Make no mistake: Everything about Casablanca is indelible
February 27, 2017 7:53 AM   Subscribe

The End of a Beautiful Friendship - Laura Miller reviews Noah Isenberg's We'll Always Have Casablanca and tracks the movie's recent loss of prestige among critics and fans.
posted by Think_Long (110 comments total) 21 users marked this as a favorite
 
Shocking.
posted by Melismata at 8:04 AM on February 27, 2017 [3 favorites]


Huh. Since the election I've heard more and more people revisiting Casablanca and finding it relevant in a way that hasn't really happened with other films of that era. I didn't realize that it had really lost that much prestige.
posted by dinty_moore at 8:13 AM on February 27, 2017 [16 favorites]


Virtually every other character in the movie exists to experience Rick’s emotions for him...

Well, Rick is the kind of man that... well, if I were a woman, and I were not around, I should be in love with Rick.
posted by Capt. Renault at 8:14 AM on February 27, 2017 [99 favorites]


I would've liked it if this article had actually tried harder to answer the "Why?" question posed at the top. If the historical moment has changed, what about it makes Casablanca less appealing? It would be nice to believe that Rick's "emotional limitations" now put male viewers off, but, uh, Rick's a saint compared to your Tony Starks or Stephen Stranges.

(Having been at a number of screenings of Casablanca at the Brattle over the years (and I don't mean the 1950s), they've always been crowded...)
posted by praemunire at 8:17 AM on February 27, 2017 [17 favorites]


Okay, after RTFA, I realize they're talking about in the last decade or so, so not a time period that would really take into account the last couple of months as much more than a blip.

But is Casablanca really becoming irrelevant faster than other classic movies of the same time period?
posted by dinty_moore at 8:17 AM on February 27, 2017 [2 favorites]


It's interesting to me that Casablanca is only number 33 (says 34 in the article but these things shift around) on the IMDB top 250. I went in to inspect the list and call out all the movies that it is clearly better than and was pleasantly surprised that that top 34 list is not AWFUL. I mean, yeah, Casablanca is better than The Matrix, for sure. Better than Return of the King, and Se7en, and American History X, but other than that all of the movies above it are at least excellent. Casablanca is better than most of them, imo, but there's such an apples and oranges thing with movies that I can't argue specifically that hard.

I'm a huge fan of Casablanca, and although I don't have a movie ranking it's one of the dozen or so movies that I say, with absolute sincerity, is my absolute favorite. One of the few that is as good as it is purported to be.

The other interesting thing about that list is that Shawshank is number one, mostly because Shawshank is a LOT like Casablanca - a movie that could be expected to be lifeless machine-made Hollywood garbage that ended up surprising a lot of people by being better than the sum of the parts. Terrific roles given to solid, beloved actors, and great actors doing great turns in great minor parts. Flashbacks that change in your memory as you learn more about the story, and, crucially, a TERRIFIC uplifting scene anchored by hopeless people being moved by music.
posted by dirtdirt at 8:20 AM on February 27, 2017 [17 favorites]


We live in a world where many people think The Dark Knight is the greatest movie ever.
posted by thelonius at 8:26 AM on February 27, 2017 [25 favorites]


But is Casablanca really becoming irrelevant faster than other classic movies of the same time period?


Not necessarily, but I thought she did a good job of tracking how its popularity (aside from its quality) was largely a post-war reaction, especially among the boomers. The same feelings didn't transfer as easily to gen X and beyond.
posted by Think_Long at 8:27 AM on February 27, 2017


Having just rewatched the movie a couple weeks ago (so as to introduce it to my 9yo son), it holds up remarkably well. There isn't a wasted scene or line of dialogue in the entire film. To watch it among the contemporary films of that era, it is clearly a standout.

