Meet John Doe + Citizen Kane

• Compare and contrast the depictions of newspapers, journalists, the masses (newspaper readers/voters/citizens), politicians and/or big business in Citizen Kane and Meet John Doe. Identify the common themes and differences in the ways the films portray these subjects and try to draw some conclusions about the directors’ visions of journalism and politics in the period of economic uncertainty and impending United States involvement in a world war.

The narratives of both Meet John Doe and Citizen Kane are propelled by the institutions of American civil life. The delineation of classes, the efficacy of governance, the reporters and editors of the daily papers, and the influence of business are themes present in each to varying degrees. The films find common ground on key issues of unknown and potentially nefarious intent, but differ in their judgement of the application of that private intent. Both also indirectly illustrate a same key point undermining their own suspicions. Between the two films, a portrait is painted of the changing relationship between the people and those institutions on the eve of war.

The “common man”, or the average everyday stereotypical middle-class American is a key player in both films. Both Doe and Kane present the common man as someone whose interests are not best represented by the people in power. It’s oddly notable that both films do so through the voice of the wealthier elites; Ann’s ghostwriting for John Doe on DB Norton’s dime, and we simply believe that Kane would be better than the figure his newspaper has indicted for corruption. Either way, it’s the approval of the common man that is necessary for both narratives to move forward. In Doe, John’s story comes to a halt when his convention of Does is broken up by Norton and his goons. It isn’t until months later, after it’s clear that John hasn’t lost that support after all, that his story begins progressing again. Charles Kane’s electoral defeat in Citizen Kane proved to be a defining moment in his life, presaging a slump in business and a self-imposed social exile, secluding himself in response to the loss of the common man’s validation.

The power of the common man is not simply metaphorical in these films, it is a force with a potential to be reckoned with. Meet John Doe and Citizen Kane in their own way each present the everyday American as a part of a vast untapped electoral power base. The readership of Charles Kane’s Inquirer is the foundation of his unassailable electoral support, the affront to their morality undid his ambitions for the governorship. Governance in Kane is a product of spoilage- the governor himself is a corrupt political boss with a finger on every electoral scale across the state. Doe spends much more time amongst the common man, and talks on a national stage. Doe’s common man is even more powerful than Kane’s, he can be found all across the nation. He is coveted by Democrats and Republicans alike, but he sees both as compromised and has voted for a civil life in which politicians are not allowed. Doe’s governance is a picture of excess- it’s bureaucrats are employed by the poverty of people, and both parties presume to function despite both clearly lacking any real support from the “real Americans” they are supposed to be representing.

Then as now, a bridge between people and government is the journalistic capacity of the media. Colloquially known as the fourth estate of government, it is the news media that allows the common man to hold his government accountable. Everyday Americans in both Doe and Kane get their news from the daily papers. It’s Kane’s Inquirer that exposes the corruption of Jim Gettys and Norton’s New Bulletin that gives voice to John Doe. The news media are a powerful force towards the informing of the common man; it is thus potentially a powerful force towards swaying him as well. Each film calls into question the actions happening behind the words we read or hear. We see John Doe’s psalms of communal redemption penned by his moneygrubbing crush and paid for by an American Mussolini, and Charles Kane angling for office under the cover of a “Declaration of Principles”.

Here the characterizations take the films in different directions. As Doe’s Bad Guy in waiting, DB Norton confers suspicion on the actions of his New Bulletin. We in the audience know the boss is up to something and he’s using the paper to do it; we don’t trust him and so we know to trust with caution anything his paper is printing on his behalf. Charles Foster Kane on the other hand is not a villain; he’s just a vaguely principled and somewhat tormented figure. His Inquirer is similarly sensational, but not necessarily villainous. In both films the news media is presented as compromised, only in Doe is that a bad thing.

This difference speaks to a subtle caveat to the films’ argument that the news media is a vehicle for flash and propaganda- sometimes it isn’t. Kane’s Inquirer and Norton’s Bulletin certainly make use of both, but each do so against the opposing Chronicles of their worlds. In neither film is the Chronicle being held up for examination as a servant of a single master. Doe’s Chronicle is doing the right thing by trying to expose the actual fraud underway at the New Bulletin, and Kane’s Chronicle has the journalistic integrity coveted by the Inquirer. Sometimes the news is the news.

Both Citizen Kane and Meet John Doe portray a period of challenge for the American voter. Politicians that in the real world sat above the hardships of the Great Depression, have become corrupt caricatures of leadership on the screen. Journalism in these films is not bound by meaningful ethics, reflective of the real-world tabloid inclinations of Randolph Hearst. The people in each are left wanting for leadership and community as their contemporaries in the audience were watching the rise of nationalism and fascism across Europe. Charles Kane’s onscreen declaration that there would be no war – well after hostilities had already begun – was an illustration of the folly in taking those voices of leadership seriously. The influence of journalism at this time is a key concern of directors Frank Capra and Orson Welles. The capacity for progress is there in both the Inquirer’s uncovering or corruption and the New Bulletin’s unifying messages from “John Doe”. But both films encourage vigilance by their audiences against those who would take advantage of them. Because no one expects a Spanish-American War.

Pols 335, Prof Frisch
June 9, 2019