Rosebud, Xanadu and the Inquirer: worth seeing a hundred times

Rating: Null/10 (2 July 2001)

With the impressive surrealism of "Caligari" and the gross realism of "Potemkin," "Citizen Kane" remains a masterpiece of film history. Orson Welles, its 26-year-old creator, achieved a lot with his ensemble of fine character actors and actresses. Despite its age, there is still some touch of its near-to-sensational inventiveness to be felt, which is basically due to Gregg Toland's brilliant photography which combined low-key crime story lighting and grand melodrama camera craftsmanship. Art direction and special effects, too, are conducive to the whole. Although awarded only one Oscar, Welles established his reputation as a genius, and there is an ironic hint at his earlier "War of the Worlds" success when Kane warns a reporter in the beginning: "Don't believe everything you hear on the radio." Its working title being "American," the picture's original criticism of newspaper tycoon Hearst is worth more than a latterday footnote, although its omission seems to add to the timelessness of "Citizen Kane."
Of the players, I still couldn't make out Edmund Cobb (as a reporter), who appeared as the bad guy in some 170 or more B westerns from 1930 to 1950, plus a couple of A's such as "Winchester '73" and "River of No Return." I did actually discern Alan Ladd this time, I think. - Welles does a good acting job, too, as does his favourite, Joseph Cotten ("The Magnificent Ambersons," "The Third Man"). Moorehead and Sloane of the Mercury Theatre stock company are wonderful, but Ray Collins' short performance as Jim Gettys, virtually reduced to his voice as he hardly mimes and moves, is outstanding to me. This is a pic worth seeing a hundred times, not least because of its humanistic message.