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(Scene: The directors' roundtable begins. The room is dim. A film projector casts flickering light across the walls. Orson Welles steps forward, his presence commanding yet warm, his voice rich and deliberate.)
Welcome, my friends.
When I made Citizen Kane, I was 25 years old and foolish enough to believe I could break cinema wide open. I didn’t know all the rules, so I did what all young artists do—I invented some of my own. Deep focus, fractured time, mirrors and shadows. But Kane… Kane was never about techniques.
It was about a man.
A man who rose higher than anyone, only to discover the air up there is cold and silent. It was about ambition that devours, memory that deceives, isolation that hardens, media that distorts, and a cinematic language that could never quite contain the man at its center.
And now—decades later—I find myself seated with titans. Directors who reshaped the very art I once tried to reinvent. Kubrick, Tarkovsky, Hitchcock, Kurosawa, Bergman, Scorsese, Nolan, Wong Kar-wai, Tarantino, Spielberg. Each of them carved new grammar into the language of film. Each of them understands Kane—not just the film, but the soul of the man himself—in ways even I did not.
So we’ve gathered here—not to praise Citizen Kane, but to interrogate it. To ask:
Who was Kane in our time?
What does he reveal about power, memory, and the price of our own ambitions?
And if we dared to remake him—what truths would we uncover today?
Cinema is not just light and sound—it is a question we ask over and over again.
And tonight, we ask it one more time.
Let the reel spin.
(Note: This is an imaginary conversation, a creative exploration of an idea, and not a real speech or event.)
The Power and Corruption of Ambition
Scene: A dimly lit screening room. Orson Welles sits with a glass of cognac in hand. The screen behind them flickers with silent clips from Citizen Kane. Around him sit Scorsese, Kurosawa, Spielberg, and Kubrick.
Orson Welles (smiling):
“Gentlemen, when I made Citizen Kane, I wasn’t setting out to chart a fall from grace—I was trying to understand a man whose dreams outgrew his soul. Let’s start with this: What happens when ambition becomes a curse rather than a blessing?”
Martin Scorsese (leaning forward):
“It becomes a trap, Orson. You chase more—more power, more attention, more legacy—but what you lose is the intimacy of real life. That’s Kane. That’s also Henry Hill, Jordan Belfort. They rise fast, but the higher they go, the more alone they get.”
Akira Kurosawa (nodding thoughtfully):
“In Japan, we have a saying: ‘The nail that sticks out gets hammered down.’ But Kane, he resists the hammer. He builds an empire to defy fate. I see echoes of Throne of Blood in him—ambition fueled by pride, ending in spiritual emptiness.”
Stanley Kubrick (coolly):
“Kane isn’t a victim. He’s a designer of his own downfall. Ambition itself isn’t evil—it’s the illusion of control that corrupts. He thinks he can engineer love, truth, and loyalty. But these aren’t things you build like Xanadu. They either come freely or not at all.”
Steven Spielberg (softer tone):
“I agree. He confuses possession with connection. Rosebud wasn’t about a sled—it was a time when he was loved without needing to prove anything. That’s the tragedy. His ambition didn’t start as evil—it was just a boy trying to matter.”
Welles (raising his glass):
“To the boy who tried to matter. Now, say you were to remake Kane today. Not copy it—but reinterpret that hunger and downfall. Where would you place him?”
Scorsese (grinning):
“I’d throw him in 1970s New York. Kane as a media mogul with one foot in the mafia. The newsroom would be electric—cigarette smoke, ticking deadlines, corrupt mayors. Think Mean Streets meets Network. Ambition in that city either makes gods or ghosts.”
Kurosawa (smiling):
“My Kane would be a shogun in decline. He builds a castle to be remembered, but forgets the hearts of the people. The final act would be snowfall—quiet, white, covering everything he built. His name survives, but no one says it with warmth.”
Kubrick (measured):
“I’d isolate him in a technological palace. Kane as a reclusive billionaire—someone like a mix of Elon Musk and Howard Hughes. The film would be cold, symmetrical, almost sterile. He surrounds himself with artificial intelligence but loses his humanity. A perfectly controlled world… utterly empty.”
Spielberg (more animated):
“I’d set mine in the digital age too, but more emotionally driven. Kane as a young orphan who becomes a tech giant—like Zuckerberg meets Hearst. But instead of a sled, Rosebud would be a memory he erased from his own timeline. A love he deleted for success.”
