Citizen Kane

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xcDJhXSIesI

I chose Citizen Kane, partly because we just watched it in class. Partly because there was one scene that I found to be executed quite perfectly. I chose the scene where Charles Kane's mother told him that he would be going to Chicago with Mr. Thatcher. The scene is about 4 and a half minutes long and falls toward the beginning of the movie. The scene was a tool that was used to give a little back story on Kane's life. It showed us where he got his start in the newspaper industry and who his mentor was. The reason I was drawn to this scene was because Wells used pathetic irony when filming it. Mary Kane, Charles' mother appeared to be kind of a star-offish mother. She was sending her son away to grow up in a different part of the country, without her, for money. He had no choice in the matter, he was just informed that that was how it was going to be. The pathetic irony comes in because the scene was set in the snow. It kind of gave a visual look at the way the situation was being handled, very cold heartedly. It was also like they were ripping Charles' childhood away from him; he had to grow up and begin to perfect his trade. This is literally evident when his sled, Rosebud, is taken from him and left in the snow to be virtually forgotten. The scene ends with the sled sitting in front of the house getting covered with snow. This is somewhat of an allegory to the mystery of Rosebud that the whole movie is spent trying to uncover.