The Orson Welles films Citizen Kane and The Lady from Shanghai each pivot on a central pair of lovers. Despite the differences between the films, each set of main characters shares a set of characteristics. The two pairs of lovers (Susan Alexander and Charles Foster Kane in Citizen Kane, and Elsa Bannister and Michael O'Hara in The Lady from Shanghai) contain a powerful person and a less powerful person; thus, the dynamics of power, desire, love, ambition, and evil form similar patterns in each couple. Although, at first glance, these people seem different, not only in terms of gender, but also in life position and temperament, the underlying motivations and the results of these motivations are very similar. Say no to plagiarism. Get a tailor-made essay on “Why Violent Video Games Should Not Be Banned”?Get the original essayOrson Welles explores the idea of ​​power and manipulation in sexual relationships in each film. Berg and Eskine, in their article on Kane, explain that "Thematically, Welles was always interested in power, love - and failure. Contrary to the conventions of the Hollywood success story with its happy ending... Welles was determined to make a 'failure story.'" (Berg and Eskine, 54). This kind of failure not only of love, but also of ambition, is a theme in both Kane and Lady. Too much power on one side of a relationship ruins any chance of success, Welles seems to be saying. This exploration of power and love, and their impact on relationships and ambition, drives the stories of both films. In both films, the more powerful lover is the “point” of a love triangle. In Citizen Kane, Charles Kane is unhappily married to a politically and socially advantageous woman. Emily Kane, we were led to believe, may not have been Charles' true love, but rather a charming upper-class political asset. The scene at the beginning of the breakfast table sequence leads us to believe that there may have been youthful affection between the couple, but that the relationship deteriorated into a marriage only in form. Charles remains married to Emily for the sake of his son and his political career. Not only would divorcing a woman ruin his political chances (in this regard, Emily has "something on" Charles), but Emily has powerful connections that could scuttle Charles' career. The bond of marriage, for the powerful character of Kane, is therefore power and not love. Similarly, in The Lady from Shanghai, the Bannister marriage is based on power and domination rather than love. Elsa is the character with power, having both money and control over others through her deviousness; she doesn't love Arthur, her husband. As Michael asks her: “What does your husband have on you?” The question was never answered, but from the context of the film it is obvious that Bannister knows of his sordid past in the Far East, is holding his gambling debts, or has some other means of keep her married to him. This is a more overt example of the kind of hostage marriage Charles has with Emily. Both Charles and Elsa are in marriages they can't break, which not only provides the tension needed for an effective love triangle, but also a plot point showing another example of the helplessness of lesser characters. powerful, Susan and Michael. Susan Alexander is the most extreme case of the powerless character. Young and naive, she comes across Charles by chance. After initially welcoming him into her room at the boarding house, she does not pursue him, but instead allows the advances ofCharles. When confronted with her status not only as a married man but also as a political opportunist to whom she represents a dangerous danger, she has a hysterical and self-protective reaction. It’s clear that she cares about Charles; indeed, Kane was “attracted to her because, unaware of his fabulous wealth and power, she loved him for himself” (Berg and Eskine 53). She is completely unaware that she holds the power not only to break up a high-profile marriage, but also to jeopardize a political and business career. Her power is entirely accidental and not wielded directly by her, but rather by the people around her. Charles's marriage is broken not by her, but by the sensationalist media and the accidental deaths of Emily and Charles Jr. Susan is awarded to Charles almost as a consolation prize, with the two's marriage being the only option , after Emily's death. , in an attempt to repair Charles' broken public image. The relationship between them is never equal. Susan even said, the first night they met: "I'm terribly ignorant, but I suppose you know that." Thus, it is not only her relative innocence that renders her powerless, but also her own admission of intellectual inferiority. Michael O'Hara's helplessness and ignorance are better disguised than Susan's, in part because he is a male character. Naremore calls him a “native wanderer” (126), but it is apparent from the first scenes that he has a masculine, even brutal, innocence. He saves Elsa from several thugs with his fists; as Goldfish says of him in the sailors' room "Mike has a lot of shit, but he knows how to hurt a man when he wants to." This is a bit of a red herring thrown at the audience, who are perhaps beginning to think that Michael will prove to be a man strong enough to get out of the mess he has already warned us about. But there is a double message; like Susan Alexander, he admits to us at the beginning of the film, and several times thereafter: “I am an imbecile”. On the surface, Michael appears physically larger and more powerful than all the other men (Grisby, disabled Arthur Bannister, Goldfish, Broome), and he certainly pulls his weight. But basically he is an admired and pampered child - coveted for various reasons by the other characters but who does not initiate or control any actions himself. For Elsa, he is sexual entertainment and a tool in the complicated