Film criticism, like most things, has its fashions. If it has really fallen out of favor, it speaks more about the tastes of the moment than it does about any qualities of the film itself.
posted by Big Al 8000 at 8:30 AM on February 27, 2017 [28 favorites]


I see clickbait film reviews haven't fallen out of favor.
posted by Celsius1414 at 8:36 AM on February 27, 2017 [23 favorites]


There was an excellent episode of Studio 360 a few weeks ago in which the authors talked with Kurt Anderson about the film's qualities and especially its relevance to today. It was really fascinating and I recommend a listen.

It's one of my top 5 films. I don't give much of a shit what critics think. If I could only watch one movie from now until the end of my life, Shawshank it would not be.
posted by Miko at 8:41 AM on February 27, 2017 [7 favorites]


I've never actually liked Casablanca very much. It's very quotable, and on paper, it's a good film, but I never liked Rick, or Ilsa, or any of the characters very much... and I just don't care for it.
posted by PearlRose at 8:43 AM on February 27, 2017 [2 favorites]


My experience of Casablanca is so different than what's presented here, but I could just be an outlier. For me, Casablanca is much more about moral courage, putting others before oneself, and enduring loss than it is about Rick's (or Bogart's) masculinity...and for these reasons it's more relevant to me now than ever. This was a film made by immigrants and refugees!
posted by sallybrown at 8:46 AM on February 27, 2017 [76 favorites]


I suspect I may be too self absorbed to care that others don't love this film the way I do.

Rick Blaine, in Casablanca (rather like Brando, in Wild Ones) has always appealed to me as the archetypical loser, that I felt was my lot in life and fit perfectly in my early generation punk rock lifestyle.
I may not win, and I probably won't get the girl, but the fuckers will know they've been in a fight. The fuckers, being loosely defined as those in opposition, bosses, parents, the government, et fucking cetera.
It felt right that you see his struggles in private (his near inability to let go of the past and and lash out at his lost love) while in public he showed a bravado and recklessness in the face of near certain loss. For me, best epitomized by the scene where he's talking with Renault, and Major Strasser, and the jig is obviously up, the Nazis are coming in and taking over and there's not a thing a small time bar owner can do about it but sneer in the face of the enemy and bide his time.
I can understand that the people of today might find the film problematic, or perhaps just not very relevant to their lives, but it has always been a go to for me.
posted by evilDoug at 8:48 AM on February 27, 2017 [19 favorites]


This was a film made by immigrants and refugees!

QFT.

Earlier this month was S.Z. Sakall's birthday — he played Carl the waiter and was himself forced to flee Europe. In the context of our current racist, anti-immigrant, kleptocratic administration, I couldn't help but remember the scene with him and the refugee couple practicing their English ("Such watch?") in preparation for coming to America.
posted by Celsius1414 at 8:56 AM on February 27, 2017 [16 favorites]


Even before it became much more relevant as a message that fighting fascism is the right thing to do, to the point of being worth personal sacrifice, Casablanca never lost any prestige with me. It's a brilliant film, and if your "contrarian hot take" is to say otherwise, it likely reflects poorly on you, unless you can muster a better case than the late Roger Ebert.
posted by Gelatin at 8:57 AM on February 27, 2017 [20 favorites]


Casablanca is one of my favourite films ever, and I will fight anybody who tells me it's not a great movie.

My read is the same as sallybrown's. It's interesting that Casablanca has such a reputation as a romance film, because even the romance plot is ultimately about resistance to the Nazis. Isla goes with Victor because she and Rick both acknowledge that supporting Victor's work is more important than their feelings for one another. (The problems of three little people don't amount to a hill of beans, after all...)
posted by tobascodagama at 9:01 AM on February 27, 2017 [22 favorites]


Nonsense, Casablanca is no more likely to fade from memory than the novels of George W. M. Reynolds or Marie Corelli. Surely public taste cannot be as fickle as that!
posted by kyrademon at 9:04 AM on February 27, 2017 [7 favorites]


Gelatin: "Even before it became much more relevant as a message that fighting fascism is the right thing to do, to the point of being worth personal sacrifice, Casablanca never lost any prestige with me. It's a brilliant film, and if your "contrarian hot take" is to say otherwise, it likely reflects poorly on you, unless you can muster a better case than the late Roger Ebert."

