Citizen Kane, legendary director Orson Welles’ debut film, and arguably his magnum opus as well, premiered in theaters all the way back in the year 1942. Very loosely based on real life newspaper mogul William Randolph Hearst (who was adamantly against the film), Citizen Kane follows Jerry Thompson, an investigative reporter, as he tries to find the meaning behind mogul Charles Foster Kane’s (played by Orson Welles himself), last word, “rosebud.”

The film does its investigation through the lenses of four different people who knew Charles Kane: The archives of Walter Thatcher, Kane’s business manager Mr. Bernstein, Kane’s old friend Jedediah Leland, and his affair partner Susan Alexander. All four paint a portrait of Charles Foster Kane’s entire life from beginning to the end for the reporter.

Why is Citizen Kane Called the Greatest Film of All Time?

Orson Welles stands amongst a lot of newspapers in Citizen Kane
RKO Radio Pictures

Though not a box office success, the film was fairly acclaimed by the Academy Awards, being nominated for nine awards. It won one for Best Screenplay, written by Herman Mankiewicz (who received his own black-and-white biographical drama, Mank) and Orson Welles. The film actually faded into obscurity, until roughly a decade later when Citizen Kane was frequently screened internationally and received rave reviews from critics, such as the legendary French critic Andre Bazin.

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The film shot to the top of critics' lists, being ranked in the top films of all time, even being #1 for multiple decades. But almost a century later, most people haven’t seen this film, so they wonder: “Why is Citizen Kane considered to be the best movie of all time?” Well, there are two standout reasons why: The structure and editing of the film, and the cinematography. With both being trailblazers for new techniques and editing that would change Cinema for decades to come.

The Structure and Editing of Citizen Kane

Pre-Citizen Kane, most films followed a standard, linear story structure. They followed the protagonists and characters from point A to point B in chronological order. Citizen Kane on the other hand, went a different route. Orson Welles told the story of Charles Foster Kane through multiple point-of-view segments from the people who knew Kane best, refracted through a non-linear narrative. This style of storytelling was a new and unique technique in filmmaking. One that can (and did) paint a near-polished portrait of its Macguffin.

Welles can also be credited for advancements in what could be considered the precursor to modern Green Screen technical effects, as can be seen in this image:

The famous matte painting shot in Citizen Kane
RKO Radio Pictures

Though it looks like a normal scene of man staring down at a stage, it is actually a very clever piece of editing. Everything to the left (the stage, the giant picture of Kane, the seats and audience), is all edited in. The man on the right was only staring into the abyss, into nothing. Then a separate clip of the stage was edited in later. This process was then used multiple times throughout to create some of the harder, more expensive set pieces for the film.

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Orson Welles also expanded on the idea of montage (the technique created by Sergei Eisenstein, to show a sequence of images all at once, to imply certain events happening). During one of the POV’s of Citizen Kane, the narrator goes over Charles Kane’s personal life, and his deteriorating marriage with his first wife, Emily Norton Kane. Instead of having long, drawn out scenes to show the deterioration, Welles’ uses an ingenious montage of the couple having breakfast, and as their marriage worsens, they get farther and farther apart at the breakfast table. It allowed Welles to use the run time for other scenes, and utilized a beautiful piece of symbolism for the passage of time and an honest but sad look at marriage.

The Cinematography of Citizen Kane

The fish eye lens shot of a nurse in Citizen Kane
RKO Radio Pictures

One of the other Academy Awards Citizen Kane was nominated for was Best Cinematography, which was no surprise, as cinematographer Gregg Toland created absolutely phenomenal and inventive techniques in the movie, cementing himself as one of the best cinematographers of his time. The one that stands out the most (for audiences and throughout time) is the beginning scenes showcasing the death of Charles Foster Kane. Instead of a standard still camera, Toland and his team chose to go with a fish angle lens shot from the perspective of the snow globe that was in Kane’s hand as he was fading away from life. And as he passes, Kane drops the snow globe, allowing the audience to see as one of his caretakers discovers his body.

Toland also heavily used deep-focus camera techniques, acquiring special lenses and equipment to do so. Using deep-focus (which allowed nearly everything in the camera’s view to be clear and visible) was very uncommon in that era of Hollywood. Even when it looked like there were scenes in the film using deep-focus, there were occasions where Toland teamed up with special effects cinematographer Linwood Dunn, and the two would combine two separate shots into one, to make it look as if it was deep-focus.

The journalists in a dark room in Citizen Kane
RKO Radio Pictures

Another standout shot of Toland’s in Citizen Kane, one that absolutely revolutionized cinematography, was the deep shot of a young Charles Kane playing outside in the snow, as his mother spoke with someone inside the house. Most cinematographers at the time were using shallow planes to create depth, but Toland managed to create a deep-focus plane that was gorgeous and easily viewable, a stunning sensation in Hollywood.

Additionally, the camera movements established by the groundbreaking crane shots would go on to inspire legions of directors and cinematographers. Gregg Toland’s techniques and cinematography for Citizen Kane were so influential that they are still taught and talked about in film, directing, and cinema classes nationwide.

Of course, Citizen Kane is also known for many more things, such as its fantastic storytelling, but its story and plot structure, editing, and cinematography are what make it stand out to be considered the best movie of all time. While this position has been noticeably shaken in recent years, slowly replaced by Alfred Hitchcock's film Vertigo, the techniques and styles it created and advanced changed the film industry, and film itself, for the rest of history.