Wednesday, December 13, 2006

Citizen Kane

Have you ever wondered why is Orson Welles' "Citizen Kane" so important a movie? Why is it deemed one of the most important movies ever made even decades later when we've supposedly had all the Hollywood's best? Well, I think I am coming to understand the fact, simple as that. It IS a masterpiece in various aspects, and Welles, though being then only twenty-five years old, knew what he was doing. The movie is telltale on its philosophical level and at the same time it seems to feature all of the cinema's best if we consider the camerawork and impeccable editing throughout it.

"Citizen Kane" as a story is an account of a life of a successful man, but shows the impossibility to depict a man from his deeds and inability to tell if he really was who he appeared to be.

Charles Foster Kane, abandoned as a child, inherits a literal empire allowing him to manipulate and control Americans. Inexorably, he became a very wealthy man and in spite of it he lacked emotional security, which plausibly led him to a death in oblivion. Kane represents exactly anti-Aristotelian style of life and refutes the "know thyself" maxim. He is presented in the picture by various acquaintances of his, each of them presenting him from a different point of view, and each of them trying to analyze him in the prism of his deathbed word, which was "rosebud." Needless to say, it is virtually impossible to be sure what he could really have meant. Such situations happen in lives and another good example of it is Nietzsche, who left, among a heap of other notes on his desk, a piece of paper with strange inscription "I forgot my umbrella."

The impossibility to understand "rosebud" and "I forgot my umbrella" lies in Derridean philosophy, the linguistic trap we are in. I don't need to say, that it was impossible for Nietzsche to write such sentence while walking in the rain, as this would make no sense then. It as well not possible for Kane to say "rosebud" hoping that somebody would be able to understand his predicament. Both man lacked something in life, and it surely wasn't wealth. "Citizen Kane" reveals the bleakness of so-called American Dream and sows futility of our attempts to be happy. Kane's attempts to secure himself happiness were useless, his marvelous vast possession only made him alone and empty. Wealth he possessed could only make him dearest as pitiful as himself.

So what?

It is time to know what you need in life. Pose a question and try to answer it best you can. What is it that you yearn for?

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