A Few Words About A few words about...™ Citizen Kane -- in Blu-ray (2 Viewers)

[Doug Otte]

I watched the BD a week ago, and thought it looked and sounded stunning. However, over at avsforum.com two posters claim that excessive edge enhancement ruined it for them. I didn't notice any EE on my 42" screen. Did anyone else notice it?
Doug

 

[Patrick McCart]

I watched the BD a week ago, and thought it looked and sounded stunning. However, over at avsforum.com two posters claim that excessive edge enhancement ruined it for them. I didn't notice any EE on my 42" screen. Did anyone else notice it?
Doug

There's occasional moments of "ringing" around high contrast areas in dupe sections, which were also in the 35mm print I viewed.
By the way, does anyone know why Warner opted to freeze-frame some parts of the newsreel segment? The most obvious part is the "NEWS ON THE MARCH" card, which looks like it has a re-created dissolve from the background to the title superimposed. The "Love Nest" headline also looks re-created from single frames. I'm guessing that those sections had serious damage on the fine-grain element?

 

[DeeF]

I had audio problems. Turns out, I've got that same Pioneer 94x receiver. Luckily, Ben-Hur bluray doesn't exhibit any problems.

 

[GMpasqua]

Warner Bros should have released "The Magnificent Ambersons" as a separate DVD (I'm sure many would want to buy it without having to buy this box set)

The film Warner Bros should have included is "Me and Orson Welles" - Warner has video rights to this wonderful piece about Wells and the Mercury Theater. The film received glowing reviews at the Cannes film festival but no studio picked it up. It was barely released by the film makers a few years ago to a few and I do mean few theaters.

It is currently available as a Target exclusive - but only online ----how many people will know it exists if it's only available on line and never played most cities?????


This films gives a good insight to the way Wells ran the Mercury and when his character's not on screen the other actors disclose much information about the man's personal life and working methods. It is also (IMO) one of the best films about theater and has enough charm to fill about a dozen other films. The performances are first rate and Christian McKay does an incredible job portraying Wells.

 

[Hollowbrook Drive-In]

Orson Welles ("Me" is spelled correctly).

 

[John Hodson]

Rather than rely on a drama, for an insight into the man, you'd be far, far better off with Simon Callow's two volumes (thus far...) of Welles biography. Fabulous books:
Orson Welles: Volume 1: The Road to Xanadu
Orson Welles: Volume 2: Hello Americans

 

[GMpasqua]

Almost any book or documentary will give greater insight to the man. I'm sure this film is also a bit fictionalized. But this is such a good film in so many ways it deserves to been seen.

Due to the subject matter and being an indenpendant, the film doesn't look like it will ever be seen by a large number of people - which is a shame. Including it as an extra to "Citizen Kane" would have been a way of increasing it's awareness since the film didn't even get a regular DVD release and would at least appeal to people who admire Welles' work

check it out if you can

 

[Robin9]

This films gives a good insight to the way Wells ran the Mercury and when his character's not on screen the other actors disclose much information about the man's personal life and working methods. It is also (IMO) one of the best films about theater and has enough charm to fill about a dozen other films. The performances are first rate and Christian McKay does an incredible job portraying Wells.

If you want an insight into Welles during his Mercury Theater days, I recommend John Houseman's autobiography Run Through. It's probably out of print but it should be available second hand.

 

[marsnkc]

Rather than rely on a drama, for an insight into the man, you'd be far, far better off with Simon Callow's two volumes (thus far...) of Welles biography. Fabulous books:
Orson Welles: Volume 1: The Road to Xanadu
Orson Welles: Volume 2: Hello Americans

I've just requested these to be published on Kindle, as I have for Adrian's bio of Bolt. Amazon relies on people putting in their two cents to get publishers to get with the program.
The creator of the role of Amadeus sure doesn't let the grass grow under his feet. I see he's also written bios of Wilde and Laughton. I wonder if he mentions Welles as a precocious 16 year old showing up at the Gate Theater in Dublin and lying to the great Mac Liammoir about his age. If he does, you'll know he pulled it off!

