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Citizen Kane : Shot by Shot


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(39:29)  Life or Death Situation : the Rainbow Lens Flare

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recalls two other rainbow lens flares in similar situations :

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EWS, 1:57:42–1:59:21

and

Phantom Thread, 1:52:49–1:54:36

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Edited by Jeff Bernstein
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Dunkirk (48:58–1:10:22)

 

After the appearance of the colossal storytelling principle evoking the ancient Greeks, the story transitions immediately into, say, an Ingmar Bergman–like surreal mode for a considerable amount of screentime. This narrative has a compendium of storytelling monuments woven seamlessly into its own identity—Kubrick, Coppola, Lean, Lynch, Bergman—the list will be considerable, if not endless : as all first-rate stories are nowadays : as if each first-rate story these days is a dirge for the end of first-rate stories.

 

Dunkirk is another dirge for the golden days of Hollywood.

 

At the end of the surreal sequence, the Downed Pilot rises above the waves, is liberated into Freedom, and the Overt Surreal Story Mode is concluded.

 

Two examples of surreal moments :

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(1) The men in the boats unable to launch against the tide.

(2) The target practice of the beached trawler. There is—obviously?—a resonancy beyond the base-note “Bullets are puncturing the hull, so watch out!”

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(2) may be not too far in symbolic spirit from :

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Edited by Jeff Bernstein
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Citizen Kane and Christopher Nolan

 

This should be obvious : Citizen Kane is a vital artwork to the Creator of Dunkirk. What if those who follow the Creator heed his practical Word on this point? Do you think it’s random that Christopher Nolan was able to produce one of the great story structures of our lifetimes?

 

Or : possibly Citizen Kane was one of the artworks that inspired him to reach that ability, and facility?

 

Theory : If you don’t come to know Citizen Kane, you will never understand Christopher Nolan. Kane is a fundamental component in Nolan’s artist mind. All the stories that result are touched to some degree with the magic of Kane. Exploring Kane will contribute to exploring the films of Christopher Nolan.

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Interlude

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We’ve completed an initial pass through part (a) of Citizen Kane, then watched a double-feature before the start of the Newsreel. If we choose, we might double back and approach the first twenty shots of CK in an entirely different way. We might do a study on, say, shot geometry and intuitive response. Or, we might explain the details of the shots in an entirely different way, so that, say, the palm tree may be assigned a different signification in the second round of Thinking. The second round of thinking doesn’t erase the first round, but integrates with it : so that when you see the film, say, a third time, you’re now seeing it through double lenses of knowledge (so to speak). Imagine, then, how you’re seeing a film when you’ve seen it over 200 times. It’s akin to glancing at a Space Shuttle engine and knowing all the parts at once : the Spectator’s Mind and Unconscious are working quickly. Also, the Spectator, knowing the story well, now has the freedom to scrutinize details otherwise ignored. This document will hopefully prove the utility of watching a movie well over 100, 200, 300 times.

 

By doing this, it quickens your understanding when you see a new film for the first time! Makes sense? So, if you like, you must remember this : "Whatever you think it is, it's not that." There is always something more to learn. Always and ever.

 

One more point just here. Would it disturb the Spectator if your humble narrator asked of you to please entertain the notion of approaching Charles Foster Kane as a character type not far from . . . a Donald Trump?

 

Weird? “Stay with me.” (Wolf of Wall Street) We’ll all go home in a limousine.

 

 

 

Edited by Jeff Bernstein
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Is this the Ultimate Story Principle?—The Element of Surprise.

 

Dear Kind Reader : Imagine if the film Dunkirk revealed to the audience the final fate of many of its characters right at the start of the story. Do you think some of the suspense potentially experienced by the audience would thereby be lost? Because the element of surprise would be lost? Revealing its story prematurely is precisely what the story of Citizen Kane does!

 

The innovative structure of Pulp Fiction? Of Dunkirk? Citizen Kane came first.

 

The following statement is neither “opinion” nor exaggeration but simple Truth : Citizen Kane is a landmark not just in the history of world cinema, but in the history of world storytelling.

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The Newsreel

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True Story : When I was a teenager living in L.A. I saw a film called Zelig (1983) in a film class. Zelig is a fiction film presented in the form of a documentary feature (e.g., interviews, stock footage, photographs, etc.). Afterwards, I was walking home with a charming young woman who, completely seriously, hesitatingly asked me : “Was that real?”

 

How many times was that same question asked by the audiences of Citizen Kane, watching "News on the March" in 1941?

 

Before the invention of television, people received their world news in audiovisual form via newsreels, short presentations which were attached to motion pictures in the manner of coming attractions. The newsreel in Citizen Kane has a running time of—here’s a round number for convenience’s sake—eight minutes (3:12–12:30). In these eight minutes the entire story of the film to come is told to the audience!

 

So much for the element of surprise.

 

So what is going on? Citizen Kane is less about the excitement of narrative surprise than about an audience reckoning with character. By discarding its story (so to speak) at the outset, Citizen Kane is communicating that the film to come is less about what happens than about how things happen : less about what characters do but why.