Welles (with a glint in his eye):
“Delicious. Each of your Kanes would still fall—but in entirely new ways. Scorsese’s dies under flashing neon and headlines. Kurosawa’s dissolves into snow. Kubrick’s suffocates in silence. Spielberg’s gets swallowed by his own algorithm.”
Scorsese (pointing to the screen):
“But here’s what binds us—we’re not just telling stories about failure. We’re asking the same question you did, Orson: What’s the price of forgetting who you were when you still believed in love?”
Kurosawa (quietly):
“Yes. And that ambition without compassion leads to ashes. Whether it’s in a castle, a boardroom, or a palace made of code.”
Kubrick:
“Ambition is only noble when it’s aimed at truth. Kane abandoned truth for image.”
Spielberg (nodding):
“And that’s why he lost everything that mattered.”
Welles (raising his glass again):
“To ambition, and to the men it makes—and breaks. Gentlemen, if nothing else, Citizen Kane taught me this: We all build Xanadu in our minds. The challenge is knowing when to stop decorating the walls and walk outside.”
All nod, the screen now frozen on a still frame: Kane alone in the vast echo of his mansion.
Memory and the Unreliability of Truth
Scene: The same screening room, now darker, quieter. The snow globe from Citizen Kane sits on the table. Clips of Kane’s overlapping recollections fade in and out on the screen. The directors gather, pensive. Welles lights a cigar and speaks first.
Orson Welles (leaning forward, voice gravelly):
“Memory is a slippery thing. In Kane, no one truly knew the man—not even himself. We told his story through others’ stories, each distorted by time, ego, or regret. Let’s talk about memory—how unreliable it is, and how it shapes truth.”
Christopher Nolan (hands steepled):
“Memory is fiction. It edits itself constantly. In Memento, my protagonist can’t form new memories, but even the ones he trusts deceive him. If I remade Kane, I’d turn it into a labyrinth—each version of Kane would contradict the last. A cinematic puzzle. No one—not even the audience—would know who the real Kane is.”
Alfred Hitchcock (eyes twinkling):
“Ah, but that’s the fun, isn’t it? Memory lets us manipulate the audience. In Vertigo, Scotty believes he understands Madeleine—but it’s all illusion. I’d remake Kane as a suspense thriller. The journalist becomes the detective, each interview a red herring, each recollection a trap.”
Wong Kar-wai (soft-spoken):
“Memory is not linear. It floats like smoke. I’d strip away the investigation entirely. My Kane would be seen only through fragments—a woman’s perfume, a letter half-burned, a photograph in the rain. The audience would feel him more than understand him. Rosebud wouldn’t be explained—it would be a mood, not a thing.”
Andrei Tarkovsky (calm, meditative):
“In Mirror, I let memory become the structure. Not a plot, but a river. I’d make Kane the memory of the world after his death. Not interviews, but dreams, visions, symbols. He appears only in silence, or through the wind. Truth is not found in words—it’s in what haunts us.”
Welles (smiling):
“You’re all after the same ghost—truth hiding in shadow. Kane, the man of headlines, becomes Kane, the mystery. But tell me—do you believe we ever can know someone through memory?”
Nolan (firmly):
“No. Memory is unreliable by design. The moment we remember, we rewrite. In a Nolan version of Kane, even Rosebud might be a false memory—planted, imagined, or chosen to fit a narrative Kane liked better than the truth.”
Hitchcock:
“I agree, but I’d say: weaponize it. Use memory to play with perception. Imagine a version of Kane where each witness is hiding something—each story builds suspense until the audience no longer cares about Rosebud, only about who’s lying.”
Wong Kar-wai:
“I think memory doesn’t lie—it just doesn’t explain. In my version, the audience would only see Kane through the people who loved him… or failed to. A woman who waited at a train station. A singer who left behind one unfinished song. You’d understand him by what he left incomplete.”
Tarkovsky:
“I would go further. The film itself would be a memory—without answers. Scenes dissolve into dreams. A child running in a snowstorm. An old man staring at birds. My Kane wouldn’t be explained—he would be felt through the silence of others.”
Welles (reflective):
“In Kane, I gave you six witnesses. You give me six doors, each one deeper than the last. You’re saying that memory doesn’t reveal truth. It reveals yearning.”
Nolan:
“Yes—and distortion.”
Wong:
“And longing.”
Hitchcock:
“And fear.”
Tarkovsky:
“And soul.”