QFT, from Ebert:

"Seeing the film over and over again, year after year, I find it never grows over-familiar. It plays like a favorite musical album; the more I know it, the more I like it. The black-and-white cinematography has not aged as color would. The dialogue is so spare and cynical it has not grown old-fashioned. Much of the emotional effect of “Casablanca” is achieved by indirection; as we leave the theater, we are absolutely convinced that the only thing keeping the world from going crazy is that the problems of three little people do after all amount to more than a hill of beans."
posted by chavenet at 9:07 AM on February 27, 2017 [27 favorites]


(I really miss Roger Ebert.)
posted by sallybrown at 9:10 AM on February 27, 2017 [30 favorites]


She gets the quotation of the movie's last line wrong. This is not a serious piece.
posted by Kylio at 9:13 AM on February 27, 2017 [5 favorites]


First they came for Casablanca, and I said nothing. Then they came for Shakes the Clown.
posted by lagomorphius at 9:17 AM on February 27, 2017 [9 favorites]


We live in a world where many people think The Dark Knight is the greatest movie ever.

Where do we begin?
posted by lagomorphius at 9:19 AM on February 27, 2017


Does the fact that it isn't available to stream anywhere have something to do with it's sudden dip in popularity?
posted by davros42 at 9:21 AM on February 27, 2017 [14 favorites]


This was a film made by immigrants and refugees!

A couple of months ago, I was watching a documentary (oh, how I wish I could remember the title, so I could link to it!) about people in the German film and theater industries who fled to the U.S. while the Nazis were in power and went to work at American studios.

The takeaway was OMG, Hitler handed us the Golden Age of Hollywood on a silver platter, with a big red bow on top!
posted by The Underpants Monster at 9:24 AM on February 27, 2017 [23 favorites]


Like with "overrated" and "underrated" I'm never quite sure what it is being talked about when people try to peg a movie to some allegedly appropriate spot in terms of some vaguely defined audience's estimation. From what I can tell, there are a number of different issues that could be causing Casablanca to become less notable as a movie in the current culture.

Not all that many people choose to watch old movies, especially those from a time too long past to carry much current cultural reference. The article touches on that speaking of it as a bridge film between the boomers and their parents, and even older Gen Xers may have had some contact with it via TV or VHS when the excitement of any "classic" release still meant something as it made them available to view at one's leisure for the first time. Hell, it was only in the eighties when most people could see Vertigo at all since its release as it'd been socked away in the vaults.

The change in methods of Hollywood filmmaking gives many viewers the impression that current conventions are somehow more "real" or "true" than previous conventions which, by their accounting feel outdated and stiff. It's the bias of the now making things farther back seem strange.

Many people who do watch older movies now have access to thousands of films from across the world that we've never had the opportunity to see before. So, to hardcore cinephiles Casablanca is old news, the exciting discoveries are films not yet talked about at all. These viewers too often tend to favor more unusual films, ones that vary from convention or, at least, are of a convention new to them. Casablanca is just getting a little more mixed into a much bigger crowd.

And not least significant, to the extent that film critics may somehow value Casablanca less is likely a mix of many critics not really knowing much about film history and thus favor current trends and some being cinephiles and being less interested in famous Hollywood films and more in those less seen or more unusual films. There too is something intrinsic to the job of writing about movies if one wants to gain notice at it, and that is you aren't going to gain as much notice or find as much pleasure in simply repeating known or believed information.

It's the hazard of academia in a way, where you are more likely to get published and draw attention if you say or find something new, since there aren't many careers made by simple repetition. You have to be really good at your job and comfortable in your future to not be tempted to go the clickbait route to draw attention or to otherwise "correct" allegedly mistaken popular notions. For Casablanca, to the extent there is a push to lower its status, this will be later faced with an equal desire to recorrect and put it back in its "proper" place, as this article is sort of hinting around doing, unsurprisingly coming from Slate, long a home of contrarian reverses and double reverses.
posted by gusottertrout at 9:28 AM on February 27, 2017 [12 favorites]


Earlier this month was S.Z. Sakall's birthday — he played Carl the waiter and was himself forced to flee Europe.

