Casablanca (Michael Curtiz, 1942) is one of the most famous, successful, and quotable films of all time. Even if you’ve never seen it, you’ve likely heard some of its best lines – ‘here’s looking at you, kid’, ‘round up the usual suspects’, ‘of all the gin joints in all in the towns in all the world, she walks into mine’, or ‘Louie, I think this is the beginning of a beautiful friendship’. Or perhaps you’ve seen it referenced or parodied in other movies or on television; cartoons such as The Simpsons and Looney Tunes refer to it several times.
Casablanca stars Classic Hollywood anti-hero Humphrey Bogart as Rick Blaine, a cynical bar owner during the Second World War who is forced to choose between his lost love Ilsa Lund (Ingrid Bergman) or helping her and her husband, escaped concentration camp prisoner and anti-war activist/rebel, Victor Laszlo (Paul Henreid) escape from Casablanca so he can continue his fight against the Nazis.
Though it featured well established and bankable stars and had a fantastic production team behind it, no-one expected the film to be as successful as it was. In the late 1930s and early 1940s, Hollywood was cranking out film after film, more like a factory than anything else, and it was challenging for even the most well-written, well-shot, and well-acted film to make a significant splash.
But Casablanca did.
The film premiered in November 1942 in New York City, riding on the publicity of the Allied invasion of North Africa a few weeks prior, and was released nationally in January 1943. It won several Academy Awards, including Best Director, Best Adapted Screenplay, and Best Picture.
The New York Times’ critic Bosley Crowther wrote that Warner Bros. had made ‘a picture which makes the spine tingle and the heart take a leap’. Crowther praised its ‘first order’ cast and screenplay, and loved the combination of ‘sentiment, humour, and pathos with taut melodrama and bristling intrigue’. The film grossed $255,000 over ten weeks (around $3.3 million today) and earned $3.7 million overall (around $47 million today).
In 1989 it was selected as one of the National Film Registry’s first films to be preserved for its ‘cultural, historical, or aesthetical significance’.
What is it that makes the film so enduring?
The story is powerful, a combination of love, heartbreak, politics, duty, and morality. It is often praised as an intellectual film; The Washington Free Beacon noted on the film’s 75th anniversary that ‘while the first time around you might pay attention to only the superficial love story, by the second and third and fourth viewings the sub-textual politics [of communitarianism and anti-isolationism] have moved to the fore’.
The performances are phenomenal. Humphrey Bogart played many, many characters in Hollywood but his portrayal of Rick is arguably his best, and Ingrid Bergman plays Ilsa with grace, vulnerability, and surprising strength. Reflecting on the film years later, Bergman said that Casablanca ‘has a life of its own. There is something mystical about it. It seems to have filled a need, a need that was there before the film’. While Citizen Kane (Orson Welles, 1942) is arguably the greater film, infamous critic Roger Ebert argued, Casablanca is more loved.
The film looks beautiful. It has elements of film noir and expressionism, with creative uses of shadows across characters’ faces to suggest imprisonment/entrapment, and the way Michael Curtiz utilises the fluid mobility of the camera makes the film feel immersive and realistic, whilst maintaining a sense of romanticism.
Especially noteworthy is the beautiful cinematography from The Maltase Falcon (John Huston, 1941) and Frankenstein (James Whale, 1931) cinematographer Arthur Edeson, who used a gauze filter to soften Ilsa’s face and made her eyes sparkle with catch lights. The effect, it was later revealed, was intended to make Ilsa seem ‘ineffably sad and tender and nostalgic’. And it does.
But what makes Casablanca such a beautiful, enduring, and memorable film (for me anyway) is its use of music.
‘You must remember this, a kiss is just a kiss…’
The film’s iconic song ‘As Time Goes By’ – written by Herman Hupfeld and part of the original play – was not the composer’s first choice. Max Steiner had made a name for himself in Hollywood for his Gone with the Wind (Victor Fleming, 1939) and King Kong (Merian C. Cooper and Ernest B. Schoedsack, 1933) scores, so Casablanca director Michael Curtiz had faith in Steiner’s ability to deliver a great score.
Steiner, however, hated ‘As Time Goes By’. He even pushed to reshoot the scenes the song was featured in and replace it with his own composition, but by that time Bergman had cut her hair short for her upcoming role in For Whom the Bell Tolls (Sam Wood, 1943). Steiner did admit later that the song ‘must have had something to attract so much attention’.
Steiner’s dislike for the song possibly stems from it being a quote-on-quote ‘popular song’. Classic Hollywood cinema rarely, if ever, incorporated already known songs into their stories. It was the norm to compose something new and unique for a film.
