Citizen Kane's Summary

Citizen Kane was a film released in 1941 and it it was voted #1 in history of American film. It was written by, directed by and acted by Orson Welles. The story was set in Xanada in Florida and started with an introduction about that place. Citizen Kane has a strange opening as it opened with the camera panning a spooky haunted mansion and then the camera lingered and zoomed in closely to the sign saying ÐŽ§No Trepassing, ЎЁ then the camera took us to the room in the house, we saw a person was lying on the bed and that was the main character of the story ÐŽ§Charles Foster Kane.ЎЁ (Orson Welles) We could see that he was dying and his last word was ÐŽ§RosebudЎЁ, and then he dropped the ball, and it shattered. Because of the word ÐŽ§RosebudЎЁ, people wanted to find out what it was, so it was a rising action which the story will began. After CharlesÐŽ¦s death, the next scence was a newsreel ÐŽ§News on the March,ЎЁ which announces the death of Charles and giving a summary of CharlesÐŽ¦s colorful life and career and surely will introduced some of the important people and events in CharlesÐŽ¦ life. As this a summary of CharlesÐŽ¦s life, this was just an introduction of him, so that we got a sences of how he was like. Later on in the film, we will deeply understand his relationships between him and his wife and about his career. The newsrell was played in a small projection room filled with reporters. He noted CharlesÐŽ¦s last word ÐŽ§rosebudЎЁ would make people suspicious. He decided to send a reporter, ÐŽ§Jerry Thompson,ЎЁ to search the meaning behind the word ÐŽ§rose bud.ЎЁ JerryÐŽ¦s first interview was CharlesÐŽ¦s 2nd wife ÐŽ§Susan Alexander Kane, who worked as a dancer and singer in a bar, thinking she would know something about rosebud. For the reason, she was drunk, she was not willing to tell anything about him, so the waiter told Jerry that she spoke of him often when he was alive, but she said she had never heard of rosebud before. After that, Jerry went to Hall and he read a diary of Charles. As Jerry began to read this memoir, the image of the page dissolves into a flashback to KaneÐŽ¦s childhood. The flashback showed how Thatcher, CharlesÐŽ¦s guardian until 25 years old, meet Charles. This was set in Colordo, and Charles was still a young child. CharlesÐŽ¦s mother, Mary knew that itÐŽ¦s not going to be better if Charles was growing up in that place. ItÐŽ¦s better for him to go to some big city, so she decided to send him away and to entrust Thatcher to raise his son for her. As a result, Charles was completely upset and disappointed by that. Over many years, CharlesÐŽ¦s relationship with Thatcher still never improved. Charles constantly made Thatcher very angry, as he was wasting his money to open a newspaper company. Back to reality, Jane found the next two pages was blank and he was asked to leave, as he only had time until 4:30 pm. Jerry went to find other people who were close to Charles and these character related their memories of the man through flashbacks as well. Jerry first interviewed CharlesÐŽ¦s employees Mr. Bernstein. As Mr. Bernstein began to tell CharlesÐŽ¦s life story, a flashback of how they both met the first time appeared. He also talked about his 1st and 2nd wife and his personalities in the film. After meeting with Mr. Bernstein, Jerry ran to interview CharlesÐŽ¦s closer friend Hedediah Leland. He told him about the events how they met each other, but he also talked about his point of view about Charles. As Jerry wanted to know more about CharlesÐŽ¦s relationship with Susan, he decided to interview her once again. This time, Susan told him the reason why he left Charles and again there was a flashback there. Before Jerry left, Susan told him to find the butler, Raymond, because she knew there will be more information from him. Jerry immediately ran to interview this butler, Raymond. He said he surely knew about the ÐŽ§rosebudЎЁ, but he wanted to bargain before heÐŽ¦s going to tell. He asked for 1000 dollars and they agreed. Then he told Jerry that he remembered Charles saying ÐŽ§RosebudЎЁ all the times following a violent episode after Susan left him, but he didnÐŽ¦t know who or what is about that. After his talking, Jerry refused to pay, because it wasnÐŽ¦t something exclusive or it was nothing special. When Jerry giving up the question, was leaving CharlesÐŽ¦ castle, Xanadu, the camera then lead up to the scene where the workers burning some of CharlesÐŽ¦ possessions. In the fire, we saw the sled that Charles was riding the day his mother sent him away, was painted the word ÐŽ§RosebudЎЁ

The film ÐŽ§Citizen KaneЎЁ was shot excellently as it was a story of mystery and narrative. As in the beginning of the story, the narrative was introducing the city of Xanadu and CharlesÐŽ¦ colorful lifetime. The story were telling from 5 different points of view. It was ThatcherÐŽ¦s point of view about Charles, but it was also CharlesÐŽ¦s employee, Bernstein, his closer friend, Jedediah Leland, CharlesÐŽ¦s ex wife Susan and the butler, Raymond. From their point of view, we knew that Charles was arrogant, lonely, thoughtless, morally bankrupt, desperate for attention, and incapable of giving love for his two wives. This faults eventually caused Charles to lose his career, friend and the beloved ones. Furthermore, the film gave the audience a feeling of supicious in the story. It also kept the audiences wanted to find out the truths behind the CharlesÐŽ¦s last word ÐŽ§rosebudЎЁ. Besides Citizen Kane opened with the camera panning across CharlesÐŽ¦s spooky castle and the camera lingered and zoomed on a ÐŽ§no TrespassingЎЁ sign, made the film more mystery. I even thought of the film was about the haunted mansion. That really made the movie effective. The film was made smoothly. For instance, in the beginning, after shooting the sign of ÐŽ§No trespassing,ЎЁ the camera gradually made its way to the house, where it appeared to pass through a lit window, liked the camera lead us through the story. Also at the end of the story, where when Jerry was leaving the house, the camera paned a scene of workers burning some of CharlesÐŽ¦s