So did Conrad "Major Strasser" Veidt, whose vocal opposition to the Nazis in Germany and marriage to a Jewish woman forced them to flee to England and then to America. Veidt was said to enjoy being cast as Nazis, in order to make them look bad.
posted by Gelatin at 9:30 AM on February 27, 2017 [31 favorites]


>We live in a world where many people think The Dark Knight is the greatest movie ever.

Laura Miller mentions a couple of different polls, the historical IMBD ranking for Casablanca, and British Film Institute's Top 50.

It's interesting to compare the two lists, because they are so different. With the IMDB's overall Top 250, Dark Knight comes in at #4 (Shawshank is #1). The BFI poll is more conventional, from a cinephile's point of view.

I do wonder what caused the sudden dropoff in popularity for Casablanca. Demographic change? Decline in number of art house cinemas operating? Walking Dead and the Wire too popular amongst white people nowadays?
posted by My Dad at 9:30 AM on February 27, 2017


Surely the opinions of a few little MeFites don't add up to a plate of beans on this crazy site of ours.....
posted by GenjiandProust at 9:33 AM on February 27, 2017 [13 favorites]


Does the fact that it isn't available to stream anywhere have something to do with it's sudden dip in popularity?

OTOH, it's practically in constant rotation on TCM and, if you have the TCM app, it's usually available to stream there, too. And, yes, the last remaining DVD rental shop in your town, no matter how small and mom-n-pop is almost guaranteed to have Casablanca on the shelves.

It really is a film that openly invites repeated viewings. Once you get past the story and performances, the production reveals itself and the film becomes a master class in efficient and effective studio factory film making. It really is an example of a production where everyone involved, from actors to the crafts people, are performing at the height of their craft. It's just fun to watch. There are so many little asides and background details going on that keep it going strong.

(About the only thing I ever have a problem with in the film is that Dooley Wilson couldn't play the piano and, apparently, couldn't fake it, either.)
posted by Thorzdad at 9:36 AM on February 27, 2017 [12 favorites]


And Madeleine LeBeau, who was featured in close-up in the La Marseillaise scene:
Marie Madeleine Berthe Le­Beau was born near Paris in the early 1920s — the dates fluctuate between 1921 and 1923. In her teens, she landed a tiny role in a play with Dalio, who was about 20 years her senior and struck by her beauty. They soon married, and Ms. LeBeau made her screen debut in a 1939 drama, “Young Girls in Trouble.”

The next year, they left Paris just hours ahead of the invading German army; Dalio’s image had been used in Nazi posters to identify Jewish-looking features. They made their way to Lisbon and, using what turned out to be forged Chilean visas, booked passage on a Portuguese cargo ship, the Quanza, that was taking more than 300 refugees to the west.

Many of the passengers were not allowed to disembark in New York or the next port-of-call, Veracruz, Mexico. However, Dalio and Ms. LeBeau secured temporary Canadian visas in Mexico and made their way to California.
posted by sallybrown at 9:37 AM on February 27, 2017 [23 favorites]


Favorite movie. Well, this, and Shaun of the Dead. Top two. And they're a lot alike, actually:

- Every single line of dialog has gobs of meaning on two or more levels and greatly benefits from repeated viewing. Zero wasted dialog.
- Timeline occurs during a period of resistance against an overwhelming foe, and the foe both directly and abstractly reflects the protagonist's own inner conflict.
- Addresses the meaning of conventional romance when the romance isn't center stage, and how the parts of the romance that fall away during such an event aren't quite what you'd assume they would be.
- Realistically addresses the nature of friendship.
- Explores themes of selfishness vs. selflessness, idealism, self-preservation.

