CITIZEN KANE

New Zealand Listener, Volume 13, Issue 338, 14 December 1945, Page 18

CITIZEN KANE

(RKO-Radio)

HE other day the sefigus picturegoers of Wellington were given an opportunity to see this Orson Welles masterPiece, some of them for the

first time, others after an interval of about four-and-a-half years (for this screening was, of course, a revival). Rather unfortunately perhaps, the man_agement of the theatre, in an attempt to enjoy the best of two worlds, chose to bracket it with The Arabian Nights, which they described as a "second request feature," the result being that many of the Orson Welles fans did not arrive till half-time, while some of those who had been attracted by’the very different brand of entertainment offered in The Arabian Nights began walking out soon after Citizen Kane had begun. Even if you can’t please everybody, there are surely better ways of making the attempt than this. Though I don’t normally notice revivals in this column, I think Citizen Kane is worth treating briefly as an exception. What I went specially looking for was same evidence of its influence on pictures that have been made since its first release in 1941. This is not, of course, an easy matter to check on; but i ~

I thought that by examining Citizen Kane again it would be possible to notice that some clear signs that the big lump of yeast which Orson Welles then dropped into the cinema had _ been actively at work. I’m afraid, however, that it is necessary to record that I didn’t notice any. Perhaps some of the treatment of Phantorn Lady and Shadow of a Doubt bore the mark of Kane; perhaps a moment or two in Dorian Gray; and you may be able to think of other instances. (Later Welles productions such as The Magnificent Ambersons are obviously excluded from’ this investigation.) But on the whole, after four-and-a-half years, Citizen Kane is still the most revolutionary, most advanced talking-pic-ture to come out of Hollywood; it is still, I believe, several years ahead of its time, When the film was first released, the Little Man gave it only a sit-down clap. Now, while adhering to the opinion he expressed then (Listener; August 29, 1941), that "Mr. Welles has often been guilty of showing. off, has been a little too clever," he is fully | prepared to admit that he was not enough and that this production deserves any critic’s highest award. ‘eo "Of this I am sure, that years from now other film producers and technicians will still be tilling the ground which Orson Welles has broken in Citizen Kane." That is what I wrote previously, and although, as I say, there is as yet disappointingly little evidence to support it, I'll stick to that statement. Some day the yeast will begin to work.