Welles (smiling softly):
“Then perhaps Kane was never a man to be known, but a prism. The more light we shine on him, the more scattered we become. Gentlemen, I thank you. You’ve reminded me that the best stories don’t explain the past—they echo it.”
The room falls into silence as the screen flickers with Kane as a boy, playing in the snow. For a moment, they all just watch. Not as directors, but as men who’ve also chased meaning through memory.
The Tragedy of Isolation
Scene: The same screening room, but colder now. A single spotlight falls on a scene from Citizen Kane—an old Kane walking alone through the echoing halls of Xanadu. Around the table, the mood is somber. Welles speaks first.
Orson Welles (quietly):
“When I imagined Kane’s empire, I didn’t want it to feel grand. I wanted it to feel… hollow. A man who could own everything but touch nothing. Today, we speak of isolation—not just loneliness, but the way ambition builds walls instead of bridges. What does that look like to you?”
Ingmar Bergman (softly, hands clasped):
“It looks like silence between two people who once shared everything. Kane’s tragedy is not just that he’s alone—but that he cannot remember how to be with someone. In Scenes from a Marriage, I showed that love does not protect you from isolation—it sometimes delivers you into it.”
Stanley Kubrick (coolly):
“Isolation is the natural state of the brilliant and the damned. Kane is both. In The Shining, the hotel isn’t just a haunted house—it’s a mirror. Kane’s mansion serves the same purpose. The man is haunting himself, wandering corridors he built. There’s no monster but the echo of his voice.”
Wong Kar-wai (gazing at the screen):
“I think of isolation not as noise, but as pause. In In the Mood for Love, two people brush past each other endlessly—but never connect. Kane speaks so much, but no one hears him. In my version, he’d barely speak. We’d only hear what he leaves unsaid—the quiet between footsteps, the sigh behind the door.”
Akira Kurosawa (deep, slow voice):
“In Ikiru, the man is dying but only starts living when he finds meaning. Kane dies long before his body does. He loses connection to the world—his wife, his friends, his own youth. I would remake him as a bureaucrat in postwar Tokyo—surrounded by people, yet seen by no one.”
Welles (leans back):
“Isolation as haunting, silence, stillness, and invisibility. Each of you paints solitude with different strokes. Tell me—how would you show that isolation in your version of Kane?”
Bergman:
“I would strip away the lavish sets. Just Kane and the people who left him—appearing as shadows. He would speak, but their replies would never come. Scenes would repeat, slightly altered. A dinner where no one eats. A bedroom where no one sleeps.”
Kubrick:
“I’d show the architecture doing the talking. Cold halls. Cameras slowly pulling back as Kane shrinks in the frame. He’d be a god in his domain, and yet—tiny. I would remove warmth. Even his memories would feel staged. Isolation as geometry.”
Wong Kar-wai:
“In my Kane, every scene would begin just after someone leaves. His lover’s scent lingers. A cup of tea still warm. We would never see the connection—only its absence. Isolation would be shown not in emptiness, but in what’s just barely gone.”
Kurosawa:
“I would use weather. Wind outside a window. Snow falling without end. Kane looking out at a world that no longer knows his name. In Japanese tradition, loneliness is felt in the seasons. His final moments would be in spring, as the world blooms without him.”
Welles (quietly):
“Do you think Kane could have saved himself?”
Bergman:
“Only if he had asked a question instead of issuing a command.”
Kubrick:
“No. The structure of his mind doomed him.”
Wong Kar-wai:
“Maybe. If someone had stayed. If he’d let them.”
Kurosawa:
“If he’d built a bridge instead of a palace.”
Welles (smiles faintly):
“You each see him not just as a man, but as a myth of what happens when connection is lost. I wanted Kane’s last word to be ‘Rosebud’—not to explain him, but to hint at the one time he wasn’t alone.”
The screen flickers: young Kane, laughing in the snow.
Wong Kar-wai (whispers):
“That boy never left the snow, did he?”
Welles:
“No. He just built bigger walls around the memory. And in the end, all he heard was the echo.”
They all fall silent. The room feels full—not of people, but of everything they’ve lost and everything they’ve longed for.
Media Manipulation and the Making of Identity
Scene: The screening room has shifted in tone—brighter, more energetic. Clips from modern news broadcasts, social media feeds, and scenes from Citizen Kane blend on the screen. Orson Welles turns to the group with a knowing look.
