# Citizen Kane: The best movie ever? Why? **URL:** \ **Category:** Cafe Society\ **Created:** [February 24, 2003, 3:34pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/citizen-kane-the-best-movie-ever-why/157168 "2003-02-24T15:34:37Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 5\ **Page:** 2
**Author:** ![Tuckerfan](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/eada6e/32.png) [@Tuckerfan](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Tuckerfan)\ **Post date:** [February 25, 2003, 5:56am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/citizen-kane-the-best-movie-ever-why/157168/21 "2003-02-25T05:56:20Z")
> [@](#): > > \*Originally posted by CyberPundit \* > \*\*Regardless of whether it’s the greatest film or not, it is the probably the greatest individual achievement in cinema history considering that Welles directed,co-wrote and starred in the film. All at the age of 25 IIRC. Amazing. > > Can anyone else think of a film of comparable importance and quality with one person doing all three? I can think of some good comedies by Chaplin, Allen etc. but none of those films has had the impact of Kane. \*\* Don’t forget that Welles managed to secure a contract for the film, better than anyone else has _ever_ gotten! (Know why Turner didn’t colorize the film back when he was colorizing everything else? Because the contract Welles signed to do the film _still_ prevented it! 😃 ) ---
**Author:** ![SwimmingRiddles](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/43a26b/32.png) [@SwimmingRiddles](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/SwimmingRiddles)\ **Post date:** [February 25, 2003, 6:14am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/citizen-kane-the-best-movie-ever-why/157168/22 "2003-02-25T06:14:52Z")
> [@](#): > > \*Originally posted by Duke \* > \*\*The scene that always got me was the one late in the movie, after Kane smashes up Susan’s room, where he walks between two mirrors. It perfectly matches his psychological state at the time–not being able to escape himself. Also “old Thatcher’s” line–“Old age. It’s the only disease you don’t look forward to being cured of.” Man, I’ve got to see it again now. \*\* I was going to refer to the same scene, I think. It’s where he’s walking down the hallway REALLY slowly, and there are mirrors on either side, right? BRILLIANT. When my film professor showed that clip in class the day after the screening, I made her play it again. It’s noirish, with the shadows falling over Kane’s face, the camera angles are irregular and chaotic, and the mirrors form a tunnel of nothingness that Kane enters. Welles himself facinates me. You can find the IMDB bio [here](http://us.imdb.com/Bio?Welles,%20Orson), but I’d scroll down to the Leonard Maltin bio, which is further down on that page. Not only does Maltin talk about Welles, but he talks about all the aspects that made Kane so brilliant. _Citizen Kane_ was the first movie I ever owned, my mom gave it to me as a Christmas present when I was 12. On a related note, my mom is SO cool. ---
**Author:** ![Achernar](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/e274bd/32.png) [@Achernar](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Achernar)\ **Post date:** [February 25, 2003, 6:16am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/citizen-kane-the-best-movie-ever-why/157168/23 "2003-02-25T06:16:02Z")
> [@](#): > > \*Originally posted by CyberPundit \* > Regardless of whether it’s the greatest film or not, it is the probably the greatest individual achievement in cinema history considering that Welles directed,co-wrote and starred in the film. All at the age of 25 IIRC. Amazing. I got the impression from reading the back of the box that what Welles did with this movie (write, star in, and direct an instant classic at the beginning of your career) is sort of every filmmaker’s dream, and that _Kane_ has inspired more directorial careers than any other movie. ---
**Author:** ![SnugTheJoiner](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/e8c25b/32.png) [@SnugTheJoiner](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/SnugTheJoiner)\ **Post date:** [February 25, 2003, 7:31am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/citizen-kane-the-best-movie-ever-why/157168/24 "2003-02-25T07:31:15Z")
There’s a wonderful gag in CITIZEN KANE: Early in the film, the camera, up in the sky, zooms down on a nightclub. It zeroes in on the skylight, moves “through” it with the help of a fade, and there we are in the club, watching as the reporter interviews the drunken Susan, Kane’s ex-wife. Later in the film, the reporter goes back for another interview. Once again, the camera, up in the sky, zooms down on the nightclub and zeroes in on the skylight . . . but this time a pane of glass in the skylight is broken. The camera passes through . . . Why is the pane broken? The camera “broke” it going through it the first time! ---
**Author:** ![Fiddle\_Peghead](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/fiddle_peghead/32/3506_2.png) [@Fiddle\_Peghead](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Fiddle_Peghead)\ **Post date:** [February 25, 2003, 1:21pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/citizen-kane-the-best-movie-ever-why/157168/25 "2003-02-25T13:21:02Z")
I appreciate the techniques that were used so well in the making of _Citizen Kane_. However, I think the importance attached to them, and how they influence people’s thinking about what makes the movie so great, is highly overrated. To use painting as analogy, many techniques that are now taken for granted, at least in most “realist” paintings, such as foreshortening and perspective, did not necessarily make the first works that used them successfully great pictures. Yes, the film techniques used add greatly to the effectiveness of the story, but, to me, while entertaining and well told, that story just isn’t compelling enough for me to make this one of my favorite films. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/citizen-kane-the-best-movie-ever-why/157168.md?page=1)