So what's the big deal with this movie?

[Zandrax]

I think it comes down to it being an archetype or template for so many movies afterward. Be it drama, romance, or action. The Rick Blaine character in many ways is the precursor to the modern anti-hero. The guy who ultimately has a good heart, but on the exterior is neutral and gets dirty without a second thought. Plus the whole drama of the former lover now in need has been redone so many times it's literally impossible to count.

[Thrifty]

I think it comes down to it being an archetype or template for so many movies afterward. Be it drama, romance, or action. The Rick Blaine character in many ways is the precursor to the modern anti-hero. The guy who ultimately has a good heart, but on the exterior is neutral and gets dirty without a second thought. Plus the whole drama of the former lover now in need has been redone so many times it's literally impossible to count.

In that explanation, it makes sense for this to be big in the 1940s and 1950s--but in 2009 it's just another cliche.

[MightyJack]

Only if you live on Bizarro world.  The term Cliché should be reserved for those that came after, not the prototype.

Drawing from that thought: The fact that Casablanca is old, that its themes have been re-done over the years, doesn't lessen its impact and beauty. Using logic like that - Shakespeare, Mozart and Michelangelo would be disregarded as quaint chestnuts of little regard or importance. There are creative endeavors that are timeless, and are not diminished even when viewed through the lens of our modern sensibilities. Failure to appreciate that is a deficiency within us, not the film.

Of course, if this discussion all boils down to a subjective argument, then we are just dogs chasing our tails at this point. And it all should be chalked up to different strokes and left at that.

[ShadowDog]

We are dogs chasing our tails, but I have to admit this has been a fascinating conversation.  I've enjoyed everyone's thoughts on this.

Only if you live on Bizarro world.  The term Cliché should be reserved for those that came after, not the prototype.

Drawing from that thought: The fact that Casablanca is old, that its themes have been re-done over the years, doesn't lessen its impact and beauty. Using logic like that - Shakespeare, Mozart and Michelangelo would be disregarded as quaint chestnuts of little regard or importance. There are creative endeavors that are timeless, and are not diminished even when viewed through the lens of our modern sensibilities. Failure to appreciate that is a deficiency within us, not the film.

I agree with you 100%, but the reality is that when 5,000 people rip you off later, it does color a lot of people's impressions even though the great works came first.  They still feel tired.  It sucks, but it's just a grim reality.

[BEERxTaco]

George Harrison, you have put into words my feelings exactly (which I couldn't do). Thanks.

[Bob]

Okay, JUST finished watching Casablanca unriffed.   I had never seen it before and I wanted to watch it first before I listened to the Riff.

WOW.

Easily one of the best movies I have ever seen.    The list of supporting actors was amazing and each one gave a great performance.   Claude Raines gave the performance for the ages.    Bogart would have been a major star in ANY era.    The movie was pitch perfect.    I really cannot think of anything I would have changed.   Such sharp writing and delivery of lines.   

[PlayMSTie]

Only if you live on Bizarro world.  The term Cliché should be reserved for those that came after, not the prototype.

Drawing from that thought: The fact that Casablanca is old, that its themes have been re-done over the years, doesn't lessen its impact and beauty. Using logic like that - Shakespeare, Mozart and Michelangelo would be disregarded as quaint chestnuts of little regard or importance. There are creative endeavors that are timeless, and are not diminished even when viewed through the lens of our modern sensibilities. Failure to appreciate that is a deficiency within us, not the film.

Of course, if this discussion all boils down to a subjective argument, then we are just dogs chasing our tails at this point. And it all should be chalked up to different strokes and left at that.

What you said. 

[RoninFox]

I realized watching the movie that the biggest thing I was colored by and had to let go of were decades of Bogart impressions.  Most of them focus so much on the eccentricites of his voice then exaggerate them (granted that is an impressionists job pretty much) that anything they say comes out flat and lifeless.  Because of that I attributed that flatness to Bogey himself.  This movie sure proved that wrong, though.  There's truckloads of subtlety in his performance.

[Bill Corbett]

The fact that Casablanca is old, that its themes have been re-done over the years, doesn't lessen its impact and beauty. Using logic like that - Shakespeare, Mozart and Michelangelo would be disregarded as quaint chestnuts of little regard or importance. There are creative endeavors that are timeless, and are not diminished even when viewed through the lens of our modern sensibilities. Failure to appreciate that is a deficiency within us, not the film.

Well said!

[Darth Geek]

I realized watching the movie that the biggest thing I was colored by and had to let go of were decades of Bogart impressions.  Most of them focus so much on the eccentricites of his voice then exaggerate them (granted that is an impressionists job pretty much) that anything they say comes out flat and lifeless.  Because of that I attributed that flatness to Bogey himself.  This movie sure proved that wrong, though.  There's truckloads of subtlety in his performance.

