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Citizen Kane Quotes (1941)
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Famous Citizen Kane Quotations
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Arguably the greatest of American films, Orson Welles's 1941 masterpiece, made when he was only 26, still unfurls like a dream and carries the viewer along the mysterious currents of time and memory to reach a mature (if ambiguous) conclusion: people are the sum of their contradictions, and can't be known easily. Welles plays newspaper magnate Charles Foster Kane, taken from his mother as a boy and made the ward of a rich industrialist. The result is that every well-meaning or tyrannical or self-destructive move he makes for the rest of his life appears in some way to be a reaction to that deeply wounding event. Written by Welles and Herman J. Mankiewicz, and photographed by Gregg Toland, the film is the sum of Welles's awesome ambitions as an artist in Hollywood. He pushes the limits of then-available technology to create a true magic show, a visual and aural feast that almost seems to be rising up from a viewer's subconsciousness. As Kane, Welles even ushers in the influence of Bertolt Brecht on film acting. This is truly a one-of-a-kind work, and in many ways is still the most modern of modern films from the 20th century. --Tom Keogh
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- Bernstein: A fellow will remember a lot of things you wouldn't think he'd remember. You take me. One day, back in 1896, I was crossing over to Jersey on the ferry, and as we pulled out, there was another ferry pulling in, and on it there was a girl waiting to get off. A white dress she had on. She was carrying a white parasol. I only saw her for one second. She didn't see me at all, but I'll bet a month hasn't gone by since that I haven't thought of that girl. »
- Bernstein: Harvard, Yale, Princeton, Cornell, Switzerland... he was thrown out of a lot of colleges. »
- Bernstein: Old age. It's the only disease, Mr. Thompson, that you don't look forward to being cured of. »
- Bernstein: President's niece, huh? Before Mr. Kane's through with her, she'll be a president's wife. »
- Bernstein: There's a lot of statues in Europe you haven't bought yet.
Charles Foster Kane: You can't blame me. They've been making statues for some two thousand years, and I've only been collecting for five. »
- Bernstein: We never lost as much as we made. »
- Charles Foster Kane III: Mother, is Pop governor yet?
Emily: Not yet, Junior. »
- Charles Foster Kane: A toast, Jedediah: to Love on my own terms. »
- Charles Foster Kane: Are we going to declare war on Spain, or are we not?
Jed Leland: The Inquirer already has.
Charles Foster Kane: You long-faced, overdressed anarchist.
Jed Leland: I am not overdressed.
Charles Foster Kane: You are too. Mr. Bernstein, look at his necktie. »
- Charles Foster Kane: As Charles Foster Kane who owns eighty-two thousand, six hundred and thirty-four shares of public transit - you see, I do have a general idea of my holdings - I sympathize with you. Charles Foster Kane is a scoundrel. His paper should be run out of town. A committee should be formed to boycott him. You may, if you can form such a committee, put me down for a contribution of one thousand dollars. »
- Charles Foster Kane: Don't believe everything you hear on the radio. »
- Charles Foster Kane: Don't worry about me Gettys. Don't worry about me. I'm Charles Foster Kane. I'm no cheap, crooked politician, trying to save himself from the consequences of his crimes.
Charles Foster Kane: Gettys. I'm going to send you to Sing Sing. Sing Sing Gettys. Sing Sing. »
- Charles Foster Kane: Hello Jedediah.
Leland: Hello, Charlie. I didn't know we were speaking...
Charles Foster Kane: Sure, we're speaking, Jedediah: you're fired. »
- Charles Foster Kane: How did I find business conditions in Europe? With great difficulty. »
- Charles Foster Kane: I always gagged on the silver spoon. »
- Charles Foster Kane: I don't think there's one word that can describe a mans life. »
- Charles Foster Kane: I run a couple of newspapers. What do you do? »
- Charles Foster Kane: Read the cable.
Bernstein: "Girls delightful in Cuba. Stop. Could send you prose poems about scenery, but don't feel right spending your money. Stop. There is no war in Cuba, signed Wheeler." Any answer?
Charles Foster Kane: Yes. "Dear Wheeler: you provide the prose poems. I'll provide the war." »
- Charles Foster Kane: Rosebud... »
- Charles Foster Kane: The news goes on for 24 hours a day. »
- Charles Foster Kane: This gentleman was saying...
Boss Jim Gettys: I am not a gentleman. I don't even know what a gentleman is. »
- Charles Foster Kane: We have no secrets from our readers. Mr. Thatcher is one of our most devoted readers, Mr. Bernstein. He knows what's wrong with every issue since I've taken charge. »
- Charles Foster Kane: You can't buy a bag of peanuts in this town without someone writing a song about you. »
- Charles Foster Kane: You know, Mr. Bernstein, if I hadn't been very rich, I might have been a really great man.
Thatcher: Don't you think you are?
Charles Foster Kane: I think I did pretty well under the circumstances.
Thatcher: What would you like to have been?
Charles Foster Kane: Everything you hate. »
- Charles Foster Kane: You're right, I did lose a million dollars last year. I expect to lose a million dollars this year. I expect to lose a million dollars *next* year. You know, Mr. Thatcher, at the rate of a million dollars a year, I'll have to close this place in... 60 years. »
- Emily: He happens to be the president, Charles, not you.
Charles Foster Kane: That's a mistake that will be corrected one of these days. »
- Emily: Really Charles, people will think-...
Charles Foster Kane: - -what I tell them to think. »
- Jedediah Leland: You still eating?
Charles Foster Kane: I'm still hungry. »
- Leland: Bernstein, am I a stuffed shirt? Am I a horse-faced hypocrite? Am I a New England school marm?
Bernstein: Yes. If you thought I'd answer you any differently than what Mr. Kane tells you... »
- Leland: That's all he ever wanted out of life... was love. That's the tragedy of Charles Foster Kane. You see, he just didn't have any to give. »
- Rawlson: It isn't enough to tell us what a man did. You've got to tell us who he was. »
- Susan: Forty-nine acres of nothing but scenery and statues. I'm lonesome. »
- Susan: Love! You don't love anybody! Me or anybody else! You want to be loved - that's all you want! I'm Charles Foster Kane. Whatever you want - just name it and it's yours! Only love me! Don't expect me to love you »
- Thatcher: You're too old to be calling me Mr. Thatcher, Charles.
Charles Foster Kane: You're too old to be called anything else. »
- Thompson: Everybody knows that story, Mr. Leland. But why did he do it? How could a man write a notice like that?
Leland: You just don't know Charlie. He thought that by finishing that notice he could show me he was an honest man. He was always trying to prove something. The whole thing about Susie being an opera singer, that was trying to prove something. You know what the headline was the day before the election, "Candidate Kane found in love nest with quote, singer, unquote." He was gonna take the quotes off the singer. »
- Thompson: He made an awful lot of money.
Bernstein: Well, it's no trick to make a lot of money... if what you want to do is make a lot of money. »
- Thompson: Mr. Kane was a man who got everything he wanted, and then lost it. Maybe Rosebud was something he couldn't get, or something he lost. Anyway, I don't think it would have explained everything. I don't think any word can explain a man's life. No, I guess Rosebud is just a piece in a jigsaw puzzle... a missing piece. »
- Walter Parks Thatcher: I think it would be fun to run a newspaper. »
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