Orson Welles (grinning):
“When we made Citizen Kane, mass media was still young—but already dangerous. Today, media doesn’t just shape public opinion. It builds entire personas. So I ask: Was Kane a man, or a brand? And what does that mean today?”
Steven Spielberg (measured, leaning forward):
“Kane was the original influencer. He didn’t just report the news—he manufactured it to build his legend. In a modern retelling, I’d make him a tech giant—someone who controls not newspapers, but platforms. His downfall wouldn’t come from scandal—but from losing control of the narrative he crafted.”
Quentin Tarantino (smirking):
“Oh man, I’d make him a 1980s cable TV tycoon with a cocaine habit and a killer wardrobe. Think Citizen Kane by way of Scarface. He’d create the most outrageous late-night empire, pushing boundaries, selling chaos, becoming a pop culture god. But the twist? He doesn’t even believe in what he’s selling. Just chasing shock value.”
Martin Scorsese (nodding):
“There’s something tragic in that. Kane sells the idea of truth, but he never believes it. That’s what I’d lean into. My version would be set in the post-Watergate era—Kane as a crusading journalist who becomes what he once fought. He starts by exposing lies, but ends up living one.”
Christopher Nolan (thoughtful):
“Kane’s identity isn’t just manipulated—it’s fragmented. I’d reframe the entire story through digital surveillance. Each version of Kane would be captured through data—emails, video feeds, online posts. But none of them would be him. It becomes a meditation on how identity is assembled through bits, not memory.”
Welles (raising an eyebrow):
“You’re all describing men who use media not just to shape the world—but to escape themselves. What are they hiding?”
Spielberg:
“Pain. Loneliness. That same orphaned boy who never found safety. My Kane builds an empire to never feel powerless again. But instead of warmth, he builds firewalls.”
Tarantino:
“Yeah, but I’d flip it. He enjoys the chaos. He’s hiding from boredom. My Kane loves spectacle. But deep down, he knows he’s empty—and he’s terrified of the quiet.”
Scorsese:
“He’s hiding from guilt. In trying to be someone the world will admire, he betrays everyone who actually loved him. My Kane would be haunted by those he stepped on to rise.”
Nolan:
“He’s hiding from the void. Kane’s greatest fear is that none of it means anything. That Rosebud wasn’t stolen—it never mattered. His media empire is a desperate attempt to prove that he exists.”
Welles (smiling grimly):
“Gentlemen, you’ve just described every man who’s ever run for power. And most who’ve held it.”
Spielberg (pointing to the screen):
“The question Citizen Kane still asks is—do we create identity, or do we lose it trying to shape how others see us?”
Tarantino:
“And today, people make that choice every time they post. Kane didn’t die—he’s just logged into TikTok.”
Scorsese (laughs, then turns serious):
“True. But here’s the kicker. In trying to control how others see us, we often lose sight of who we are. And that’s what killed Kane.”
Nolan:
“Or maybe there was never a ‘who’ to begin with. Just layers of performance.”
Welles (tapping the snow globe):
“You know, I once said that ‘Rosebud’ wasn’t about the sled. It was about what Kane lost before he learned how to lie. What if all the media, all the headlines, all the myth-making—was just noise drowning out the sound of his own childhood voice?”
The screen fades to black. Silence. Then, slowly, it lights up with Kane’s face—blurred, pixelated, distorted like a corrupted file.
Welles:
“So tell me—what would your Rosebud be?”
The directors say nothing. Because for all their genius, they too have built mirrors. And sometimes, it’s better not to look too closely.
Cinematic Language and Breaking Rules
Scene: The screening room is now a sacred space. A reel projector hums gently. On the screen: the low-angle shot of Kane towering over his campaign crowd, the smoky noir of Susan’s opera breakdown, the surreal montage of mirrored reflections. The directors sit in reverent silence. Orson Welles speaks first.
Orson Welles (smiling softly):
“They told me I couldn’t do it—deep focus, nonlinear timelines, ceilings in the frame, a camera moving like it shouldn’t. But I was too ignorant to follow the rules, so I broke them. I’d like to ask each of you: What rules did you break—and what new ones would you dare to shatter in a new Kane?”
Stanley Kubrick (calmly):
“I never saw rules—I saw tools. In 2001, I stripped away dialogue for minutes, then hours. I let space speak. In my Kane, the story would unfold not through words but through architecture. Each room would reveal a version of him. No flashbacks. Just space, silence, and form.”
