Sorry to be a downer, but here's what I think of Casablanca.

Rating: 5/10 (9 January 2001)

I do not like Casablanca. Wait! Before I'm burned at the stake, hear me out. One of the problems I have with Casablanca is that it tries to exist on two different plains. It expects us be drawn into the emotional struggle that Rick undergoes throughout the movie. But no matter how hard I tried (and believe me I wanted to love this movie), the film failed on the emotional level. Rick, as played by Humphrey Bogart, seemed horrifically ingenuine. He continually spewed out dialogue which pandered, even insulted, the audience. "I stick my neck out for no one", "Rick never drinks with anyone", etc., etc. These lines are definitely memorable, but a capable actor could have communicated Rick's veneer of cynicism without words, and trusted the audience's intelligence to figure it out. Indeed, it is this constantly simplistic dialogue, as well as the cardboard performance by Bogart, that continually held me back. I couldn't plunge into the emotional power of the film as I wanted to, and indeed I began to grow annoyed by the film because it seemed as if it didn't believe its own convictions. It seemed as if it would rather be hip than genuine. The film is not without its strong points, definitely: the great performances by Bergman, Rains and Wilson, the surehanded direction of Curtiz, and the memorable song "As Time Goes By". But Casablanca failed to draw me in emotionally, and also failed to invoke the feeling of Casablanca at that time. Compared to great films like The Third Man (which invoked the paranoia of Cold War Vienna), Schindler's List (the closing walls of the Holocaust) and Saving Private Ryan (the chaos of war), Casablanca fails miserably in comparison. Whenever I see Casablanca, I am always a little saddened. It could have been a great and profound film. Instead, it is a mediocre escapist entertainment.
**/*****