Jeff Smith, a professor at University of Wisconsin-Madison who specialises in early Hollywood music, explains that popular music was ‘thought to be unsuitable for underscoring’ for it ‘lacked dynamic change and its repetitive form made it unadjustable to the changing actions and events on screen’. He also noted that this view was likely ‘enhanced by a certain elitism or vanity on the part of the composers’.
It is therefore ironic that Steiner’s dislike for ‘As Time Goes By’ inspired him to be creative with it and change its meaning several times throughout the film. Casablanca is arguably where the use of popular music in films became accepted and therefore…popular. Steiner may have hated the song, but the way he used it changed film scoring forever.
In his article ‘The World Heard: Casablanca and the Music of War’, Paul Allan Anderson notes that ‘As Time Goes By’ ‘offered a reassuring promise of steady forward movement when it relatedly concluded, against countervailing evidence from science and society alike, that ‘the fundamental things apply, as time goes by’. The ‘fundamental things’ in matters of love and courtship, the lyrics promised, lie in clinging to beliefs about the lawlike character of romantic destiny’. This observation lies at the heart of Casablanca.
‘As Time Goes By’ has several meanings in the film and is presented in several ways. The first time we hear it is when Ilsa, her face lit softly and eyes sparkling with unshed tears, asks Sam, Rick’s piano man and long-time companion, to play the song. When Sam claims he can’t remember the song and is a little rusty, Ilsa hums it for him. The melody is romantic, yet melancholy. As Sam sings, Curtiz lingers on a close-up of Ilsa. Bergman’s performance is hypnotic. Her expression suggests the song has a deeper meaning, that it’s associated with something in her past that she no longer has but continues to long for.
When Rick hears Sam playing, he charges towards him and says, ‘I thought I told you never to play…’ but he doesn’t finish his sentence. Rick follows Sam’s nod towards Ilsa. Curtiz cuts back to a close-up of Ilsa, accompanied by a low timbred lingering note, indicating that Ilsa is the reason Rick does not want that song played.
Together, Curtiz and Steiner show the audience that Rick and Ilsa have a romantic past that did not end well, by just using cuts, framing, and music. No dialogue is necessary. The vaguely ominous sound of the singular note hints at a previously unhappy ending for the pair and gets the audiences’ attention. That one note makes us wonder what happened to them and why, thus securing our engagement in the story. It’s deceptively simple in its cleverness.
The next time we hear it, it’s Rick asking Sam to play it, shouting, ‘If she can stand it, I can!’ Rick is alone in his bar after closing, drowning his sorrows in drink. The noir, expressionist lighting hides one half of his face in darkness and illuminates the other half, signalling Rick’s conflicting beliefs in love, sentimentalism, and romance, with his heartbroken, disillusioned, and cynical side. The light notes of Sam’s piano, unaccompanied by singing this time, contrast with the darkness of Rick’s bar. Curtiz slowly zooms in on Rick, framing him in a close-up that echoes Ilsa’s. This time, instead of imagining what their past was, we get to see it.
Flashback to Paris, pre-German occupation. Rick and Ilsa are happy and in love. An even lighter version of ‘As Time Goes By’ is present throughout the montage as a leitmotif which characterises their relationship. At this point in the film, we know Rick has always been on the side of the oppressed and fought alongside them. Ilsa, who reveals she once loved a man who is now dead, is the embodiment of Rick’s happiness and idealism and therefore the heart-breaking catalyst for the cynical version we meet in the present day. The couple are so wrapped up in their romance that they agree to enjoy the moment and not pry into each other’s past.
Then the Nazis invade France.
Curtiz switches to a more realistic, documentary style of shots, shattering the romantic, sentimental enchantment of Rick and Ilsa’s bubble. Rick’s past would make him a target, so the couple decide to flee Paris together. They toast their departure atop Sam’s piano as he plays ‘As Time Goes By’, the lyrics reflecting the action within the story, ‘it’s still the same old story, a fight for love and glory, a case of do or die’ (my favourite line of the song).
As Paul Allan Anderson notes, the song takes on an allegorical meaning here, wherein politics and romance merge in a mythic vision of destiny. It unites the private and the political, the lyrics practically prophetic.
While Rick seems cautiously optimistic – after all, what does the war matter if he has his best girl by his side? – Ilsa seems reserved, reflective. She struggles to meet Rick’s eye throughout the scene. When Rick raises his glass and says the famous line, ‘Here’s looking at you, kid’, a non-diegetic up-tempo string version of ‘As Time Goes By’ plays, hinting at tension. It is cut jarringly short by an announcement that the Germans have almost reached Paris.
