Citizen kane

Citizen Kane essay

Citizen Kane is a 1941 film a clef, directed and starred by Orson Welles.
This film is ranked and considered by the AFI (American Film Institute), and the BFI (British Film Institute), the number one and best American film for at least a decade now. The film is about the life of Charles Foster Kane who is based on the life of William Randolph Hearst.
The story was soalike that when the movie came out Hearst prohibited mentioning the film on his newspaper.
The film is narrated mostly trough flashbacks, when Charles Foster Kane dies, the reporter interviews the people that was closer to him and knew him better to find out what he meant with his last words “rosebud”.

The movie starts when Charles Foster Kane dies at Xanadu, the entire movie is about finding outthe last words of Kane “rosebud” meant, and that’s where Kane’s life is shown.
When Kane was little his mother wanted him to have a really good life study at the best schools in New York so she gave him away, he asked Walter Thatcher his mentor and guardian to take him. Thatcher was in control of Kane’s life, but changes when he takes over the Newspaper.
Kane and his best friend Jedediah Lelandstarted the Newspaper, after a time Jedediah and Kane make a declaration of principles that was a bone of contention; this declared that they were going to publish only the truth.
Kane decided to get married to a women named Emily Norton, at first the marriage was amazing, he demonstrated love but with the time he became so involve in his work that he didn’t had time to spend with his wife andthis starts to deteriorate the marriage, so much that they became like strangers, they didn’t even talk.
Kane meets Susan Alexander in the middle of a street, she invites him to come to his apartment, after a while they started spending time together and he begins to fall in love with her.
Kane runs for president but Gettys doesn’t want him to win so he starts to investigate him and finds outthat he is cheating on his wife with Susan. Gettys send a note to Emily that only had an address,(the address of Susan), she got over there and fins out that he was cheating on her, Gettys threatened him to publish the story on the newspaper, Emily told Kane to come with her that they were going to leave but he said no and stayed with Susan. The “secret” was revealed on the newspaper.
Kane andSusan get married; he opens an opera house for her to sing. On the opening night she sings, people didn’t like her, she wasn’t bad but she wasn’t good to be an opera singer.
Kane tells Leland to write about Susan even though she wasn’t good so while writing it he passed out and Kane finished writing the review-and making it negative just as Leland had stared it.
Susan goes furious at the badreviews she received. Kane received the declaration of principles sent by Leland with a check that was for him, this meant that he was quitting and he was no longer going to work with Kane.
Susan tries to kill herself because of everything that has happened, and he promised her he wont make her sing anymore. After this they move to Xanadu (mansion), she is frustrated and after a while she decided loleave him. (This was the only time in the whole movie that Kane loses control).
At the end of the movie they show everything that Kane owned, at the end we see a sled with the word “Rosebud” written in it. The word meant his childhood, every moment that he couldn’t be with his mother, the whole he had in his heart.

Charles Foster Kane is a character that interprets the movie “Citizen Kane”, hehad a very poor childhood because his mother gave him away to his mentor (Thatcher) when he was only 8 years old, because she wanted him to have a better life, to go to the best schools and best colleges.
As and adult he took over the newspaper. One of his first acts was to sign the “declaration of principles”, saying that he would tell only the truth, but as the time goes by he forget about...