Rosebud...

What does it mean? You know, at the start, in the first 5 minutes, I actually wondered. Actually cared. It didn't take long before I regretted putting this movie in the DVD player. Actually I'm really starting to wonder if it was a very good idea to watch these so called "classic" movies.
This week I am reviewing Citizen Kane. Released in 1942 in Australia and winner of an Oscar for best writing in an original screenplay. All I can think is that it was in the war years, so it must have been the only movie made that year. It was nominated for a heap of other Academy Awards but didn't win them, which still makes sense. It is so bad that even if there was no competition, the Academy still wouldn't be able to give them the awards.
Citizen Kane was co-written by Orson Welles and he also played the lead character. I don't know much about Orson Welles and after seeing this movie I don't care to find out much about him. Except to say that if I see another movie that is written by or starring him I will run screaming for the nearest bomb shelter, deserted island or Armish community. Any place that a TV can't be found. I can actually take heart that I read the following on the trivia section on IMDB : "Despite all the publicity, the film was a box office flop and was quickly consigned to the RKO vaults. At 1941's Academy Awards the film was booed every time one of its nine nominations was announced. It was only re-released for the public in the mid-1950s." If only they'd left it in
the vault and then tested atomic bombs over it.
[The next bit contains spoilers]
Anyway, enough whingeing, the plot is about a media mogul, Charles Foster Kane (played by Orson Welles) who has just died. His last word before he dies is "Rosebud". The story then retells his life story because a journalist at his paper interviews key characters in his life to try to find out what Rosebud means. This idea I think is clever, and if executed well, it would be great. But the story is so incredibly boring that I don't know how I didn't fall asleep. I mean there would be no such thing as insomnia if everyone in the world owned a copy of this movie. You could come home from a stressful day at the office, all wound up, not able to sleep, pop Citizen Kane on and in about 10 minutes you'd be punching out zeds. I'm sorry, I'm whingeing again, I can't help it. So the story plods along and by now I couldn't give a rats what Rosebud means and my mind starts to wander, and I start thinking about why glue doesn't stick to the inside of the bottle. True story. Anything to keep myself awake. Then we find out what Rosebud means and because I had already given up caring about it, I wasn't disappointed that it was the name of his sled when he was a boy and not the love of his life or anything remotely important. Then that's the end and I am tinged with happiness and sadness. Happiness because the movie is finally over and sadness because I just realised that is 2 hours of my life I will never get back.
What else can I mention about this movie? The camera angles were quite arty. I also found it weird that the characters often talked over the top of each other. It was a little bit off putting. The makeup was pretty good because it made Orson look believably old and young.
Brace yourself for the ratings. As you could imagine this won't be pretty. I have actually left some room because I have seen movies that are even worse than this one, believe it or not.

Here goes -
Citizen Kane : 2 faded old newspapers