In the presence of greatness

I am wrenching my attention from the television screen for a few moments to report on a special occasion: BBC2, just reincarnated in HD, is celebrating the fact by showing two of the greatest movies ever made back to back: Citizen Kane and The Magnificent Ambersons.

Watching Kane again, after a gap of many years, is like standing in front of a Michelangelo: one is almost struck dumb by its immense stature: the light and shade (down in large part to the brilliant cinematography of Greg Tolland), the pace, the writing, but above all Welles's huge mind standing behind and in front of it all. It also launches me back nearly forty years to when I first saw it at my university film club on a scratchy print with a defective soundtrack, neither of which detracted in the slightest from its extraordinary and unprecedented impact.

Welles never realised fully the potential expected following two such amazing early offerings, but in a way, how could he? How can you improve on perfection? It's like the promising young batsman, playing for his country for the first time at Lords and scoring 100 not out on the first day of an Ashes Test. Where can he go from there?

Where could Welles go? He shone in The Third Man, he won great praise in Chimes at Midnight, and his role in Touch of Evil transformed that film into a minor masterpiece. But truly, Welles could have retired comfortably after the wrap party for Ambersons and left it at that. His place in history would have been assured, like Thomas Chatterton, who wrote a handful of deathless poems aged seventeen then killed himself when he was still a teenager.

If you haven't seen both of these films yet, don't get any older before you do. You won't regret it, I promise.