I've watched them both dozens of times and they're worthwhile every time.
posted by mochapickle at 10:00 AM on February 27, 2017 [24 favorites]


people in the German film and theater industries who fled to the U.S. while the Nazis were in power and went to work at American studios.

Also, a lot of classical music people who fled Europe ended up in the film business, which used to need a lot of violin players
posted by thelonius at 10:02 AM on February 27, 2017 [1 favorite]


Does the fact that it isn't available to stream anywhere have something to do with it's sudden dip in popularity?

It's available on Amazon video (rent/buy).
posted by okayokayigive at 10:03 AM on February 27, 2017 [1 favorite]


It's a brilliant film, and if your "contrarian hot take" is to say otherwise, it likely reflects poorly on you

Also the Beatles are the Best Band Evar
posted by grumpybear69 at 10:06 AM on February 27, 2017 [1 favorite]


Where do we begin?

By trying to say what you are talking about???
posted by thelonius at 10:18 AM on February 27, 2017


Also the Beatles are the Best Band Evar

If you think about the sheer variety of their output, the Beatles were four or five of the best bands ever.
posted by justsomebodythatyouusedtoknow at 10:32 AM on February 27, 2017 [14 favorites]


I am always gripped emotionally by stories in which the characters face impossible situations and end up sacrificing their own happiness for honor and the greater good, like Camelot and Sommersby. Casablanca is tops in that category, because it's a damn well-made movie besides. I told my kids that the best love stories have unhappy endings, but I should have clarified that further, because Romeo and Juliet and Gone With The Wind ended unhappily for no greater good at all.
posted by Miss Cellania at 10:41 AM on February 27, 2017 [4 favorites]


Does the fact that it isn't available to stream anywhere have something to do with it's sudden dip in popularity?

It's available on Amazon video (rent/buy).


Tangent, but I was looking at the NYT list of where to find the Oscar-nominated movies, and it seems like "streaming" has come to mean "for free, or at least included with a subscription of some sort", as opposed to "available to rent/buy over the Internet", for instance:
‘O.J.: Made in America’
...
Where to watch: Stream it on Hulu or purchase at iTunes or Amazon.
posted by Etrigan at 10:47 AM on February 27, 2017 [3 favorites]


My experience of Casablanca is so different than what's presented here, but I could just be an outlier. For me, Casablanca is much more about moral courage, putting others before oneself, and enduring loss than it is about Rick's (or Bogart's) masculinity...and for these reasons it's more relevant to me now than ever. This was a film made by immigrants and refugees!

I want to highlight this because I think it's the predominant narrative about Casablanca that's shown up in the Trump era, and in that, it's a lot more fascinating than then 'cultural artifact gradually loses relevance as tastes and tastemakers change', which really doesn't tell us much about the film and little more about the people who liked or rejected it. Gen X didn't like it as much as the Boomers did, and critics nowadays are as likely to have their tastes established when Casablanca was popular as when it wasn't. The examples of Casablanca in popular culture are old - you're talking about 25 years since it was expected that people watched Casablanca, 50 since it was a Woody Allen plot point. The reason why literature tends to last longer than a generation or two tends to be because we teach it (and force people to read it), but we don't teach film as universally as we teach literature.

Also, it's not necessarily the lack of Casablanca on streaming that might have hurt it - canistream.it lists decent if not universal coverage on different platforms. But simply the firehose of film experiences that are available now means that it's more difficult for older films to come to the forefront unless there's a specific reason to seek them out. Like, for example, you're looking for some good fighting fascism movies.

So if Casablanca is in fact getting a mini-resurgence and a slightly different read on it (which was more similar to the original read of the film, from what I understand of it) because of Trump, that's a lot more interesting, and it makes me wonder what it's going to do for the popularity of Casablanca in five to twenty years time. I mean, it's not really the same thing as tumblr becoming obsessed with an 170 year-old short story for a month or whatever is going on with the I lik the bred poem, but the way that newer forms of media literacy interact with older objects is pretty damn interesting.

