charles Kane. We learn of his 2 wives. We learn of his successes and failures. And we learn of his charisma.

Then the movie reveals to us the group of people who produced said documentary. They are all sitting in this very cool, smoky screening room. And they are arguing about what is missing from the documentary. They all decide that they need to figure out what the hell the dying words of Mister Kane were. What the hell was "Rosebud".

From this scene onward the good movie Citizen Kane that a person from 2025 can enjoy, begins. The first scene is good. The spoof documentary is probably good if you know what documentaries at the time looked like. But for the audience in the 2020s this scene will feel a little strange. A little chaotic. There are a lot of references, or what appears to be references, and inside jokes that the modern audience will just be confused by. And I was certainly confused by it too. But then when you get to the producers talking about "Rosebud" and thinking about sending people to investigate what the hell "Rosebud" was. That is when the film becomes amazing. Amazing for 2020s audiences.

The plot of the film follows a "detective" guy, who is one of the documentary's producers, who's mission is to talk to various people that knew Charles Foster Kane, in hopes that they would tell him what "Rosebud", his dying word, means.

From their conversations a more detailed picture of Kane is produced. And yet from a certain perspective all of those people might have their own biases against Mr. Kane. Making their narratives questionable.

Their conversations always creatively, with cinematic flourish, fade into a flash back of the events they are talking about. And those flashbacks are the meat of the plot.

Those flashbacks together feel somewhat like the 2013's Martin Scorsese picture The Wolf of Wall Street. We see a guy become extremely wealthy. This guy breaks the rules. He makes lavish parties. He marries one woman and cheats on her with a blond. But in the end of the day he falls on his face.

In 2013 obviously Martin Scorsese can do more. He can show nudity. He can be explicit when talking about sex. He can show not just that the characters are using drugs, but he can make a comedic sequence based on the effect of said drugs. Non of it was possible in the 1940's era Hollywood, when "the code" dictated that every picture should be a moral tale that is also "family friendly".

Yet this slight perversion of Kane's charisma. His like-able disregard to the norms and rules is very pronounced. And the film, despite the limitations does a lot to be very enjoyable indeed.

This movie shows that people are usually not wrong, per se, when they are calling a movie "best" in one way or another. The Godfather, good film. Actually good film that you can enjoy. It doesn't feel like it should be. It was made long time ago. And probably the expectations are different. The Godfather does have pacing issues, when it comes to 2020s audiences. But it is good.

Citizen Kane being an even older, more than twice as old as The Godfather is probably even better than The Godfather. Citizen Kane doesn't have the pacing issues. It moves! Even the strange, to today's audiences documentary scene, moves in a million miles an hour.

Yes there are flaws. The sound of some the dialogue clips at times. It was a limitation of the technology. The old man makeup, trying to make a 25 year old Welles look like an old man Kane, have visible at times seams. This would be done a million times better these days. But the film is good. It is genuinely a good experience.

It is not just good in a pretentious academic way. It is good as entertainment.

Happy Hacking!!!


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c:0 @Troler
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  Troler c:0


What makes Citizen Kane special, at least in what I gathered, is the motion itself. The movie never feels like you are watching a recorded play. Back before 1940s cameras were clunky and heavy. It was not that easy to move them.

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