Just as with the visual effects, the sound effects in Citizen Kane are so rich and subtle that one could almost endlessly go on pointing out interesting examples. With every repeated screening of the film, one can discover more. It is a mark of Welles’s achievement that these effects are never merely clever gimmicks. They work both to amuse by their wit and to deepen the film’s psychological and thematic meanings. These meanings are never directly presented, but implied through a visual symbolism that encourages a level of audience participation in creating meaning that remains rare in a Hollywood film. Welles’s groundbreaking combination of realism and expressionism in the images and sounds of Citizen Kane more than justifies the critical approval with which it was first received and the high praise it receives to this day.
First Film (part 9)
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