We have seen two films, His Girl Friday and Citizen Kane, in which the protagonists work in the newspapers business (Walter Burns is an editor, Hildy Johnson a reporter, Charles Foster Kane a publisher). What do these films tell us about the job of a reporter or publisher in the 1940's? What is the role or status of the newspaper at that time? How have things changed since that time?
The role of a worker at a newspaper business, portrayed by Citizen Kane and His Girl Friday, is a demanding, fast-paced, and addicting job, making for loud and manipulative characters. In His Girl Friday, Hildy is so attached to her career at the newspaper business and her ex-husband's boss that she leaves her fiance for a life of newspaper writing. A similar decision can be seen in Citizen Kane when Charles Foster Kane’s relationship is torn apart by his late hours at the newspaper and his desire to be at work rather than with his first wife. In a breakfast montage, Kane’s wife grows impatient and distant due to his obsession with the newspaper and manipulating the public. She is specifically appalled when Kane becomes so self-obsessed with his job that he exclaims, “The people will believe what I tell them to believe!” A character quite similar to Kane in His Girl Friday is Walter Burns, a head executive at a New York City newspaper. His personality is quite cunning and manipulative, which serves him well in the newspaper business and allows him to fit the newspaper work archetype of 1940s cinema quite well. This is specifically evident when he gives his ex-wife’s fiance fake money so that he is put in jail for counterfeit currency, and he can spend time with his ex-wife while she writes his story. Despite this not directly relating to working at a newspaper business, it seems that most of the men at the newspaper in His Girl Friday and Charles Foster Kane think in similar ways. The fast-paced newspaper business of 1940s cinema seems to foster main characters with quite loud and manipulative personalities.
ReplyDeleteBoth Citizen Kane and His Girl Friday illustrate the priorities of a worker in the newspaper. In His Girl Friday, Hildy had a set time to leave town for her wedding. Throughout the movie, Hildy pushes back this time in a desperate attempt to report a story that will improve her career. In the end, she ends up getting the story, and even after she finds true love at the end of the story, she still seems more excited to report the story than to marry her true love. Similarly, in Citizen Kane, Charles Foster Kane, the head of a newspaper, consistently prioritizes his work over his wife. In the famous breakfast table montage, Kane and his wife seem to start with a good relationship, but as time passes, his wife becomes increasingly upset about how much time Kane spends at work instead of with her. They eventually grow farther apart, both spatially and emotionally, and the newspaper creates a barrier between them. It even gets to the point where both aren't speaking but are reading the newspaper instead. In both examples, the high demand of the newspaper industry took priority over a spouse, demonstrating the stakes to which workers hold their jobs. Despite the newspaper industry dying out, we still see increasing examples of this in other industries including professional sports, Hollywood, and others. With more and more examples of skewed priorities, it is time to question which path we are willing to take regarding our priorities professionally and socially.
ReplyDeleteIn both of the movies His Girl Friday and Citizen Kane, newspapers are used as a medium in which the people controlling the paper could directly and deliberately influence public opinion to spread their views or further their own goals. The journalists in His Girl Friday are engaged in a campaign to stop the reelection of the mayor by stopping the execution of Earl Williams. While their goal in this one specific situation was noble — saving innocent life — their behavior while reporting that they do not hesitate to lie and manipulate the narrative in order to gain the public's attention and push their views. Every time there was a development, each of the reporters would report back to their respective papers with a different exaggeration or misrepresentation all in the interest of convincing the public of the narrative they were trying to push. In Citizen Kane when Charles Foster Kane first takes over the Inquirer, he publishes his Declaration of Principles on the front page stating that he wants to "provide the people of this city with a daily paper that will tell all the news honestly" and a "fighting and tireless
ReplyDeletechampion of their rights as citizens and as human beings." Despite presenting himself as a selfless defender of the people, Kane manipulates public opinion to further his own goals and seeks worship from the public he claims to want to support. One of the biggest ways that Kane managed to garner popularity for himself was by engaging in yellow journalism and manipulating public perception of the Spanish American War. We see Kane's true motivations and the departure from his stated principles over the sequence of events between him losing the election and the firing of Jedediah Leland. Leland accused Kane of not believing he owned "the people" and wanted admiration from them. After firing Leland some time after a negative review of his wife's show, Leland sent Kane the original paper where he wrote out his principles calling Kane out on his dishonesty and desire for power. Kane rips up the paper showing his rejection of his principles and desire to maintain the power that he had gained through the paper.