 

Citizen Kane discards its story at the outset in order to urge the audience to devote its complete attention to Character.

 

The twist is that by the end of Kane, we’ve reached no closer to our subject!

 

Technical Twist : By giving away its story at the outset, Citizen Kane eliminates some of the audience's potential for "vicarious thrills" in favor of urging the audience to think about what they're about to see. But the element of surprise, while effaced to some degree with regard to story, remains a powerful force throughout the entire picture. How can this be? In what way may Kane maintain a surprise level in the face of what seems like insuperable odds?

 

Film style.

 

Every shot of Kane is a Surprise.

 

 

 

Edited by Jeff Bernstein
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Twist No. 3

 

A film delivers its information in a time-bound format (ideally—let us imagine film as a-film-experienced-in-the-cinema-auditorium). So : just because the audience receives the whole story of Kane at the outset doesn't mean the audience is going to remember what it was told. Especially, say, an hour into the film.

 

A detail to consider, but not any further just here.

 

Edited by Jeff Bernstein
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The Fact of Facts

 

Consider another shade to Citizen Kane giving away its character facts right off the bat :

 

The story is making a point about the point of so-called “facts”.

 

 

 

Edited by Jeff Bernstein
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THE WORLD BEHIND THE NEWSREEL

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Comedy. The Newsreel presents Charles Foster Kane as both hero and villain. At times Kane is shown as idiotic, then at other times with sentimental pathos—Kane as “consequential American”. The Newsreel is not Art, however : the juxtaposition of different POVs is not meant to generate any thematic effect; it is simple mind manipulation. In the guise of “presenting facts”, the Newsreel, meant for the general public, is essentially and intentionally saying Nothing.

 

Comedy. The Newsreel hypes its subject through emotional cues (e.g., patriotic sentimentality intensified by powerfully persuasive music). The Newsreel has to do this. "Millions" of Americans loved Kane, and “millions” of Americans “hated” Kane. So the Newsreel universalizes the theme—through cynical emotional manipulation. CK is presenting mass media news as infotainment.

 

Comedy. The Newsreel Creators are cynics without any love for Kane. But their coldly manipulative news product might have actually worked on some Americans—some might have watched it and responded : “Well, that Kane wasn’t so bad after all. Now that it’s all over, it’s fine to know that he was a good American at heart.”

 

This is what's called Blowback : the unintended consequences of the idiotic decisions of Tyranny.

 

But the Creators of the Newsreel wouldn't have cared. The Newsreel is nothing more than a formality of a working day. Nobody concerned with the Newsreel cared about the Newsreel.

 

Social responsibility : a subject explored throughout Citizen Kane.

 

 

 

Edited by Jeff Bernstein
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From Harlot’s Ghost (1991) by Norman Mailer, 3.1

 

The first day of classroom instruction at the CIA had us working for two hours to construct a scenario on the basis of a torn receipt, a bent key, a stub of pencil, a book of matches, and a dried flower pressed into a cheap unmarked envelope. These items, the teacher told us, happened to be the pocket litter left by an agent under suspicion who had decamped in unholy haste from a furnished room. For two hours we fingered these objects, brooded upon them, and offered our theories. I forget mine. It was no better than the others. Only Arnie Rosen was to distinguish himself that day. Once all the others had finished their expositions, Arnie continued to look unhappy. “In my opinion,” he said, “too many pieces are missing.”

 

“This is the sum of your contribution?” asked the teacher.

 

“Yessir. Given the paucity of facts, no viable scenario is available.”

 

“Rosen,” the teacher told us, “is on the nose. These objects were selected arbitrarily. A correct solution does not exist.”

 

Explanation: The exercise was to alert us to the risk of autointoxication when formulating scenarios.

 

“Respect that subtle hollow,” the teacher told us. “When a scenario feels absolutely right, it is usually right, but if your story feels almost right, yet just a little empty, well, then, it’s all wrong.”

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See that Newsreel?

 

Naw, I was outside getting popcorn. What about it?

 

The Newsreel was part of the movie.

 

What are you talking about?

 

The Newsreel was about the character in the movie.

 

How can a Newsreel be about a fictional character?

 

The movie made the Newsreel. The Newsreel's part of the movie.

 

That’s far-out.

 

Yeah.

 

So, what’d I miss?

 

Nothing much. You saw the story.

 

Tell me.

 

Well, there were shots of that ridiculously massive estate of his, Xanadu. Apparently the name comes from some poem. My wife—she’s a librarian—told me it's from some Coleridge guy who was into opium or something. Anyway, the Newsreel gave us a lot of numbers about all this stuff he had there : trees, paintings, pictures, statues. "Enough for ten museums." But get this. All this stuff we saw was nothing you or I would want. Just old-looking artsy junk. My wife remarked on one thing the newsreel guy said—“He had a collection so big it can never be catalogued.” She said that concept is actually true. There are libraries all over the world, like university libraries, she said, with so much stuff that people there don’t know what they have, and rare stuff is being discovered all the time on shelves in basements. Anyway, this guy Kane lived in a museum more than you’d call it a house. I have no idea why someone would want to do that.

