There are a lot of things that we as the audience take for granted when it comes to movies since we’ve grown up in an era when movies are common, when cinematography and editing and every possible method under the sun is being utilized, adapted, evolved, and made into something better. Citizen Kane didn’t exist in those times, as movies back in that day were often herky-jerky pieces of work that didn’t resemble the smoothly-running operations that are so prevalent today. These days a person can make a better video with their phone than a filmmaker could nearly a century ago, and for this reason, Citizen Kane became a classic since it looked like an actual movie, not like a bad puppet show where the actors continually felt as though they were being pulled along by strings. The story might not resonate with everyone, but the fact that it would help to usher in a new standard for movies was something that can’t be discounted considering that the movie did a great service to the film industry in showing what a working film really looked like. This is one of the biggest contributions to the filming industry that any movie has ever given since the idea of how a movie is supposed to look and feel is absolutely important it’s vital to the modern era.
People want quality, they want to be able to fall into the story and get lost, and from the storyline to the cinematography to the editing, Citizen Kane was able to bring every desired quality without sacrificing too much in order to get its point across. Now as far as personal taste goes, the movie is something that appeals to many people in many different ways, but it is an older movie and Orsen Welles isn’t everyone’s cup of tea. To be fair the idea for the movie is something that appeals to many people but not everyone and the overall effort was bound to create excitement among some folks since back in those days effects weren’t all that great and a movie that told a compelling story was often more appreciated than it is now thanks to the fact that special effects and big-name actors have kind of taken over in a big way and made it almost impossible for a lot of lesser-known movies to make a push for their own fame. But Citizen Kane was the type of story that people paid attention to at that point and a movie was a luxury that a lot of people couldn’t afford or at least saw as something that was a special occasion, unlike the movies we’ve taken for granted so often in this day and age.
When you think about that, the fact that movies and the many methods that are used to bring them to life are so common in this era, it does make the average person feel that maybe we’ve stepped a little too far ahead, or perhaps we’re simply taking too much for granted. People that are born into each era have a built-in excuse for not knowing how things worked in the generation before theirs, but it’s still not much of an excuse when it comes to learning said techniques and how they’ve changed over time. It’s the job of the older generations to teach those that come after them what was considered great, what came before what they know now, and how it worked back then versus the current era. Citizen Kane is kind of an anomaly that happens every so often since it helped to bring about the change that was so badly needed when it came to filmmaking. The movie was something that some people might find extraordinary for its use of imagery and the overall story, but others might feel is a bit too bland for their liking, as this is a matter of personal taste that everyone has a right to possess. But what it did for the industry is why it’s still considered a gem in the ever-expanding crown of Hollywood and why it’s still used as a reference from time to time. If anyone’s keeping count, Citizen Kane has been widely used in many different ways throughout the years since its story and the many images it brought to mind have managed to influence movies, literature, cartoons, and pretty much every facet of life possible given that it was such an influential movie.
Some might say that there are movies made in the last few decades that are every bit as valuable, and they could be right since advances in filmmaking have been ongoing throughout the years. But one driving reason why Citizen Kane is still seen as a huge deal in show business is that it helped to change things in a way that vastly improved the art of making movies.
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