And the Difference Is?

Finally saw Citizen Kane this week, and thought it wonderful. More (perhaps) on that at a later date. I'm still going through Roger Ebert's so-far wonderfully informative and illuminating commentary track and may indulge in Peter Bogdavonich's before I put the disc back in the mail. Anyway, I did want to mention one seeming bit of hypocrisy I noticed in watching the film. We've all heard the endless lamentations for the pre-digital era, and endless diatribes against all of the CG backgrounds utilized in today's films. And yet as Citizen Kane so ably demonstrates, the notion of filming real actors in front of fake (here, painted) backdrops is old, old, old. I mean, what makes the painted Xanadu any more "authentic" than the painted Naboo? Am I missing something deeper or is this just old-fashioned snobbery at work?

Until Whenever