Rick and Ilsa embrace, the intense version of ‘As Time Goes By’ softening and slowing in tempo, reverting to the romantic original. The song becomes a symbol of their love during the world’s most turbulent time, and its constant interruption indicates that their love will also be interrupted – in fact, not once in the film is the song played the whole way through. It never reaches a satisfying conclusion, much like Rick and Ilsa.
The flashback ends with Rick alone at the train station, his last memory of Ilsa a handwritten letter saying that she cannot go with him. Rick and Sam board the train, and as the train pulls out of the station, Rick’s face hardens; the cynic is born.
‘As Time Goes By’ comes to reflect the city of Casablanca on a wider scale, and the war itself. Casablanca is a purgatory of uncertainty, where fleeing lovers wait for safe passage to the US, one of the only safe places left in the world. Rick comes to embody the US’s stance on the war – isolationist, cynical, unwilling to help. Seeing Ilsa again, though painful, shatters Rick’s cynical façade and encourages him to take action and help Ilsa and her husband – the face of the revolution – escape Casablanca so Victor can do the work only he can do.
The symbolism of Rick retrieving the letters of transit from Sam’s piano that Ilsa and Victor require for safe passage out of Casablanca is powerful. Sam’s piano represents the before, the past, but it comes to serve as a protection for Ilsa and Victor, a connective gateway to the future. While it may be the end of Rick and Ilsa’s relationship, it is only the start of the resistance of the Nazi regime. Rick fights ‘for love and glory’, finally understanding that the ‘fundamental things’ are not only bigger than him but are worth fighting for.
The song plays in some variation during the pair’s every interaction, and it is heart-breaking and bittersweet. It represents a ‘could have’, not a ‘someday’. Rick realises his commitment to the world and the good people in it is more important than his individual desires – Ilsa must go with Victor to save the world. Rick sacrifices his love for the good of others. Their love, while small scale on a personal level, has consequences for the world on a larger scale.
‘As Time Goes By’ connects the past and the present. It simultaneously represents morality in the face of wider responsibilities and the universality of ill-fated love that impacted thousands of people during the war. Rick and Ilsa’s relationship is both personally relatable and universally representative, a metaphor, and the use of ‘As Time Goes By’ throughout the film only strengthens that metaphor.
‘Viva la France!’
‘As Time Goes By’’s allegorical meaning throughout Casablanca is complemented by ‘La Marseillaise’, the French national anthem. Before we get into its use in the film, we need to understand the context.
‘La Marseillaise’, originally called ‘Chant de guerre pour l’Armée du Rhin’ (‘War Song for the Army of the Rhine’), was written by Claude Joseph Rouget de Lisle in 1792, after France declared war on Austria. The lyrics reflect the turmoil France was undergoing at the hands of invading armies from Prussia and Austria, and its evocative melody led it to be used throughout France as a revolutionary battle cry. It became France’s national anthem in 1795. The song became known as ‘La Marseillaise’ after Marseille volunteers sung it as they marched to defend Paris.
Morocco’s capital city of Casablanca was controlled by the Vichy, a French State, during the Second World War. Like the Nazis with whom they collaborated, it was antisemitic, xenophobic, traditionalist, and authoritarian. Casablanca’s position at the north-west coast of the African continent meant it was an ideal place for refugees to flee Europe and settle in America. Casablanca (the city would not be free of French control until the late 1950s) adopted a policy of ‘asymmetrical neutrality’ in favour of the Germans. The city became a melting pot of cultures as thousands of people from all over Europe became stuck there awaiting permission to travel.
Rick’s bar in the film is the embodiment of these ideas. The music is multi-cultural, but it favours American, representing the idea of the US as a place of freedom and fresh starts. Everyone is welcome at Rick’s as it is (supposed to be) neutral ground. Nazis, French, African, American, Polish, Jewish, Christian, Muslim, etc. would mingle. It was not peaceful, but it was not outwardly dangerous either.
Rick’s becomes the preferred hang out of the Major Heinrich Strasser, a high-ranking Nazi officer; Strasser was, ironically, played by silent film star Conrad Veidt – he fled Germany to protect his Jewish wife Ilona, and donated most of his considerable fortune to Britain to help the war effort.
The happy-go-lucky atmosphere of the bar changes when the Nazi officers are present, and it’s not difficult to understand why.
