About
Citizen Kane (1941), directed, co-written, and starring Orson Welles at age 25, is a landmark in cinema technique. Its non-linear narrative, deep-focus cinematography, innovative sound design, and narrative complexity were unprecedented. Based loosely on William Randolph Hearst (who tried to prevent its release), the film follows the rise and fall of media mogul Charles Foster Kane through the investigation of his dying word: 'Rosebud.'
Citizen Kane was a commercial failure on release — Hearst blacklisted it from his publications and theaters. It only gained recognition in the 1950s and 1960s through reassessment by critics. It topped the Sight & Sound critics' poll as the greatest film ever made from 1962 to 2012, when it was displaced by Vertigo.
# Top 10 Citizen Kane facts
- 1Orson Welles was just 25 when he made Citizen Kane — it was his feature film debut
- 2William Randolph Hearst blocked its release in his newspaper empire and tried to have the film destroyed
- 3It was a box office failure in 1941 but was later voted the greatest film ever made for five consecutive decades
Fascinating Facts
- ◆Orson Welles was just 25 when he made Citizen Kane — it was his feature film debut
- ◆William Randolph Hearst blocked its release in his newspaper empire and tried to have the film destroyed
- ◆It was a box office failure in 1941 but was later voted the greatest film ever made for five consecutive decades
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