double betrayal she has concocted to get rid of both Grisby and Arthur. Arthur uses him as entertainment for his wife (a surrogate child, perhaps, or at least a man whom his wife admires and whom, through his employment, he is able to control - and Arthur is therefore able to control his wife by extension) and also as part of his plan to trap his wife and prevent the divorce of their marriage. Grisby is using Michael as part of the scheme with Elsa and also, it seems, for his own deranged amusement. All use Michael as a legal scapegoat and foil for their varying levels of distrust and dysfunction. It's as if they feed off his youth, his strength, his honesty and his innocence. In Citizen Kane, Charles' manipulation and control of Susan's life and career shows his high status. Charles takes his little singing ability and uses it as a new ambition for himself. “Emerging from his journalism, Kane's politics were both progressive and domineering, as if each of the tasks in his life triggered a mechanism that undermined the full acceptance of his being – by himself or by others. The destructive nature of his quest to manage the public - via the opera career of his second wife, Susan - calcified Kane's character andworked to isolate him from everything that made him alive" (Castle, http://www.brightlightsfilm.com/45/kane.htm). "We're going to become a big opera star," Charles said on the day of his marriage to Susan, rather than "she's going to be a big opera star." Susan's talent is just a product for Charles's use. Elsa's control over Michael, but Elsa's control is no less effective Throughout the film, Michael does what Elsa wants, or what he thinks Elsa wants. He seems to lose all form. of control over himself, in action or in morality He collapses psychologically "while his last illusions are suppressed"; his moral center, weakened, cannot "maintain"; "authority or power that he once had" (Castle, http://www.brightlightsfilm.com/45/fake.htm He is also Elsa's slave by his own desire. embarked on the Panama Canal cruise without his desire for Elsa, and through this personal weakness she controls him in every other way. The only thing that could have convinced him to follow Grisby's fantastic plan was the desire for money to provide for Elsa, rather than any greed for himself. Likewise, Susan's inability to resist Charles' manipulation and her lack of confidence in her own worth. and her intelligence, make Susan a pawn of Charles for much of the film. She never had ambitions to become an opera star and even mocks her mother for assuming she should. She compromises morality the first time she meets Charles by inviting a stranger into her room. She doesn't seem to have any will of her own when it comes to Charles - until, of course, until the end. Susan and Michael's status as outsiders in Charles and Elsa's worlds also strike a similar note in the stories. Susan is a complete stranger to the high society world of Charles, Emily and Jed Leland. Not only is his social status and educational level different, but the very sound of his voice proclaims his strangeness. Susan speaks with what sounds like a cross between a Brooklyn accent and a South Chicago accent, in stark contrast to Jedidiah's distinguished, slightly southern voice, Emily's beautiful and completely correct diction, and the measured tones and urban areas of Charles. Likewise, Michael appears as a complete outsider in the world of Arthur, Grisby, and Elsa. He's completely different socially and, quite literally, comes from a foreign country, his Irish accent separating him from Elsa (who, inexplicably, was raised in China by Russian parents and somehow acquired an American accent), Arthur and Grisby. Michael starts out as an outsider and is drawn to the machinations of Arthur and Elsa, but he never becomes part of the group. During the picnic scene, Grisby, Arthur and Elsa trade insults on their beach chairs, and when Michael is called to join them, he lectures them with his parable of the sharks. Michael, although employed by the Bannisters, makes it clear that he is not part of their group. He never sits with them (except when he gets Arthur drunk at the sailor's bar), nor joins in their conversation other than being questioned by them. Even at the end of the film, as Michael watches Elsa die, “Michael is in frame, but blurred in the background, emphasizing his outsider status” (Berg and Erskine 206). Susan, likewise, in the scene in her boarding house when Gettys and Emily confront Charlie, is an outsider of the lesser kind. During this scene, Gettys, Emily, and Charles talk to each other, but never direct their remarks to Susan. Even when Susan screams and runs towards them saying“But what about me?” his concerns are never answered. Generally, Gettys, Charles, and Emily are depicted in shadow in this piece, while Susan remains in the light most of the time. It's as if she is the only enlightened person because she is unaware of the dark world of compromises and agreements that the Gettys, Charles, and Emily inhabit. She understands little of the conversation, and even less of her role in it. Later, in Xanadu, she is almost always shown alone. She sits for hours fruitlessly searching for puzzles, and is never shown with her guests or even enjoying the comfort of a friend. In his scenes with Charles, he either listens to him ramble or gives him lectures or decisions as if from above. Susan may live in Xanadu and be named after Charles, but she never became part of his world or even really part of the house. And in the end, of course, she leaves that house and leaves Charles alone in his own world. The seemingly magical aura given off by Charles and Elsa is further proof of their great power status. Charles built a castle "like a wizard's house" (Naremore 55) and possessed "fantastic wealth." Charles Foster Kane is not