Release Year: 1941

Genre: Drama, Mystery

Director: Orson Welles

Writer: Orson Welles, Herman J. Mankiewicz

Stars: Joseph Cotten, Dorothy Comingore, Orson Welles

It's fair to say that sometimes (or maybe even most of the time, for the pessimists out there), life doesn't work out the way we think it will. This is definitely the case for Charles Foster Kane, the title character from Orson Welles' super-famous, super-revered, and super-classic film, Citizen Kane.

Charles enters adulthood as an idealistic guy who wants to take on the rich and greedy and change the world forever. The only problem is that he's more interested in making people love him than he is in his principles. Over time, his pride totally corrupts him until you can't even recognize the young visionary he used to be. Then on his deathbed, he whispers the word "rosebud" and everyone around him looks at each other and says, "What? What does that mean?!" And—bam!—we have a central mystery that Orson Welles can build his movie around.

Released in 1941, Citizen Kane was an immediate success with critics, but not with the American public. Maybe it's because the movie openly criticized the pursuit of money and power… which wasn't a popular opinion just as the U.S. was dragging itself out of the Great Depression.

Or maybe it's because the character of Charles Foster Kane was a little too similar to the media mogul William Randolph Hearst, who (a) built a giant castle mansion to isolate himself from society in his older years and (b) banned all mention of the film from his many newspapers. (Check out this article for the full story. It's kinda of a big deal.)

Or maybe, it was because this film is insanely innovative and people had to warm up to all of Welles' new techniques before they could appreciate how awesome they were.

Despite Kane's lukewarm success when it first came out, the film went through a revival in 1956 and has never looked back since. In fact, most American film critics consider the movie to be the best film ever made, and it currently sits at the #1 spot in the American Film Institute's Best Films List.

Not bad for a movie made by a twenty-five-year-old dude named Orson Welles who had almost no filmmaking experience and who decided to write, direct, and star in this movie. And let's not forget to give kudos to RKO pictures for giving some young guy total creative control over his movie. They might not have known it in 1941, but their gamble would change film history.

Forever.

You should watch Citizen Kane because most critics call it the best film ever made. Ever. End of conversation.

Ha.

As if you would trust a bunch of film nerds (who probably eat way too much movie theater popcorn) to tell you why should see Citizen Kane.

Instead, listen to us (a bunch of film nerds who definitely eat way too much movie theater popcorn). You should watch Citizen Kane because…it's quite possibly the best movie ever made.

Don't get us wrong. We love all sorts of movies, from Mad Max: Fury Road to Pitch Perfect 2, from Oscar winners to Nic Cage-fueled ridiculousness. But there's something about Citizen Kane that is so huge in scope, so genius about its encapsulation of the weirdness of the American dream, so poignant in its characterization, so beautiful in its camera angles, so deftly written…

Should we go one?

Old? Yeah. Slow? Absolutely. But it makes you think about some deep and troubling issues. 

• Like how much of our ambition is fueled by pride. 
• Or how we as humans fail to love. 
• Or whether class distinctions can ever be erased. 
• Or whether any of us can really live a fulfilling life.

Listen, no one said it was an upper.

You may end your viewing of Citizen Kane a tad troubled. Maybe you'll have a bit of an existential crisis. But hey—you will have watched one of the movies that people routinely herald as the best. 

And that's definitely one to cross off the bucket list.