 

[AdrianTurner]

I once had the rare privilege of looking after Mr Welles for a week in London. I'm writing this not to name drop but because I did have a rather interesting encounter with him which might be of interest to readers of this most excellent forum.
It was 1983 and Mr Welles wanted to stay at the Savoy. He requested the suite with the 'John Wayne Bed' which was big enough to contain him. I think Wayne had stayed there when making Brannigan. Mr Welles also requested that he didn't have a regular limo but a certain type of American car, I forget exactly which, but something with fins and chrome from the 60s which was big enough and easy enough for him to slide into the front seat. He wanted a specific driver who was a stuntman based at Pinewood Studios. Mr Welles at the time was almost an invalid and in a wheelchair for a lot of the time.
I'd had several phone calls with him and found him easy to get along with. I once went to Paris to meet him at the Tremoille Hotel to finalise some details. In London I went to see him after he had checked into the hotel and there sitting at his feet was someone I knew. Mr Welles said, "Have you met my pimp?" This was none other than Alan Yentob who was a major BBC arts producer and had, indeed, produced the wonderful interviews for the Arena programme. Anyway, we all had a chuckle at Mr Welles's remark. There was someone else in the room - some sort of Italian prince who was possibly financing one of Mr Welles's Shakespeare projects. For some reason Mr Welles gave me the bulky script to look after for a few days.
The occasion for his visit was to receive one of the first Fellowships bestowed by the British Film Institute. Mr Welles was to make the keynote speech at a banquet held at the medieval Guildhall in the City of London. Prince Charles was there and so was virtually everyone who was anyone in the British film industry. Plus me. After the speech we took Mr Welles into a small ante-room - he didn't want to attend the main reception without being able to stand up. So Alan Yentob and I brought people into the room to meet the great man - I remember taking Kevin Brownlow, Marcel Carne, Sam Spiegel and a few others. Then Richard Attenborough arrived with Prince Charles and many of us just sat on the floor while Mr Welles told a few stories. An amazing evening.
I also remember Mr Welles asking for two First Class return air tickets from Las Vegas. Even though he came from Paris. That was part of his charm, though the director of the BFI, Tony Smith, was absolutely furious that we should have spent so much money on him. I thought he was worth every cent.

 

[John Hodson]

I've just requested these to be published on Kindle, as I have for Adrian's bio of Bolt. Amazon relies on people putting in their two cents to get publishers to get with the program.
The creator of the role of Amadeus sure doesn't let the grass grow under his feet. I see he's also written bios of Wilde and Laughton. I wonder if he mentions Welles as a precocious 16 year old showing up at the Gate Theater in Dublin and lying to the great Mac Liammoir about his age. If he does, you'll know he pulled it off!

There already appears to be Kindle editions of the two Callow volumes...and yes, of course he does. I would also recommend his book on Laughton, though that's not available via Kindle and is OOP, it's easily available via Marketplace sellers.

 

I bought the gigantic vhs boxed set of Kane back in the day. It included a wonderful making of book by Harlan Lebo and the complete screenplay (which looks nice on the shelf.)

 

[Richard--W]

I once had the rare privilege of looking after Mr Welles for a week in London. I'm writing this not to name drop but because I did have a rather interesting encounter with him which might be of interest to readers of this most excellent forum.
It was 1983 and Mr Welles wanted to stay at the Savoy. He requested the suite with the 'John Wayne Bed' which was big enough to contain him. I think Wayne had stayed there when making Brannigan. Mr Welles also requested that he didn't have a regular limo but a certain type of American car, I forget exactly which, but something with fins and chrome from the 60s which was big enough and easy enough for him to slide into the front seat. He wanted a specific driver who was a stuntman based at Pinewood Studios. Mr Welles at the time was almost an invalid and in a wheelchair for a lot of the time.
I'd had several phone calls with him and found him easy to get along with. I once went to Paris to meet him at the Tremoille Hotel to finalise some details. In London I went to see him after he had checked into the hotel and there sitting at his feet was someone I knew. Mr Welles said, "Have you met my pimp?" This was none other than Alan Yentob who was a major BBC arts producer and had, indeed, produced the wonderful interviews for the Arena programme. Anyway, we all had a chuckle at Mr Welles's remark. There was someone else in the room - some sort of Italian prince who was possibly financing one of Mr Welles's Shakespeare projects. For some reason Mr Welles gave me the bulky script to look after for a few days.
The occasion for his visit was to receive one of the first Fellowships bestowed by the British Film Institute. Mr Welles was to make the keynote speech at a banquet held at the medieval Guildhall in the City of London. Prince Charles was there and so was virtually everyone who was anyone in the British film industry. Plus me. After the speech we took Mr Welles into a small ante-room - he didn't want to attend the main reception without being able to stand up. So Alan Yentob and I brought people into the room to meet the great man - I remember taking Kevin Brownlow, Marcel Carne, Sam Spiegel and a few others. Then Richard Attenborough arrived with Prince Charles and many of us just sat on the floor while Mr Welles told a few stories. An amazing evening.
I also remember Mr Welles asking for two First Class return air tickets from Las Vegas. Even though he came from Paris. That was part of his charm, though the director of the BFI, Tony Smith, was absolutely furious that we should have spent so much money on him. I thought he was worth every cent.

