From Wikipedia

Battle Over Citizen Kane

Citizen Kane is a 1941 American drama film, directed by and starring Orson Welles. The film is often considered the greatest of all time and is particularly praised for its innovative cinematography, music and narrative structure. Citizen Kane was Welles' first feature film. The film was nominated for Academy Awards in nine categories; it won an Academy Award for Best Writing (Original Screenplay) by Herman Mankiewicz and Welles.

Hearing about the film enraged Hearst so much that he banned any advertising, reviewing or mentioning of it in his papers, and had his journalists slander Welles. Following lobbying from Hearst, the head of Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer, Louis B Mayer, acting on behalf of the whole film industry, made an offer to RKO Pictures of 5,000 to destroy all prints of the film and burn the negative. Welles used Hearst's opposition to Citizen Kane as a pretext for previewing the movie in several opinion-making screenings in Los Angeles, lobbying for its artistic worth against the hostile campaign that Hearst was waging.

When George Schaefer of RKO rejected Hearst's offer to suppress the film, Hearst banned every newspaper and station in his media conglomerate from reviewing — or even mentioning — the movie. He also had many movie theaters ban it, and many did not show it through fear of being socially exposed by his massive newspaper empire. The documentary The Battle Over Citizen Kane lays the blame for Citizen Kane's relative failure squarely at the feet of Hearst. Even though it did decent business at the box office and went on to be the sixth highest grossing film in its year of release, this fell short of its creators' expectations, but was still acceptable to its backers. In The Chief: The Life of William Randolph Hearst, David Nasaw points out that Hearst's actions were not the only reason Kane failed, however: the innovations Welles made with narrative, as well as the dark message at the heart of the film (that the pursuit of success is ultimately futile) meant that a popular audience could not appreciate its merits.