Fascinating movie. There are flashes of brilliance, as you'd expect, and it feels like the bones of something really magnificent are there. Then at the same time there are so many bizarre elements that don't work that it feels like a failure, if only compared to what I imagine it could have been without studio interference. Plot elements don't add up, multiple characters make some truly incomprehensible accent and line reading choices, and the courtroom scene is supremely baffling.

But I actually felt like Welles himself was the biggest missing piece: Welles as an actor and a person is just too intelligent, too knowing, to play a character so hapless and foolish. One reason Kane worked was because Welles has the aura of someone who is perpetually the smartest person in the room--Michael O'Hara, as he repeatedly tells us, is definitely not. And unfortunately, Welles' acting ability isn't able to transcend the persona.