Andrei Tarkovsky (quietly):
“I believe time is the essence of cinema. In Kane, time skips like memory. I’d go further. Long takes, no music. Let the camera drift like a soul remembering its own life. No explanation. No resolution. Just a man dissolving into the very house he built. He doesn’t die—he fades.”
Alfred Hitchcock (wry grin):
“You were a magician, Orson. You gave the audience just enough to guess, then pulled the rug out from under them. I did the same with Psycho. My Kane would be more psychological. I’d show him only through the objects he leaves behind. A gun, a torn photo, a broken watch. The audience would piece him together like a suspense puzzle. Citizen Noir.”
Wong Kar-wai (dreamily):
“I don’t follow rules—I follow feeling. In my films, time drips instead of ticks. In my Kane, the camera wouldn’t observe—it would float. Light would change mid-shot. Rain would fall indoors. We’d never see Kane directly—only his afterimage, left in the dust on a mirror or the corner of someone’s eye.”
Welles (delighted):
“I love this. Kane as a house. Kane as a ghost. Kane as a crime scene. Kane as perfume in the air. But tell me—how do you know when to break a rule? And how do you know when the audience will follow you?”
Kubrick:
“You don’t. You lead them into the unknown, and you build the map as they walk it. I made 2001 for the subconscious mind, not the conscious one. If a rule limits what the soul can feel—it should be discarded.”
Tarkovsky:
“Truth doesn’t come from clarity. It comes from depth. Let the viewer sink. Let them be lost. Only then can cinema become spiritual.”
Hitchcock:
“But sometimes you break the rules to control. You create disorientation, then deliver the illusion of safety—just before shattering it again. That’s suspense. You give them a pattern, then break it.”
Wong Kar-wai:
“I agree. But I also believe cinema is memory. Imperfect, tender, fragmented. You don’t guide the audience—you let them wander. My Kane would be a wandering soul, leaving trails of beauty behind, like footprints in wet neon.”
Welles (raising a brow):
“So no narrative? No structure?”
Kubrick:
“Only if the structure reflects the soul.”
Tarkovsky:
“Only if the structure breathes.”
Hitchcock:
“Only if the structure is a trap.”
Wong:
“Only if the structure disappears by the end.”
Welles (chuckling):
“You’re all rebels, every one of you. I see now that Kane was just the beginning. If we remake him, he’s no longer just a man with a sled—he’s an echo in the medium itself.”
The screen behind them shatters into split scenes: Kane whispering in black and white, then spinning in Tarkovsky’s water, then suspended mid-shot in a Kubrick corridor, then reflected in Hitchcock’s broken glass, then dissolving in Wong’s red curtain.
Welles (softly):
“I broke the rules to be heard. You break them to feel. To dream. To haunt. I think… that’s the future of cinema.”
As the directors rise, the light fades. All that remains is the projector, humming like memory. And somewhere far away, a boy is sledding. Again. Still. Always.
Final Epilogue by Orson Welles
(Scene: The room is nearly dark now. The final clip—Kane’s snow globe falling from his hand—has just ended. The projector hums softly. Smoke curls in the still air. The directors are gone. Orson Welles stands alone, speaking to the empty chairs, or perhaps to us.)
“So… we have spoken.
We’ve unraveled Kane from every angle—from his rise to ruin, his silences, his myth, and the echoes he left behind. We’ve seen him as a king, a ghost, a brand, a wound. Each of us found something different in him—because Citizen Kane was never just one man. He was all of us. Or rather, what becomes of us when we stop listening to the small voice inside.
That voice we heard as a child,
on a sled,
in the snow.
They called Kane the greatest film ever made. But it wasn’t meant to be perfect. It was meant to provoke. To ask questions. To remind us that greatness without intimacy is hollow. That wealth without memory is noise. That fame without truth is just another headline.
And here’s the truth I’ve come to understand, sitting with these giants:
You don’t measure a life by what it built.
You measure it by who we became while trying.
That’s what we do in cinema, too.
We don’t just light the screen.
We light the dark corners of the human heart.
So, to those who dare to film ambition, to shatter rules, to haunt memory, to whisper silence, to speak in shadows—
Keep going.
Because somewhere out there, a new Kane is waiting to be born.
And perhaps this time, he’ll get it right.
Goodnight, old friends.
Let the screen go black.”
(The projector shuts off. Silence. Then the soft sound of wind. A faint glimmer of snow.)
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