Citizen Kane

"Rosebud..."

"The news goes on for 24 hours a day."

"If the headline is big enough, it makes the news big enough."

"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."

"It's my duty and — I'll let you in on a little secret — it's also my pleasure to see to it that decent, hard-working people in this community aren't robbed blind by a pack of money-mad pirates, just because they haven't had anybody to look after their interests."

"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."

"If I don't look after the interests of the underprivileged, maybe somebody else will. Maybe somebody without any money or property, and that would be too bad!"

"I always gagged on that silver spoon."

"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."

"I was on my way to the Western Manhattan Warehouse in search of my youth. You see, my mother died a long time ago and her things were put in storage out West. There wasn't any other place to put them. I thought I'd send for them now. Tonight, I was going to take a look at them. You know, a sort of sentimental journey."

"I run a couple of newspapers. What do you do?"

"[I entered this campaign] with one purpose only, to point out and make public the dishonesty, the downright villainy of Boss Jim W. Gettys' political machine, now in complete control of the government of this state. I made no campaign promises, because until a few weeks ago, I had no hope of being elected. Now however, I am something more than a hope. Jim Gettys, Jim Gettys has something less than a chance. Every straw vote, every independent poll shows that I'll be elected. Now I can afford to make some promises. The working man, the working man and the slum child know they can expect my best efforts in their interests. The nation's ordinary citizens know that I'll do everything in my power to protect the underprivileged, the underpaid, and the underfed."

"I don't think there's one word that can describe a man's life."

"A toast, Jedediah, to love on my terms. Those are the only terms anybody ever knows - his own."

"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! [louder] Gettys! I'm going to send you to Sing Sing! Sing Sing, Gettys! Sing Sing!"

"You can't buy a bag of peanuts in this town without someone writing a song about you."

"Harvard, Yale, Princeton, Cornell, Switzerland... he was thrown out of a lot of colleges."

"President's niece, huh? Before Mr. Kane's through with her, she'll be a president's wife."

"We never lost as much as we made."

"[to Jedediah Leland] Mr. Kane is finishing the review you started. He's writing a bad notice. I guess that'll show you."

"Old age. It's the only disease, Mr. Thompson, that you don't look forward to being cured of."

"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."

"I can remember everything. That's my curse, young man. It's the greatest curse that's ever been inflicted on the human race: memory."

"[referring to Kane's 'Declaration of Principles'] I'd like to keep that particular piece of paper myself. I have a hunch it might turn out to be something pretty important, a document, like the Declaration of Independence, and the Constitution, and my first report card at school."

"I suppose he had some private sort of greatness, but he kept it to himself. He never gave himself away. He never gave anything away, he just left you a tip, hmm? Ha. He had a generous mind. I don't suppose anybody ever had so many opinions. But he never believed in anything except Charlie Kane. He never had a conviction except Charlie Kane in his life. I suppose he died without one. It must have been pretty unpleasant. Of course, a lot of us check out without having any special convictions about death, but we do know what we believe in, we do believe in something."

"He married for love. Love. That's why he did everything. That's why he went into politics. It seems we weren't enough, he wanted all the voters to love him too. Guess all he really wanted out of life was love. That's Charlie's story, how he lost it. You see, he just didn't have any to give. Well, he loved Charlie Kane of course, very dearly, and his mother. I guess he always loved her."

"You know, when I was a young man there used to be an impression around that nurses were pretty. Well, it was no truer then than it is today."

"Legendary was Xanadu where Kubla Khan decreed his stately pleasure dome. Today, almost as legendary is Florida's Xanadu, world's largest private pleasure ground. Here, on the deserts of the Gulf Coast, a private mountain was commissioned and successfully built. One hundred thousand trees, twenty thousand tons of marble are the ingredients of Xanadu's mountain. Contents of Xanadu's palace: paintings, pictures, statues, the very stones of many another palace — a collection of everything so big it can never be catalogued or appraised, enough for ten museums — the loot of the world. Xanadu's livestock: the fowl of the air, the fish of the sea, the beast of the field and jungle. Two of each, the biggest private zoo since Noah. Like the pharaohs, Xanadu's landlord leaves many stones to mark his grave. Since the pyramids, Xanadu is the costliest monument a man has built to himself. Here in Xanadu last week, Xanadu's landlord was laid to rest: a potent figure of our century, America's Kubla Khan, Charles Foster Kane."

"Kane helped to change the world, but Kane's world now is history. The great yellow journalist himself lived to be history, outlived his power to make it."

"Alone in his never-finished, already decaying pleasure palace, aloof, seldom visited, never photographed, an emperor of new strength continued to direct his failing empire, varyingly attempted to sway as he once did the destinies of a nation that had ceased to listen to him, ceased to trust him. Then last week, as it must to all men, death came to Charles Foster Kane."

"Mr. Rawlston: It isn't enough to tell us what a man did. You've got to tell us who he was."

"Walter Parks Thatcher: Mr. Charles Foster Kane, in every essence of his social beliefs, and by the dangerous manner in which he has persistently attacked the American traditions of private property, initiative, and opportunity for advancement, is in fact, nothing more or less than a Communist!"

"Politician: The words of Charles Foster Kane are a menace to every working man in this land. He is today what he has always been, and always will be: a Fascist!"

"Susan Kane: [referring to Xanadu] Oh, a person could go crazy in this dump with nobody to talk to, nobody to have any fun with. Forty-nine thousand acres of nothing but scenery and statues. I'm lonesome."

"Raymond: [last lines] Throw that junk in!"

"It's Terrific!"

"Everybody's talking about it!"

"The classic story of power and the press."

"I hate him! I love him! He's a scoundrel! He's a saint! He's crazy! He's a genius!"

"Some called him a hero. Others called him a heel..."

"Orson Welles - Charles Foster Kane"

"Joseph Cotten - Jedediah Leland"

"Everett Sloane - Mr. Bernstein"

"Dorothy Comingore - Susan Alexander Kane"

"Agnes Moorehead - Mary Kane"

"Ruth Warrick - Emily Monroe Norton Kane"

"Ray Collins - James W. Gettys"

"William Alland - Jerry Thompson"

"Paul Stewart - Raymond"

"George Coulouris - Walter Parks Thatcher"