Thank you so much for sharing this experience.
I'm tempted to ask you a hundred questions.

 

[Charles Smith]

Yes, great story. More, please!

My one time seeing him in person was at a Welles festival held at USC around 1981. Just being able to stand in his rather great (in every sense of the word) presence for a few minutes afterward as he walked and chatted on his way to the door has been a small but cherished memory. I think he was still getting around all right then, and I believe those were the days in which he was regularly holding court over great food and probably greater wines at Ma Maison (if I'm remembering correctly).

 

[Richard--W]

In the backpages of this thread there was some discussion about documentaries on Citizen Kane that are more appreciative, objective and factual than The Battle Over Citizen Kane, an anti-Orson blast which Warner Brothers keeps recycling.

The BBC's The Complete Citizen Kane has been posted on youtube. It contains a revealing interview with William Alland that can be seen nowhere else. Everyone who loves the film needs to watch this:

 

[Ray Faiola]

I'd be very interested to know more about the soundtrack. The DVD had a track that was definitely noise-reduced. Listen to the trailer track and you hear a fully vibrant soundtrack. Has the feature track on this new release been "adjusted for modern ears"??

 

[Richard--W]

The BBC used some footage from THE COMPLETE CITIZEN KANE in its more expansive biography of Welles' life and career, THE ORSON WELLES STORY which aired on the documentary program ARENA. It also aired in the USA on TNT, edited differently under the title ORSON WELLES: MEMORIES OF A LIFE IN FILM (1982). There is no good reason why it has never been released on DVD or blu-ray. In either edit, it's a brilliantly made documentary. Welles was a fascinating interviewee. He was erudite, knowledgeable about literature, theater and cinema, very political, self-aware, self-deprecating and humble, always willing to share credit or give credit where it is due, funny as hell and impeccably honest. The interview footage is loaded with quotable quotes, and the documentary footage is full of period gems seen nowhere else.

The footage doesn't include the interviews with William Alland and others who worked on CITIZEN KANE, so you have to watch both documentaries to get the full story. Here is the complete ARENA broadcast in very nice quality:

 

[Oblivion138]

There's occasional moments of "ringing" around high contrast areas in dupe sections, which were also in the 35mm print I viewed. By the way, does anyone know why Warner opted to freeze-frame some parts of the newsreel segment? The most obvious part is the "NEWS ON THE MARCH" card, which looks like it has a re-created dissolve from the background to the title superimposed. The "Love Nest" headline also looks re-created from single frames. I'm guessing that those sections had serious damage on the fine-grain element?

I was also taken aback the first time I watched the BD and saw that they'd frozen the News on the March card and used a digital dissolve...in the process, removing the damage that was no doubt intentional on the part of Welles. Unless I'm very much mistaken, that title card was meant to look worn and battered. It's a small thing, but pretty much the only real blemish on an otherwise sterling presentation.

Any time I've brought this up on any forum, the question seems to be ignored. I haven't really found any actual discussion of the issue anywhere.

 

[moviebuff75]

Would the "News on the March" title card be purposely battered though? I think the "footage" in it was supposed to be battered because it was old, but the title card for the news reel shouldn't be battered.

 

[bigshot]

In the film, they're watching the newsreel on 16mm film. The title card should have film dust and such.