Casablanca

Everybody comes to Rick’s, and everybody comes to Casablanca. As poignant, universal and influential as art has always been and will always be, few movies are more poetically tied to the meaning of ‘classic’ as Casablanca. As I think of this possibility and round up the usual suspects, none makes the cut. Its production is history, its performances are pop culture icons and its screenplay is legend. 71 years after its rushed release, it doesn’t stop surprising moviegoers and remains as one of the finest examples of American and Hollywood cinema.

Casablanca, named after the Moroccan city, tells the story of Rick Blaine (Humphrey Bogart, in a few romantic roles), the owner of a highly regarded saloon who hides his past and his personal motifs as parts of his code, that is until he meets the famous Resistance leader Victor Laszlo, accompanied by his wife Ilsa Lund (Ingrid Bergman) in search of a way to escape to America. Casablanca, made in 1943, exhales patriotism, romance and Hollywood’s unmistakable style almost with excess, but Bogart, Bergman and Rains carry the story on with such grace and intelligence it’s impossible not to love it.

There are other notorious performances both for their quality and for reminding us of other films: we see Peter Lorre (the iconic villain in Fritz Lang’s M) once again playing next to Bogart, as he did in The Maltese Falcon; Claude Rains and Ingrid Bergman in major roles both here and in Notorious; John Qualen, one of John Ford’s favorites, once again running away from the authorities; Conrad Veidt, the man inside The Cabinet of Dr. Caligari; Marcel Dalio, a Renoir favorite; and several actors that would play against Bogart in To Have and Have Not in important roles. Everyone who has a major role, from top to bottom, is a perfect choice for the role; this allows the movie to swing from the major story to the countless subplots without harming the film’s smooth continuity.

The indisputable charm of Casablanca is in its script: based on the play Everybody Comes to Rick’s, it was a risky adaptation that became a model for screenplays all around America and the world. It’s is now considered by the Writers Guild of America the best screenplay ever written, and Casablanca itself is always near the top of the rankings and lists best films of all time (notably AFI and Sight and Sound).That, however, would bea surprise to Jack Warner and the whole production; it was supposed to be just another A-list average picture. The script was written alongside the shooting process and was based on an unstaged play. Finally Jack Warner, after witnessing the results from the Oscar ceremony, was so surprised he decided to direct the credit for the production to himself.

The rest is history, and Casablanca now enjoys the status of a universally acclaimed film. It blends spot on storytelling with the limitations and mannerisms of American cinema in a way that it tackles everything that Hollywood does gets right. The flow is natural and impeccable, yet you can almost see the skeleton of the story: we enter Casablanca through a voice-over and dive into the city with a minor introduction, setting the lighthearted mood for the core story and giving background to major premises; we then enter the bar, and watch the various customers as outsiders, until we finally get to the mysterious hand of a man signing a check for gambling matters; the owner is no more, no less than Humphrey Bogart. Amid minor intermissions with supporting characters depicting the many facets of those who stay and leave Casablanca, the story develops and rises from an average romantic plot to pure cinematic thrill.

In one of the most notorious essays on the film, Umberto Eco defends a spot on analysis of why the film has aged so perfectly in spite of its drastically conventional structure:

Thus Casablanca is not just one film. It is many films, an anthology. Made haphazardly, it probably made itself, if not actually against the will of its authors and actors, then at least beyond their control. And this is the reason it works, in spite of aesthetic theories and theories of film making. For in it there unfolds with almost telluric force the power of Narrative in its natural state, without Art intervening to discipline it.

…When all the archetypes burst in shamelessly, we reach Homeric depths. Two clichés make us laugh. A hundred clichés move us. For we sense dimly that the clichés are talking among themselves, and celebrating a reunion.

More than that, the move from the crew to set the story before Pearl Harbor gives it an underlying analogy to the whole political stance of the United States. There’s sacrifice, there’s love, there’s comedy, multiple characters from multiple countries and that final, everlasting victory that everyone loves. The thing about its clichés is that they’re exactly the reason why the film works.

But a screenplay well written and built also needs character development, and major characters should be given dramatic needs that blend with the story and become larger than life. Although the love triangle consists of Rick, Ilsa and Victor, the real triangle in the movie replaces Victor with Captain Renault, who switches great lines with Rick in such class and such conviction it would be impossible to imagine a masterpiece in Casablanca without them as they are. Ingrid Bergman, in her breakthrough role, is surely not her strongest character: she has the worst and cheesiest lines in the movie and has to get away with them – “Was that cannon fire? or is it my heart pounding?” But she shines, she stuns and she takes our breath as the quintessential Hollywood leading lady with contagious seriousness and loveliness.

The fast framing for his shots, especially close-ups, the use of the environment as a framing device and the interest in using light and shadows as subjective components of the story are striking, especially when the screen’s big enough. The most peculiar aspect of the way Casablanca is shot is the cinematography, beautifully crafted by Artur Edeson (All Quiet on the Western Front, The Thief of Baghdad, Mutiny on the Bounty, The Maltese Falcon). Edeson used catch lights for both Bogart’s and Bergman’s appearances, to add a sparkle to their eyes that only comes in key moments. We notice from these moments the true intentions and feelings of the characters, as cynical and mysterious as they are. The film also gives much more light to Bergan than it does to anyone else in the movie, one of the main reasons why people have always love her role in it.

As time goes by, the major message of Casablanca remains fairly debatable, as the stings of love and war collide and play against one another. The film’s love triangle is constantly challenged when they face the consequences of their actions, since any major decision will change their lives and the lives of the world permanently. What should the three infatuated people have really done regarding the hill of beans in this crazy world is up to the spectators to decide. I personally prefers things exactly the way they are: safe in another place, far away from Morocco.

Casablanca

Year: 1943

Director: Michael Curtiz

Cast: Humphrey Bogart, Ingrid Bergman, Claude Rains, Paul Henreid

Academy Awards: Best Picture; Best Director; Best Adapted Screenplay; Best Actor (Humphrey Bogart, nominated); Best Supporting Actor (Claude Rains, nominated); Best Cinematography (nominated); Best Film Editing (nominated); Best Original Score (nominated)

Sight and Sound’s Top 250: #84 (tied)