treated like any other human being when he dies, but must be investigated by Thompson and the "News on the March" team. His enigmatic status makes him special and somehow other than human. He builds a house, Xanadu, modeled on a fantasy taken from a poem by Coleridge. His stature, both physical and figurative, sets him apart from all the other actors in the film. From the beginning, when he is different from the other boys not only by his wealth but also by the fact that he was sent away from his parents to be educated, he is somehow special and different from the rest of the world. Elsa, too, is described as semi-magical: "In The Lady from Shanghai, [Elsa] sings the siren song of gold, or compromise...and Welles's romantic fool follows" (Haskell, 204 ). Not only does the reference to her status as Circe, the mythical enchantress who transformed men into pigs, or at the very least as Mermaid, a nymph who lured men to death, distinguishes her as quasi-magical. When everyone is sweating in the tropical heat, Elsa always stays fresh and well-groomed. While the rest of the characters worry, rant and rave, Elsa always remains calm. When Elsa sings, Michael can't help but be drawn to her, as if in a trance. In contrast, Susan and Michael are both completely human and down-to-earth. On the contrary, they are artistic failures. Michael claims to be a novelist, but earns his living as a sailor. Susan, less ambitious and arguably even less talented, has a slight talent for singing that she had no intention of using as a career. Again, these characters emphasize that they are "a jerk", "just a girl", or "a dope", and are easily led and fooled by the powerful characters - whether because of the powerful character's unfulfilled ambitions or a devious plot. Michael sweats it out with Arthur and Grisby, and Susan ends up a penniless alcoholic. Thus, human flaws and weaknesses are largely represented in Susan and Michael. By analyzing the meeting scenes between Elsa and Michael, and between Susan and Charles, this high power/low power pattern is further revealed. Michael pursues Elsa, whom he admires as she rides a carriage through the park, in a manner more pleading than dominating. He said to her, after offering her a cigarette: "I'm the last one, don't disappoint me." Even though he “saves” her from the attackers in the park, it’s clear that she’s been in power all along. She has agun in her purse and, rather than using it on her attackers, leaves it in the purse for Michael to find. Although she strokes his male ego enough to make it seem as if he is saving her in the gender-specific manner required by romantic conventions, there is no doubt that the person in power is Elsa. Also, Michael doesn't know Elsa's last name or name. her high status as Mrs. Bannister until he left her. He learns from the men in the garage that she is the wife of "the greatest criminal lawyer in the world." A similar scenario plays out between Susan and Charles. Once again, the couple finds themselves on the street, but with another twist of power involving making Susan laugh at the mud-splattered Charles. In a slightly suggestive moment, she offers him some hot water and takes him to her room. The power, as in the case of Michael in the meeting scene with Elsa, seems to be on Susan's side, but the situation quickly reverses. Charles is certainly not as devious as Elsa, but, just as Elsa took advantage of a chance encounter and acquired a human being, so does Charles. Charles takes a liking to Susan, and she to him, and (as noted above) like Elsa's Michael, Susan does not yet know how powerful Charles is. It appears to be a meeting of equals, but as soon as knowledge of Susan and Charles' relationship becomes public, Charles is in complete control of Susan's life. She could have escaped Charles's sphere of influence, just like Michael, but both Susan and Michael remain under the influence of their powerful lovers. This leads, of course, to their near ruin. The parallel with drug suicide attempts is more than a coincidence for Michael and Susan. Michael grabs Arthur's pills, desperate at the thought of the coming verdict against him, driven not only by the horrible mess he finds himself in, but also by Elsa's tacit suggestion. Susan is driven to overdose on sleeping pills because Charles won't stop pushing her to become his "big opera star." It is their involvement in the plots of the high-powered lovers that push these low-powered characters to the point of self-destruction. It is also significant that the method of suicide is a passive rather than an active method. These low-status characters are not trying to shoot themselves or throw themselves off a bridge - they are using the "cowardly" method of poison and, in fact, sleeping pills to end their lives in the manner as painless as possible. In both cases, they fail. The high-powered characters in these films not only control the actions and emotions of their low-powered lovers, but also appear to have almost the power of life and death over them. Cinematically, the duality of power-power-power is shown. obviously in both films. When Elsa and Michael first meet, she is, although smaller than him, depicted above him in the carriage. Charles' obvious height and volume advantage over Susan provides a built-in visual indicator of power, but Charles' lighting also shows his power. In the scenes following their wedding, Charles (mostly depicted above her, standing while she sits on the floor, such as in the hotel room or at the picnic, or at a table in the scene of the puzzle) is often depicted in the dark, while Susan is harshly lit. The darkness shows Charles' ability to hide his feelings, as Susan is never able to do, and the power of being able to see Susan clearly when she cannot see him. In The Lady from Shanghai, whenever Elsa can be elevated above Michael, she is,, 1992.