Not that Impressive

Rating: 6/10 (3 March 2013)

I saw the movie on DVD and again with commentary by Roger Ebert. It is rated as the number 1 movie in the AFI's 100 Years... 100 Movies list.
Orson Wells, child prodigy and coming after his War of the Worlds stunt was given a free hand with this film, his first director role. So it had a lot to live up to. Failed at the box office, but later rediscovered, the film experienced a revival. The story was supposedly based on Hearst, a media Baron (although this was denied by Wells). Hearst went to some lengths to try and ban the film.
Looking at it now, it is very dated. It does make some very telling points about human nature and the newspaper business. But I cant help but feel Wells tries too hard at being ground breaking, both in choice of a controversial story and in its cinematography. While the film was ground breaking, I didn't find it was a particularly entertaining film at all.