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Wednesday, August 11, 2010

Black and white movies

As I sit here and watch The Rocky Horror Picture Show, I am going to write about old black and white films. Trust me as a film major in school, I've seen a lot. The main one I am going talk about is Citizen Kane.

As far as b&w films go, this is one of the most famous ones. It tells the story of Charles Foster Kane, who was given up for adoption, and became a very wealthy newspaper writer.

When the movie starts we see a very old Kane laying in his bed holding a snow globe. The first thing we as the audience hear is the word "Rosebud" as Kane drops the snow globe and dies.

Throughout the movie the story revolves around What rosebud means, while we see old friends of Kane being interviewed, and telling what they knew about him. While the movie goes along, no one was able to tell us what this mysterious word meant. Even though we didn't find out who or what it was, we did see it. I know someone will be like "what is it?" Guess what I'm not telling.

I think that the twist and turns of not hear what rosebud is, but seeing it, makes Kane more interesting. Many people may and will disagree with me, and feel free.

Other than the story Orson Welles' use of lighting, camera movements and angles also help make the movie interesting. For instance, to show Kane's power and importance, when he is speaking Welles (who played Kane) uses low angles towards Kane to make him seem bigger than normal.

Many of the other things that were used are to lengthy to explain, so watch the movie to see how they work.

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