Separation of Self: Analyzing Citizen Kane

In the movie, "Citizen Kane", the director Orson Welles, portrays the main character Charles Foster Kane having a mimetic relationship with his family and friends. Charles Kane is separated from his community by the use of different narratives, innovative camera angles, deep focus, and manipulation of on-screen space. As the movie progresses Kane furthers his distance from the social world due to his controlling mentality. The dialogue becomes less, and the cinematic separation becomes more evident as Kane declines into seclusion and a mimetic state. Orson Welles uses many cinematic techniques to show Kane as having a mimetic relationship to his community of relatives and friends.

When Kane's mother comes into huge wealth she sends her son Charles Kane away to grow up with her financial advisor Thatcher. Kane resents being taken from his normal life and the safety he felt there and never settles himself to that event in his early childhood. As a result, Kane grows up to be an arrogant and uncaring man who separates himself from others. In due course, his outlook on life estranges him from everyone who cares about him. Not only does he lose his newspaper, his fortune, and his friends, but he ultimately dies a lonely man. As an adult Kane has a vast amount of wealth and control but has no emotional protection with those who surround him. This absence of security apprehends his maturity and fuels his charge against authority. Because of his wealth, Kane has no motivation or incentive to subject to social norms. With his lost childhood and uncaring efforts to form he creates separation from those around him.

Kane has great intentions at the beginning of the movie with the scene of him stating his values and ethics towards the efforts of his newly acquired news periodical. This is a key moment in the movie as it shows a lighter side of Kane and his hunger for excellence. Charles Kane vows in this scene that he will bring the truth out and be a people's person. The on-screen space is completely full with the characters which shows their unity as a community. At this point in the film "Citizen Kane" demonstrates a cathartic relationship to his family and friends. The space is equal among all the objects that the camera captures. This equilibrium shows the balance of power of Kane's power and his humbleness to social order.

After that point Charles Foster Kane continually finds himself sheltered from the world around him, which implies that his final isolation is foreseeable. Deep focus is used to show Kane's displacement in the film. The camerawork in "Citizen Kane" emphasizes this isolation. For example, earlier in the movie the viewer sees Kane as a happy child playing in the snow. Later in the scene the camera separates him between his mom and Mr. Thatcher as they arrange to move Kane away from his regular life. Kane's isolation follows him into adulthood. Even though there is celebration once he gains control of the newspaper, he is all alone. The director Orson Welles places Kane in a triangular shot between Bernstein and Leland as the two men discuss Kane's increasingly corrupt strategy. The three men may seem close, but the ganged up conversation on Kane separates him even more. The use of deep focus creates more separation between Charles Kane and his community of family and friends.

Different narratives are used in the movie "Citizen Kane" to provide different viewpoints on the life of Charles Kane. The movie is based upon six narrators who tell the story of Kane's life. This technique creates separation between the narrators and Kane. As each story is told, the narrators give personal stories about the main character and how he is distant from the world. Each story purposes that Kane lived in a world that he created due to disconnection. Kane repeatedly fails in his attempts to control the people in his life. The main character collects statues and other worldly goods to create a false impression of a separate world he can manipulate. This disconnection is exploited in the scene where Kane leaves his wife for his mistress. Instead of Kane dropping out of the election, he decides that he will still be able to win with him cheating on his wife. Kane could have saved his career and marriage but chose to pick his self gain in the election which he lost nevertheless.

Kane continues to create a fake world by investing his fortunes into his estate Xanadu. He moved out of the country to produce this false world and control everything that takes place around him. Kane even attempts to control his second wife and friends as he has parties they attend on his estate. As Susan, Kane's second wife rots away her life on Xanadu she slowly gains the courage to stand up to Kane's manipulation. The use of large on screen space is used to show the separation of the marriage and ultimately Kane's life. The high ceilings and large rooms show the control that Kane has never had. Camera angles that show Kane larger than he really is create the impression of his attempt to control his surroundings. Susan finally stands up to her husband and leaves him. This scene portrays Kane's inability to control his surroundings, let alone his own life. After Susan finally leaves Kane walks through a hallway of mirrors. In this scene it depicts the separation of ones' self as his notion of control is completely lost.

As the movie ends Kane is shown dropping a snow globe as his life passes away. The camera catches the globe crash onto the floor and shatter into pieces. This scene represents the idea of Charles Kane's false or made up world being broken. The snow globe that falls from Kane's hand when he dies relates the end of his life to his youth. The idea of the snow globe is straightforward, calm, and orderly, much like Kane's childhood before Thatcher and the money came. The snow globe also associates these qualities with Susan his second wife. The separation of his false creation and real world become more apparent towards the end of the film as Charles Foster Kane reaches his deathbed. There is a close up on the globe hitting the floor which signifies the significance of the importance of Kane's falsity. His second life eventually left him, just like his mother, and her leaving similarly wrecks him. As Kane's life went on he tried to direct of the world around him, which in turn solidified the falsity of his control.

In the picture, "Citizen Kane", the director Orson Welles, depicts the major character Charles Foster Kane as having a mimetic relationship with his relations and surrounding community. Charles Foster Kane is separated from his community by the use of different narratives, innovative camera angles, deep focus, and manipulation of on-screen space. As the movie progresses Kane furthers his distance from the social world due to his controlling mentality. The dialogue becomes less, and the cinematic separation becomes more evident as Kane declines into seclusion and a mimetic state. With deep focus, Welles showcased overlapping actions that created the separation between the main character and his community. Kane separates himself from his family, friends, business, and the outside world. Orson Welles uses many innovative cinematic practices to demonstrate Kane as encompassing a mimetic connection to his life.

Citations

Citizen Kane. Dir. Orson Welles.

Perf. Orson Welles, Joseph Cotton, Dorothy Comingore, Agnes Moorehead.

Copyright 1941.