You must give up alcohol or coffee. Which do you choose?
Post your answer in the LEAVE A COMMENT section below. I’m not the boss of you, though. Don’t write anything for all I care! Grab a coffee and a cocktail; do yourself a little experiment before answering.
. . .here are my thoughts.
You must give up alcohol or coffee. Which do you choose?
Many parallels run through Mank and Citizen Kane: black and white, short scenes, time jumps, acts of violent destruction near their ends, etc. My favorite analog, though, are the mysteries of Rosebud and the Organ Grinder’s Monkey. Rosebud is elucidated at the end of Citizen Kane, while the Organ Grinder’s Monkey parable in Mank comes after multiple mentions with no explanation. Both come off as rather anticlimactic. Gary Oldman—playing the titular character, Mank—was in his early 60s during filming. He didn’t wear much in the way of extensive make-up or facial prosthetics, so I believed his character to be of similar age. At one point, someone references Mank’s dismal health and advancing age. Mank retorts that he’s only 43. Because of his oft demonstrated quick-wit, I believed that to be yet another joke. However, at the end of the film it’s noted Mank died from complications of alcoholism about 12 years after that scene … at the age of 55. Mank may be less a film about the creation of Citizen Kane, and more a 2-hour PSA about the cosmetic damages of alcoholism. Caffeine for the win!