In the most recent movies we have watched in class, the protagonist or protagonists are associated with newspapers. For example, in His Girl Friday, Walter Burns is an editor and Hildy Johnson is a reporter. In Citizen Kane Charles Foster Kane is a publisher of a newspaper. Both of these movies being created in the 1940s tells us that newspaper jobs were highly respected in that time. Considering that people in the 1940s did not have access to the modern devices and technology that we use to read or watch the news, they had to rely on newspapers. This is why we see our protagonists of the time working in that industry. Protagonists are usually individuals who are portrayed as heroic, charming, influential, and important, and newspaper employees were respected due to not very many other news sources around at the time, so what better occupation for a protagonist in movies made in the 1940s is a job in the newspaper industry. Since then, things have changed. Technology has advanced to no longer require the newspaper. Although there are still some newspapers around, they are very heavily overshadowed by televisions and cell phones. This is very interesting because other characters from that time period were employed at newspaper businesses. Clark Kent from Superman works at the Daily Planet newspaper journal in Metropolis, and Peter Parker from Spiderman works at the Daily Bugle. Overall we can tell that the protagonists in movies in the 1940s were members of the newspaper industry because at the time they were very influential and powerful.
ReplyDeleteIn the films 'His Girl Friday' and 'Citizen Kane,' the portrayal of protagonists working in the newspaper industry during the 1940s illuminates the high-paced nature of the profession, showcasing the relentless pursuit of stories, the pressure to meet deadlines, and the complex interplay between journalistic integrity and personal ambition. Throughout both films, the fast-paced environment is shown in every aspect of the film. First, throughout the actual action of the film. In ‘His Girl Friday’, there are many scenes where the news reporters are running around trying to all get a different or better story than each other. They all call in different stories in the newsroom, and they are all speaking very fast which adds to the fast-paced action of the newsroom. Similar scenes are in ‘Citizen Kane’ as they try to make deadlines. Which brings the best point. The pressure of making deadlines is shown in both films. Back in the day, the film industry was extremely competitive which shows the need to meet deadlines and the fast-paced environment within the industry. Lastly, Both films show how the newspaper industry affected the news reporter's relationships and personal lives. In ‘His Girl Friday’ Hildy’s ex-husband is shown to want to keep her in the newspaper industry as she is ‘one of the best’. And as Hildy wants to move away with her partner to settle down she's faced with the constant need to keep reporting which overall keeps her with her ex-husband and as a newspaper reporter. It is shown that this reporting business is like a drug to reporters because they can't keep away and they feel obligated to report when there is a story around them no matter if they're still in the business. This effect on the news reporter's personal life is also shown through the film ‘Citizen Kane’ As the main character kept pressuring his wife into being an opera singer because of the news articles written about her. It is also shown that the newspaper business threatened their relationship because of the stress and overall ended up breaking it apart. These scenes and the films show how the newspaper industry in the 1940s was a high-paced profession that made reporters strive to meet deadlines and overall affect their personal romantic and social lives.
ReplyDeleteThrough the films “Citizen Kane” and “His girl Friday”, we see that people who worked in the newspaper business at the time were powerful and important people who had heavy impacts on society, but now people who work in the newspaper business have far less power and influence. In both films, newspapers are the main focal point. Hildy is a successful newspaperwoman who, at the beginning of the movie, wants nothing to do with Walter, the head newspaperman. She talks about how she will live a simple life with Bruce, yet her love for the newspaper slowly draws her back into love with Walter. He gets her to start researching and writing stories and getting excited about the job, and at the very end, he says something similar to ‘Stay and work on the newspaper and we will chage the world, our story will shape our future and only we can do that’. These gestures and events in the movie show that the newspaper companies are very influential. That newspaper company does have a direct effect on getting rid of corrupt politicians and capturing the escaped convict, showing that influencing people with words is not the only thing they do. Then, in “Citizen Kane,” Charles Foster Kane has become one of the most famous and successful people in the country. What does he do? Run newspapers. His newspaper got so influential it almost got him elected to office if it weren’t for his unloyal tendencies. Then, when his wife goes on tour, although she is not a very talented singer, every single newspaper review is positive, which makes the public think she is great. This is because Kane runs all of the newspapers, giving him direct power to control how many people think and whether or not they go to her shows. At the end of the film, he is so important and powerful that people want to learn everything about him, and he is incredibly rich. He was a newspaperman, but his impact was very obviously felt. Today, newspapers do not have nearly as much impact or power. With the rise of social media, every person with something to say and access to the internet thinks that they have the latest news, and oftentimes, people believe them. Everyone gets their news from different people, papers, and organizations, and one of the most influential newspapers still around, the New York Times, is largely so popular because of the games they have created and are selling. So, in conclusion, although newspapers and people who worked in the newspaper business in the twentieth century were of high status and very powerful, today, limitless amounts of people can report on the news, often times the news is untrue, and the abundance of news has made newspaper companies significantly less influential and powerful in society.
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