Director: Michael Curtiz
Distributor: Warner Bros.
Top Billed Actors: Humphrey Bogart, Ingrid Bergman, Paul Henreid
Won 3 Oscars:
Outstanding Motion Picture - Warner Bros.
Best Director - Michael Curtiz
Best Screenplay - Julius J. Epstein, Philip G. Epstein, and Howard E. Koch
Nominated for 5 more:
Best Actor - Humphrey Bogart
Best Supporting Actor - Claude Rains
Best Scoring of a Dramatic or Comedy Picture - Max Steiner
Best Cinematography, Black-and-White - Arthur Edeson
Best Film Editing - Owen Marks
Plot: As time goes by, an American club owner in Vichy France Morocco says a lot of memorable quotes while he decides how to sacrifice in order to save the love of his life and her husband.
Distributor: Warner Bros.
Top Billed Actors: Humphrey Bogart, Ingrid Bergman, Paul Henreid
Won 3 Oscars:
Outstanding Motion Picture - Warner Bros.
Best Director - Michael Curtiz
Best Screenplay - Julius J. Epstein, Philip G. Epstein, and Howard E. Koch
Nominated for 5 more:
Best Actor - Humphrey Bogart
Best Supporting Actor - Claude Rains
Best Scoring of a Dramatic or Comedy Picture - Max Steiner
Best Cinematography, Black-and-White - Arthur Edeson
Best Film Editing - Owen Marks
Plot: As time goes by, an American club owner in Vichy France Morocco says a lot of memorable quotes while he decides how to sacrifice in order to save the love of his life and her husband.
Out of all the gin joints in all the towns in the world, Casablanca (1942) stands the tallest. What seemed like a typical romance war picture in 1942 turned out to be the most critically acclaimed film of its year (when it went into general release in 1943). Over the years, it has only grown in stature until it has become the cinematic landmark it is today. This is the only Best Picture winner directed by Michael Curtiz and he wins his only Best Director Oscar as well after being nominated a handful of times. Screenwriters Julius and Philip Epstein adapted an unproduced play, "Everybody Comes to Rick's" and they became the first set of twins to win Oscars; they are also the grandfather and great uncle of Theo Epstein, the man who engineered the World Series drought busting teams of the Boston Red Sox and Chicago Cubs (Go Cubs!). The cast has a distinct international flavor, which fits the narrative of refugees and exiles congregating in a neutral port town as the Nazis attempt to run roughshod over the region. Many of the actors were refugees in real life, which injects a real sense of emotion in the duel of the anthem sequence. One cannot discuss Casablanca without mentioning the endless amounts of quotable lines of dialogue. It has a whopping six quotes on the AFI 100 Years... 100 Movies Quotes list. One of the quotes has been famously misquoted over the years. "Play it again, Sam" is never quite uttered in the film, but rather "Play it, Sam. Play 'As Time Goes By.'" "Here's looking at you, kid" is said four times throughout the picture and "Louis, I think this is the beginning of a beautiful friendship" was dubbed after the film was nearly finished. That last line in the film is often attributable to producer Hal B. Wallis, who won the Irving G. Thalberg Memorial Award. He produced another Best Picture nominee that year, Watch on the Rhine (1943). When Casablanca won Best Picture, studio head Jack L. Warner went on stage to accept the award. The rest of the Warners blocked Wallis' way to the podium and this lead Wallis to leave the studio shortly thereafter. To quickly round up other accolades heaped onto this film: it was in the first batch of entries into the National Film Registry in 1989, it has been in the top five in both of the AFI 100 Greatest American Movies lists, and the Writers Guild of America considers it the best screenplay of all time to go along with the Directors Guild of America slotting it in as the fifth best directed film of all time.
Getting out of the weeds of the production and awards, let's dive into why this film is so beloved. At first glance, it is a simple romantic story with a love triangle and a somewhat nonsensical MacGuffin with the letters of transit. Yet the story stands the test of time as well as it being very much of its time. Set and produced during World War II, there is always an unsettling vibe when Nazis are around. That feeling persists today so the thrilling aspects of the script never wavers. Also of its time, the dialogue is peppered with so many corny cliches. But it works because this style of writing is committed to all the way through and it starts to sound natural. It also helps that a deadly serious and mostly deadpan Humphrey Bogart is the one laying it on. His ability to not stick is neck out and never get too excited grounds the film as well as keeping the corn in check. He'll never top a "best actors" list but he's perfect for the role of Rick and his many iterations throughout the story. Ingrid Bergman is also prefect for her role, mainly because she is so beautiful. Her face is a dream come true for the cinematographer, who lit her close-ups with such exquisiteness. Every scene seems to outdo the last until she is simply angelic in the final airport sequence. No wonder why Rick and Laszlo fell for her.
