Citizen Kane Viewing Questions

1. Choose one scene and describe in detail its mise-en-scéne.
2. How would you describe Charles Kane’s performance style? How would you describe Susan’s?
3. How does this film play with temporal order (that is, how does it manipulate events that happened in linear time to build the mystery of Charles Kane)?
4. How many perspectives tell the story of Charles Kane? How do they differ?
5. What leads to the downfall of Charles Kane?
6. Describe the ways that the cinematographer designed the lighting on/in Xanadu. How does it change?
7. According to Citizen Kane, how is American “news” produced?
8. Pay attention to the camera angles. Describe how a few are used (give brief scene description).
9. How does Citizen Kane depict the 30’s?
10. How would you characterize the lighting of the film? Be sure to use the terms from your book.