I scratched another item off my “life list” yesterday when I watched for the first time the motion picture classic, “Citizen Kane.” This is one of those movies that I’ve heard about all of my life, but for whatever reason, I’d never taken the time to watch it. I put it on my “life list” a couple of years ago, and on Sunday, thanks to NetFlix, I watched the entire thing. It was great.
Aside from the fact that this movie’s famous, I knew very little about it before watching it. I did know that it was about a newspaperman who became one of the most famous men in the world and for the “Rosebud” catchphrase, but that’s about all I knew. As it turned out, that was for the best, and I probably enjoyed the movie more because I went in with a blank slate.
For those of you unfamiliar with “Citizen Kane,” this movie was released in 1941 and was directed, written and produced by Orson Welles, who also played the leading role in the movie. Welles, you will remember, is arguably best known for his famous Halloween “War of the Worlds” radio hoax of 1938. In “Citizen Kane,” Welles plays the role of Charles Foster Kane.
Kane’s family was poor, but struck it rich when it was discovered that they owned property on top of a huge gold reserve. Instead of raising the boy themselves, his parents turned his upbringing over to their lawyers and financial advisors. Kane went on to be educated in the finest schools in the world, but he had sort of a wild streak that helped him get kicked out of more than a few of these institutions.
Kane came into his full fortune when he turned 25, and he launched into a career as a newspaper publisher. He also burned through much of his money, bought expensive works of art from around the world, constructed a monstrosity of a mansion and was married and divorced a couple of times. He also lost his best friends along the way thanks to his bad behavior and poor decisions.
When Kane dies, journalists begin trying to get the story behind Kane’s last words, “Rosebud.” At the end of the film, we learn that this is a reference to a simple, wooden snow sled that Kane owned as a child. It’s seen early in the movie as a plaything that Kane enjoys just before he’s taken away from his parents’ home.
The message of this movie seems simple enough: No matter how much money or how many possessions you have, the simple things in life are what’s important. Relationships with our friends and family are worth more than material things because, after all, we can’t take it with us and it all ends up in someone else’s hands.
In the end, I enjoyed watching “Citizen Kane” and scratching another item off my life list. How many of you have seen “Citizen Kane”? What did you think about it? Let us know in the comments section below.
2013 LIFE LIST ITEM “CONFIRMED KILLS” TO DATE:
1. Ate a funnel cake
2. Ate a peach from Chilton County, Alabama
3. Ate at Big Daddy’s Grill in Fairhope
4. Ate at Callaghan’s Irish Social Club in Mobile
5. Ate catfish at the Stage Coach Café in Stockton
6. Ate octopus
7. Ate pigs feet
8. Attended a Beulah Campground service
9. Drank a fresh lemonade at Toomer’s Drugs in Auburn
10. Drank a Mimosa
11. Drank Cognac
12. Drank goat’s milk
13. Hiked the Grand Canyon
14. Joined the H.P. Lovecraft Historical Society
15. Joined the Sons of Confederate Veterans
16. Made an origami animal
17. Listened to Pink Floyd’s “The Wall” without interruption
18. Listened to The Beatles’ “White Album” without interruption
19. Planted a vegetable garden
20. Ran the Alligator Trot 5K in Florala
21. Ran the Battle of Mobile Bay 5K on Dauphin Island
22. Ran through the Bankhead Tunnel in Mobile
23. Read all the Hellboy graphic novels
24. Read “And Then There Were None” by Agatha Christie
25. Read “Charlie and the Chocolate Factory” by Roald Dahl
26. Read MLK’s “I Have a Dream” speech
27. Read “Rammer Jammer Yellow Hammer” by Warren St. John
28. Read “Savage Wilderness” by Barry Ralph
29. Read the “Complete Stories and Poems of Edgar Allan Poe”
30. Read the entire Bible
31. Read “Who Goes There?” by John W. Campbell Jr.
32. Saw the Ginkgo tree in Evergreen
33. Spent the night in the Old Dr. John Watkins House at Burnt Corn
34. Started a fire without matches
35. Took the downtown Selma walking tour
36. Tried 100 different types of beer
37. Visited Ellicott’s Stone
38. Visited Packer’s Bend
39. Visited the Grand Canyon
40. Visited the grave of Lewis Lavon Peacock
41. Visited the Hank Williams Statue in Montgomery
42. Watched “A Streetcar Named Desire”
43. Watched “Brazil” (1985)
44. Watched “Cat on a Hot Tin Roof” (1958)
45. Watched “Citizen Kane” (1941)
46. Watched “Dracula” (1931) 47. Watched “Easy Rider” (1969)
48. Watched “Frankenstein” (1931)
49. Watched “Nosferatu” (1922)
50. Watched “This Is Spinal Tap”
(AUTHOR’S NOTE: The whole point of these life list updates is NOT to draw attention to myself or to anything that I’ve done. Instead, I hope to encourage others to accomplish their own bucket list goals. I’m just a regular guy, and if I can do these things, so can you.)
No comments:
Post a Comment