This is a rare instance here I will take this penultimate paragraph to continue gushing about the film rather than finding things to nitpick. Let's move on to the music - Max Steiner's score and his use of "As Time Goes By" is one for the ages. "As Time Goes By" was a song written in the early 1930s so it wasn't eligible as an original song but Steiner morphs the melody in the score to fit any occasion. Nostalgia, romance, thrills, and sacrifice, the music is so malleable as Steiner paints the sonic soundscape of the film. The tune even became the Warner Bros. official theme played during the opening logo of their films. The diegetic music plays in Rick's Cafe is also fun and appropriate but the sequence that stands out is the aforementioned duel of the anthems in which the Nazis are singing some German lied when Laszlo gets the house band to start "La Marseillaise." Tears in the eyes of the on screen actors matched my own. And that comes to the crux of the overall narrative - that of sacrificing for the cause of fighting injustices, specifically against Nazi Germany. For the first couple of times I watched this film, it was too easy to get caught up in the drama of the letters of transit and the romance between Bogart and Bergman. But this last viewing, along with it being contextualized by my watching plenty of other WWII films recently, has me grasping an interpretation of Rick the American starting to sacrifice and joining the fight. I don't think this being set right before the attacks on Pearl Harbor is an accident. Isolationist attitudes were finally going by the wayside at that point and when Rick tells a French officer that this is the beginning of a beautiful friendship, it seals the deal that the Allies are banded together to fight for what's right.
Overall, every aspect of this masterpiece is as indelible as the last. Bogart and Bergman has a chemistry that will outlast all of us, the script manages to incorporate memorable lines while also thrilling the audience to its core, Max Steiner's score weaves in and out of nostalgia and melancholy, and the black-and-white cinematography fluidly captures the landmark that is Rick's Cafe. On first glance, it's a wonderful love story but on further viewings, the message of sacrifice and fighting injustices takes this to even greater heights.
My Score: 10/10
Getting out of the weeds of the production and awards, let's dive into why this film is so beloved. At first glance, it is a simple romantic story with a love triangle and a somewhat nonsensical MacGuffin with the letters of transit. Yet the story stands the test of time as well as it being very much of its time. Set and produced during World War II, there is always an unsettling vibe when Nazis are around. That feeling persists today so the thrilling aspects of the script never wavers. Also of its time, the dialogue is peppered with so many corny cliches. But it works because this style of writing is committed to all the way through and it starts to sound natural. It also helps that a deadly serious and mostly deadpan Humphrey Bogart is the one laying it on. His ability to not stick is neck out and never get too excited grounds the film as well as keeping the corn in check. He'll never top a "best actors" list but he's perfect for the role of Rick and his many iterations throughout the story. Ingrid Bergman is also prefect for her role, mainly because she is so beautiful. Her face is a dream come true for the cinematographer, who lit her close-ups with such exquisiteness. Every scene seems to outdo the last until she is simply angelic in the final airport sequence. No wonder why Rick and Laszlo fell for her.
This is a rare instance here I will take this penultimate paragraph to continue gushing about the film rather than finding things to nitpick. Let's move on to the music - Max Steiner's score and his use of "As Time Goes By" is one for the ages. "As Time Goes By" was a song written in the early 1930s so it wasn't eligible as an original song but Steiner morphs the melody in the score to fit any occasion. Nostalgia, romance, thrills, and sacrifice, the music is so malleable as Steiner paints the sonic soundscape of the film. The tune even became the Warner Bros. official theme played during the opening logo of their films. The diegetic music plays in Rick's Cafe is also fun and appropriate but the sequence that stands out is the aforementioned duel of the anthems in which the Nazis are singing some German lied when Laszlo gets the house band to start "La Marseillaise." Tears in the eyes of the on screen actors matched my own. And that comes to the crux of the overall narrative - that of sacrificing for the cause of fighting injustices, specifically against Nazi Germany. For the first couple of times I watched this film, it was too easy to get caught up in the drama of the letters of transit and the romance between Bogart and Bergman. But this last viewing, along with it being contextualized by my watching plenty of other WWII films recently, has me grasping an interpretation of Rick the American starting to sacrifice and joining the fight. I don't think this being set right before the attacks on Pearl Harbor is an accident. Isolationist attitudes were finally going by the wayside at that point and when Rick tells a French officer that this is the beginning of a beautiful friendship, it seals the deal that the Allies are banded together to fight for what's right.
Overall, every aspect of this masterpiece is as indelible as the last. Bogart and Bergman has a chemistry that will outlast all of us, the script manages to incorporate memorable lines while also thrilling the audience to its core, Max Steiner's score weaves in and out of nostalgia and melancholy, and the black-and-white cinematography fluidly captures the landmark that is Rick's Cafe. On first glance, it's a wonderful love story but on further viewings, the message of sacrifice and fighting injustices takes this to even greater heights.
My Score: 10/10