‘La Marseillaise’ plays a pivotal role in this scene. Prior to it, Victor Laszlo is in Rick’s private quarters, trying to persuade him to hand over the letters of transit, but Rick refuses, challenging Laszlo to ‘ask your wife’. It is in that moment that we hear the Nazi officers singing loudly. Rick and Victor return to the bar to see Major Strasser leading his officers in singing ‘Die Wacht am Rhein’ (‘The Watch on the Rhine’). This was a popular song in Germany that was rooted in their enmity with France. The song is essentially a battle cry made for all Germans to rush and defend the German Rhine, to ensure that ‘no enemy sets his foot on the shore of the Rhine’.
Major Strasser and his officers sing loud and boisterously, drowning out all other music and chit-chat in the bar. It’s intimidating, and it’s meant to be. The Nazis are demonstrating their power over them.
Laszlo won’t let this slide. He marches confidently to the bar’s musicians at the other side of the room and commands them to play ‘La Marseillaise’. Only when Rick grants permission with a subtle nod, showing where his true loyalties lie under his façade of cynical isolationism, do the musicians play.
Victor sings alone but loud as he and the musicians attempt to drown out the Nazis. Bar patrons stand patriotically and join Victor, as does the bar’s resident female vocalist. Major Strasser, who will not be beaten, encourages his men to sing louder, like a conductor. Curtiz shots Strasser from a slightly low angle shot to make Strasser look big and intimidating, before cutting to a longshot of yet more bar patrons joining Victor. The song becomes a demonstration of solidarity and anti-Nazism, the bar serving as an ideological and cultural battleground.
Humiliated, Strasser and his men give up and sit down, but this does not stop Victor.
The bar patrons continue to sing, loudly and with more passion. Considering the devastation the Nazis had upon their enemies, this was a brave thing to do and that cannot be understated. Something as simple as a song could have gotten them killed, and yet they did it anyway because their identities were more important than their safety. Though not all the bar patrons are French, this identification and show of solidarity unites every refugee in their struggle against the Nazi regime.
Particularly moving in this scene is a close-up of Yvonne, Rick’s ex who has been snuggling up to German officers in a self-preservation effort to gain her freedom from Casablanca. She sings with passion and determination, tears in her eyes. Yvonne was played by Madeleine LeBeau, a real-life French refugee who had fled Nazi-occupied Europe.
Curtiz cuts between an exalted Ilsa looking up at Victor, overwhelmed with respect and love for her husband, and Victor staring into the distance as he sings with gusto, singing not only to the bar patrons and the Nazis, but the resistance he represents. The song ends, Yvonne shouts ‘Viva la France’, and the bar patrons cheer and clap, congratulating Victor.
The triumphant atmosphere is cut short by Major Strasser, who is enraged at not only Victor’s ability to rile up the bar crowd, but the potential he has to rile up the secret resistance within Casablanca. The demonstration leads to Rick’s being closed.
In the same way ‘As Time Goes By’ characterises Rick and Ilsa’s relationship, ‘La Marseillaise’ characterises Victor. It is used as a leitmotif throughout his scenes to associate him with revolution and patriotism.
Rick’s dislike for Victor partly stems from his marriage to the love of his life, but it’s also possible that Victor represents something Rick can never be: the face of a political resistance, unfaltering in his commitment to the cause. He is a man you cannot help but admire, and perhaps Rick resents him a little for that. When Ilsa informs Rick of what happened between her and Victor, chords from ‘La Marseillaise’ overlap with ‘As Time Goes By’, indicating that her life is as tied to Victor’s as it is to Rick’s. The love between Ilsa and Rick may be a different kind of love that she has with Victor, but they’re both important to her.
The fact that we hear the sung version of ‘La Marseillaise’ after we hear ‘As Time Goes By’ is significant. Ilsa’s return, and the memories of what a pre-war life was like, prompts Rick to reconsider his apolitical stance. Though his relationship with Ilsa disenchanted him from all forms of commitment, it is her commitment to Victor and the cause he represents that reignites the spark of morality within Rick.
‘La Marseillaise’ opens and closes Casablanca, and is sandwiched by ‘As Time Goes By’. When Rick and Ilsa bid each other goodbye at the airport, Steiner combines ‘As Time Goes By’ with ‘La Marseillaise’, suggesting that politics influence the personal, and vice versa. You cannot shut one out, for one influences the other. And you can’t hide from it. ‘As Time Goes By’ emphasises the virtue, sentimentalism, and idealism that the world had pre-Nazis, and ‘La Marseillaise’ is the battle cry for the fight to win that back.
Casablanca is one of the best films to come out of Hollywood and that is, in no small part, thanks to its musical score. Casablanca changed film scoring forever and showed that music can be a powerful, evocative, and meaning-making part of the film viewing experience.
Written by Victoria Brown | BanterFlix Website Editor & Resident Disney Queen