Undoubtedly one of Hollywood's greatest love stories

Rating: 10/10 (17 August 2014)

As the much-vaunted greatest Hollywood movie on love, Casablanca didn't quite fit my expectations but it was superb! I was expecting a whirlwind romance between characters brought together by adversity and one character making a sacrifice for them to stay together. But no. While the romance and sacrifice elements were present, the premises and outcome are totally different. In the early years of WWII, Rick (Humphrey Bogart) runs a very successful restaurant-cum-bar in Casablanca, neutral French territory where Europeans pay a fortune for exit papers to get to America. One day, his former lover Ilsa (Ingrid Bergman) appears, with her husband political activist Victor Laszlo. Rick and Ilsa had a whirlwind romance some years back in Paris but she disappeared on the day they were supposed to depart together, leaving only a note of apology and a devastated Rick. Ilsa is determined to help her husband escape from the Nazis, but decides to stay behind with Rick. Although it comes at some cost to himself, Rick does what he feels is best for her, in the spirit of true love.
The acting, the script, the soundtrack, were all splendid. The story and message were powerful, definitely more so than the Titanic, as much as I liked that movie. Everyone should watch this!