The first scene, in both story and plot, is Kane’s childhood. It begins showing Kane, about ten years old playing alone in the snow. The camera then tracks backwards to show the inside of Kane’s home, with his parents and Thatcher present. The camera then tracks further backwards and the indoor characters follow it to a table. The shot composition has Mrs Kane closest to the camera, seated on the far right, with Thatcher just behind her. Mr Kane stands a little further back on the left edge of the frame, and Charles can be seen through the window in the far distance. This shot is in deep focus, so all of the characters are in clear focus. The adults then move back over to the window and the camera, still tracking, follows them. This is all done in one take, 1 minute 44 seconds long. The average take is around 10 seconds[1], so this is considerably longer than that.
The next shot begins completely static, Mrs Kane dominating most of the frame, and Mr Kane and Thatcher in the background. This shot also uses deep focus, so they are all still in perfect focus. The shot then moves back out through the window and the characters move outside to join Charles. The camera pans and tracks around to join all the characters congregating around a snowman, with Mr Kane a little further away in the background, signifying that he is of less importance, and all the others quite close to the lens. Charles then attacks Thatcher and attempts to run away. This take is interrupted by a close-up on Mrs Kane, showing her key importance in this scene. This take runs for 1 minute 55 seconds, also very long by contemporary Hollywood standards. The close-up shows Mrs Kane holding Charles very close to her. This then fades into a shot of Charles’ sled with snow piling up on it. The scene concludes with a temporal ellipsis as we hear the sound of the train Charles is most likely on as he leaves home.
These two long takes we can assume are in total real time, that is to say the screen duration is equal to story duration and plot duration. This editing decision has a strong effect on story time, by presenting every second of events to us it creates a strong sense of continuity, in that we don’t need to infer any events, even though usually ‘We are probably not aware of having made these inferences, but they are no less firm for going unnoticed’[2]. Story time usually greatly exceeds plot time, as story time includes elements that we do not see, that we are only told about. In this sequence there are no unseen inferred events, therefore reducing story time to equal plot time, thus creating this feeling of continuity.
The second scene, the breakfast scene, is as differently edited from the previous scene as two scenes can be. From very minor editing to very heavy, this scene is made up of six sequences at the breakfast table of Charles and Emily, his first wife. The first shot shows Emily sitting in the middle of the table, as Charles enters and sits near her, the camera tracks in, and then there is a shot/reverse shot pattern, utilising the 180° system. This then dissolves into what appears to be a camera moving past windows quickly, before dissolving back to Emily at the breakfast table, now at the opposite side to Charles. They both look slightly older, and there is another shot/reverse shot sequence. The passage of time here is clear, shown by Emily’s more mature way of talking. There is another dissolve to a joining shot and back to a further shot/reverse shot cycle, again with them older, signified by clothes, hair and voice changes. This repeats for sections four and five, and finally in number six, there is one shot/reverse shot, before the camera pans and tracks back to a long shot showing the two of them sitting at opposite heads of the breakfast table, a new table much longer than in the first shot, the physical distance between them representing their emotional distance. This is the first time we’ve seen anything other than a close-up on the characters, switching between them, and it emphasises the overall change in their relationship from beginning to end. This montage lasts for three minutes and ten seconds, which is shorter than the two takes of the previous scene, compared with the story time in each of several years versus four minutes. Each shot is also closer to the ten second average of modern cinema, though some in the shot/reverse shot are much less.