 

You remember that book, From the Mixed-Up Files of Mrs. Basil E. Frankweiler?

 

I loved that book! Something to think about. We also saw his private zoo.

 

I don’t understand some people. Who needs the hassle?

 

Beats me. Then we got the usual. Kind of boring. Famous powerful guy who came from nothing. You remember what made him rich? His nothing of a family had a chance ownership of a silver mine.

 

Wow. Lucky guy.

 

This ordinary guy, given the riches of the pharoahs.

 

What would you do with money like that?

 

I wouldn’t buy a newspaper empire. Boring! Then we heard the usual. Investments in everything, vertical integration, all the financial chicanery of the one percent, he was called his own one-man American Empire.

 

Kane was like our King, man.

 

He was an orphan. Did you know that?

 

No.

 

I never knew it either. His parents signed him away when they got rich. Thought it would be a good idea.

 

What mother can give up her kid?

 

Anyway, then we heard the usual : "American", "Anti-American"—depending who you talk to. Blah, blah. He didn’t come out too well at that point. The Newsreel reminded us he invented the Spanish-American War to sell newspapers—

 

Everybody knows that story. Not a very socially responsible employment of his fortune and power.

 

No, it isn't. Get this one—he opposed our participation in World War I.

 

Why would he do that?

 

The Newsreel didn’t tell us. These newspaper men, though—they're bigger in politics than you think. There was film of him standing with Teddy Roosevelt, Hitler, all sorts. Did you know they know about him even in China?

 

China cared about Charles Foster Kane?

 

Apparently his death was front-page news in every country in the world.

 

“The person you love to hate"?

 

Not everybody hated him. “Spoke for millions of Americans"—Newsreel said. Even though for forty years his newspapers spun the news.

 

Whatever.

 

He was married and divorced twice.

 

Forgot about that first wife.

 

Me too. Funny thing. She was a niece or something of a president, you know? Really young and beautiful. She died in a car accident just after their divorce. Their little boy, too.

 

Kane lost a little boy?

 

Yeah.

 

Wow.

 

I guess they kept it quiet in the newspapers.

 

What about that blonde bombshell with the voice of a bombing raid?

 

Susan Alexander. His second wife. All sex. Did you know he built the entire Opera House in Chicago just for her?

 

Some women might prefer a diamond.

 

Anyway, while his newspapers were putting diamonds on the velvet, so to speak, well, when he put himself there—you know what happened when he ran for governor.

 

Rejection.

 

Mother abandons him, two divorces, and rejection from the people of the state!

 

If I remember correctly, he fxcked it up for himself with his whoring.

 

Yeah, but some whore. (Just keep her mouth shut.)

 

Oh yeah. The Newsreel said it was his fault no one trusted any politician after him for twenty years.

 

Whatever.

 

He lost a lot of money in the Depression.

 

So did everybody.

 

Newsreel made it seem as if he fell on "hard times", like he was one of us.

 

Yeah, like a rich man has “hard times”. Howard Hughes didn't feel the Depression.

 

Yeah. Then the Newsreel showed us some stupid stuff about the guy. Made it seem like he was some senile old man. He was into laughing at his own dumb jokes. Senile as he was, he said he was still able to see “the responsible leaders of England, France, Germany and Italy”. The Newsreel really stuck it to him there. He told a reporter, “There’ll be no World War II.”

 

Moron.

 

Maybe so, but whatever Charles Foster Kane said, he was confident about it.

 

Confidence and blindness : a reckless combination.

 

No different from anyone else in that.

 

Anyway, it’s all over now. Him and everything he represented.

 

What did you think of the movie?

 

Fxcking weird.

 

I couldn’t make head or tails of it. Everything was out of order.

 

I guess they sort they were being “intelligent” or something. You know those Hollywood types.

 

Yeah, give me a Clark Gable any day. Wait a minute. I remember one more thing.

 

What’s that?

 

That house of his. It became like a prison.

 

What do you mean?

 

Some time during the thirties he dropped out of sight.

 

Yeah, I'd forgotten about him. His obituary had to remind me he'd lived.

 

“Aloof, seldom visited, never photographed.”

 

Strange man. All those people are.

 

I didn’t understand any of it. Anyway, a great flick's coming up in a couple weeks—Blood and Sand with Rita.

 

What a looker!

 

 

 

Edited by Jeff Bernstein
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"People were still going to the movies. While searching for night lodgings, I passed a drive-in. In a selenian glow, truly mystical in its contrast with the moonless and massive night, on a gigantic screen slanting away among dark drowsy fields, a thin phantom raised a gun, both he and his arm reduced to tremulous dishwater by the oblique angle of that receding world—and the next moment a row of trees shut off the gesticulation."

 

Nabokov, Lolita, 2.34.

 

 

 

Edited by Jeff Bernstein
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dust, time, futility

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The Death of Kane : Coming Yet Again Soon.

recalling other moments of dust, time, futility :

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Sunset Boulevard

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Barton Fink, 12:48

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Carnage (2011), 20:16

 

 

 

 

Edited by Jeff Bernstein
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