Almost everybody in our group has viewed (or has at least heard about) "Citizen Kane". When you first get a glimpse at the movie you imagine it would be "usual", but you discover that even after ten minutes after it had begun you can't un-glue your eyes from it. And the question is (well, questions are) "WHY? What does this film has that makes it so fascinating?" and more: "Were you to write about the single thing that sets this movie apart from all the others, what would you write about?" And we finally got an answer: .
= the enigma of Rosebud=.
Let's start by explaining how this word (Rosebud) appears for the first time in the movie! A moribund, who you later identify with the media magnate Charles Foster Kane, utters this word as his last one. All the scenes from this point on are only flashbacks in Kane's life. Of course, the reporter assigned to the puzzle of Kane's dying word -Thompson- fails in his attempt to uncover the mystery. Its surface is very easy to comprehend, but its depths can't be understood without the help of the film critics. The one thing that the common viewer can interpret without reading any scholars' essays is the connection between the burning sled and the word, simply because the director shot the famous closeup with the sled's engraved name. You are led to think that the toy represents the innocent past, the sense of security from those paradisiacal years of childhood, just before being taken away from his almost reliable family. Why "almost"?, you might wonder. Well, because even though the boy's mother appears to be weeping for the son, yet packing his trunk a week in advance. So, not only does Kane have uncertain ideas about love, but you are left with a question hanging above your head: what did she do, and then-why? You can get a very intellectual approach from Laura Mulvey, who offers a psychoanalytic interpretation of this scene.