The purpose of this montage is to accelerate the progression of time, to tell a significant part of the story in a very rapid, abridged and intense way. In the first sequence they are both quite young, not much older than in the previous scene. They are newlyweds, and talk about how they went to six parties the night before. ‘The ways the young husband and wife express their feelings are far apart and so, probably, are the feelings themselves.’[3] This is shown by Charles’ attempt at a joke by pretending to be her waiter that she totally ignores, and also by his suggestion ‘to leave the breakfast table to make love, the scene ends before you see her response, but it’s so clear that the two are on different tracks that you can’t imagine her saying yes.’[4] In the five remaining sequences ‘we see the marriage dissolving from tenderness to coldness’[5], and we also see the characters age, from youth to middle age. In each of the first three sequences, Emily makes complaints about the newspaper Charles is running, about how much time he spends there, and about some of the content. She gets increasingly annoyed with Charles’ reaction, but he remains slightly playful and half-jokingly announces his desire to be president one day. The fourth sequence is about Emily’s distaste for Bernstein, and Charles’ demand to have absolute control, refusing Emily her way. The fifth accentuates this even more, being the shortest of the sequences, with only one shot of and line from each. Charles snaps that people will think what he tells them to think he becomes the demanding controlling man he will be for the remainder of the film.
They keep on breakfasting together…to preserve appearances, probably, but they speak less and less, and by the last episode their warfare has become silent, cold and without either the passion or the pleasure of open anger, with Kane at his end of the table reading The Inquirer, Emily at her end reading The Chronicle.[6]
The sixth and final sequence here is in total silence, showing them sitting as far apart as they can at the table, both reading newspapers. Charles is reading his own newspaper, The Inquirer, whereas Emily is reading The Chronicle, The Inquirer’s rival. This is an intentional and slightly childish attempt by her to upset Charles, with her taking noticeable care to ensure he can see that she is reading this rival paper instead of his.
This method of editing has the effect of greatly compressing story time into much less plot time or screen time. Indeed several years - we can’t be sure how many - are shown here over only a few minutes. The method of montage is described in Film Art: an Introduction as
Brief portions of a process, informative titles,… stereotyped images,… newsreel footage, newspaper headlines, and the like can be joined by dissolves and music to create a quick, regular rhythm and to compress a lengthy series of actions into a few moments.[7]
It then sums up the usage of it
The continuity style uses the temporal dimension of editing primarily for narrative purposes. [the effect] allows the viewer to follow the story with minimal effort.[8]
A large amount of story time is presented in a very small amount of screen time, without confusing the audience or complicating the narrative at all.
These two editing techniques have strong impacts on the narrative of the film, and they are deployed here to great effect. We really feel that Mrs Kane took a long time to come to the decision to send Charles away, that it was a tough decision. Later, in the sequence of scenes around the breakfast table, the collapse of the ‘marriage just like any other marriage’ as Leland describes it, is shown to us clearly, effectively and economically, without wasting any time. We immediately understand exactly how it deteriorated, from Charles’ late nights at the newspaper (and maybe other things), to his increasing obsessive desire to control everything. ‘Citizen Kane’ demonstrates how it is possible to use different approaches to showing the passage of time, and how the passage of time is subservient both to the film’s plot and to the meaning the film conveys.
Bibliography
David Bordwell and Kristin Thompson, Film Art an Introduction, McGraw-Hill, New York, 2010
Robert Garis, The Films of Orson Welles, Cambridge University Press, 2004
Joseph McBride, Orson Welles, Cinema One, Secker & Warburg, 1972
Pauline Kael, The Best Film Ever Made, Martin Secker & Warburg, 1971
[1]David Bordwell and Kristin Thompson, Film Art an Introduction, McGraw-Hill, New York, 2010, p. 213
[2]David Bordwell and Kristin Thompson, Film Art an Introduction, McGraw-Hill, New York, 2010, p. 80
[3]Robert Garis, The Films of Orson Welles, Cambridge University Press, 2004, p. 45
[4]Robert Garis, The Films of Orson Welles, Cambridge University Press, 2004, p. 45
[5]Joseph McBride, Orson Welles, Cinema One, Secker & Warburg, 1972, p. 50
[6]Robert Garis, The Films of Orson Welles, Cambridge University Press, 2004, p. 45
[7]David Bordwell and Kristin Thompson, Film Art an Introduction, McGraw-Hill, New York, 2010, p. 254
[8]David Bordwell and Kristin Thompson, Film Art an Introduction, McGraw-Hill, New York, 2010, p. 254
Final Mark: 54%, 2-1
Final Mark: 54%, 2-1
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