I agree with you on that one. Also, Peter Lorre impressions as well.

[Bill Corbett]

I realized watching the movie that the biggest thing I was colored by and had to let go of were decades of Bogart impressions.  Most of them focus so much on the eccentricites of his voice then exaggerate them (granted that is an impressionists job pretty much) that anything they say comes out flat and lifeless.  Because of that I attributed that flatness to Bogey himself.  This movie sure proved that wrong, though.  There's truckloads of subtlety in his performance.

I agree with you on that one. Also, Peter Lorre impressions as well.

Same here on both counts.  Hadn't seen this movie in many years, and honesty, didn't appreciate it when I first saw it.  I tended to remember both Bogart and Lorre much more as their Looney Tunes caricatures.   But both of them were real artists. 

[Darth Geek]

I realized watching the movie that the biggest thing I was colored by and had to let go of were decades of Bogart impressions.  Most of them focus so much on the eccentricites of his voice then exaggerate them (granted that is an impressionists job pretty much) that anything they say comes out flat and lifeless.  Because of that I attributed that flatness to Bogey himself.  This movie sure proved that wrong, though.  There's truckloads of subtlety in his performance.

I agree with you on that one. Also, Peter Lorre impressions as well.

Same here on both counts.  Hadn't seen this movie in many years, and honesty, didn't appreciate it when I first saw it.  I tended to remember both Bogart and Lorre much more as their Looney Tunes caricatures.   But both of them were real artists. 

Hopefully there are more Peter Lorre movies upcoming?

[ScottotD]

Well it's a very well directed,well written,well acted,and exciting drama.

Other then that I have no idea what the big deal is.

Agreed.  I felt the same way when I first watched Gone With the Wind, it was a very well made movie but... yeah.  The acting is much better then most films of it's era I've seen and it's much more subtle and even modern in a weird way but having seen homages and ripoffs my whole life I was constantly taken out of the movie by thinking "oh, that's where that's from"

[Invisible NanoGhost]

I (vaguely) remember some major comedian (possibly Robert Klein) talking about the first time he saw Charlie Chaplin.  He said that he kept wondering why people thought he was so funny, when his routines seemed so commonplace.  It finally clicked that Chaplin's movies had been done before everyone that he (the comedian) had seen, and that all the people he thought were so imaginative were really just copying stuff from Chaplin.

I'm another person who thinks "Casablanca" is pretty close to the perfect romance-during-war movie.  Great performances by many actors, and good well-developed lines to develop a real feel for many of the characters.  Most movies this days can't write good lines for more than one or two characters (if that!), and everyone else in the movie is just background noise for those main characters.

[AramFingel]

Where to begin?

As I am downloading this rifftrax I decided to come into the forum (something I rarely do as my internet is somewhat limited here in Iraq) and see what people thought.

This movie has always been, to me, the greatest movie of all time.  The first time I saw it I wept and, as a soldier and grown man, I'm not ashamed to admit that.

I am kind of dreading what they have done with it

Why is it so great?

The acting is perfect, the storyline is great and a prototype for almost all war/love movies to come, and Bogart pretty much creates the archetype of anti-hero in this movie.

This movie, when it was made, was not expected to be anything special.   It was shot in a few weeks and quickly rushed out - as was the style at the time.  The movie was based on the play "Everybody Comes to Ricks" which was a semi-factual account of the playwright's escape to America during the start of the German occupation of France in 1940.

As to the question of why didn't Strausser simply arrest Victor or have him killed it has to do with the politics, as well as the west's limited knowledge of internal Nazi workings, at the time the play/movie was written.  While Vichy France was just a puppet government set up by Germany - Germany still had to maintain a facsimile of autonomy for the rest of the world.  For that reason they tried their best to make it at least appear as if Vichy France was running itself with only limited help from Germany.

Combine this with the fact that it still was not fully or widely known the extent of Nazi brutalism and totalitarianism in the non-occupied nations, it seems quite justified (at the time) that the Nazi's would work with but not through or around the local authorities in Vichy.

Now, what makes the movie the greatest in my mind?

The fact that the protagonist changes from being a self-centered, egotistical man full of hate to someone who will give up his one true love for the greater good of mankind is a tearjerker.  That by itself would be enough, but when you consider the cast: Peter Lorrey, Claude Rains, Humphrey Bogart, and the list goes on...each one considered one of the best actors of his/her time and one of the greatest of all time - they all put everything they had into their roles and it showed.

Well, thats my take, its almost done downloading so lets see if I cry from the humorous destruction rained down by the rifftrax crew