And really, this is probably the least problematic in his masculinity that Bogart had been in his entire career. If they had made this argument about pretty much any other classic film that Bogart had starred in, I'd have believed it a little more.
posted by dinty_moore at 11:04 AM on February 27, 2017 [13 favorites]


All of this is to say that I am now going to create a bunch of Casablanca gifs and see how far they can go.
posted by dinty_moore at 11:14 AM on February 27, 2017 [5 favorites]


Wait... Casablanca is problematic?
posted by jeff-o-matic at 11:21 AM on February 27, 2017


Welp, Rick is only the hero of the film in the way that World War II is all about the US. I mean it is, insofar as it's a bit part of the country's history, but behind the scenes quietly finding his own moral center is Claude Rains as Renault as the personification of Europe and its beautiful friendship with the States. The scene when he drops the Vichy water in the bin is THE seminal moment of the film.
posted by low_horrible_immoral at 11:27 AM on February 27, 2017 [24 favorites]


I think the piece was distorted by relying so much on the take Woody Allen provided in Play It Again, Sam. Casablanca is filtered both through Allen's own perspective and the imagined perspective of the character he created for his movie. It emphasizes the features that were useful to Allen as a actor/writer/director creating a comedy several decades after Casablanca was released. I don't think Miller's contention (that what Allen took from the film for that specific purpose is a good guide to what most of its fans valued in the movie) is well-supported in her piece.
posted by layceepee at 11:30 AM on February 27, 2017 [5 favorites]


The Underpants Monster: A couple of months ago, I was watching a documentary (oh, how I wish I could remember the title, so I could link to it!) about people in the German film and theater industries who fled to the U.S. while the Nazis were in power and went to work at American studios.

Was it this one?
posted by non canadian guy at 11:31 AM on February 27, 2017 [2 favorites]


Wait... Casablanca is problematic?

If all you have is a problematizer, everything is problematic
posted by thelonius at 11:32 AM on February 27, 2017 [25 favorites]


So, the treatment of Ilsa is genuinely problematic. She doesn't have much agency or moral center or purpose in the story except to vacillate between Rick or Victor as the plot requires. So, if you want to make an issue of that, there's a lot of material there.

I haven't read TFA because I don't have time for Slate contrarianism or Slate counter-contrarianism. But if it tries to make an issue out of Rick's masculinity rather than Ilsa's existence as a McGuffin on par with the letters of transit, then, uh... I don't know what to say about that.
posted by tobascodagama at 11:39 AM on February 27, 2017 [1 favorite]


Casablanca is the Citizen Kane of movies.
posted by blue_beetle at 11:43 AM on February 27, 2017 [19 favorites]


Well, it is a very old movie, and I doubt anyone sees it as a moral blueprint for how to live your life in 2017.

I agree that the Ilsa character is weakly written, but problematic?
posted by jeff-o-matic at 11:45 AM on February 27, 2017 [3 favorites]


As the book itself says (I'm quoting from another review) of the 14 credited on-screen roles, only three were played by American-born actors: Bogart, Dooley Wilson, and Joy Page (who plays the Bulgarian refugee Annina). Overall, actors from over 30 nations were involved as extras or uncredited roles.
posted by YoungStencil at 11:55 AM on February 27, 2017 [4 favorites]


I agree that the Ilsa character is weakly written, but problematic?

As Ebert points out, the screenwriters literally did not know which character she'd end up with during most of filming, which actually lends believability to her performance -- she has to play each scene ambiguously, so as to support either outcome.
posted by Gelatin at 11:56 AM on February 27, 2017 [3 favorites]


Wait... Casablanca is problematic?

The movie carries a lot of the racist and sexist baggage of its time. For example, Ilsa calls Sam "boy" when she first arrives at Rick's.
posted by jedicus at 11:57 AM on February 27, 2017 [5 favorites]


Lighten up, Francis.
I used the word might, which in this context means, I hadn't heard that it is, but wouldn't be surprised to find it had become. As I stated at the beginning of my comment, I'm pretty fucking self centered, also I'm pretty goddamned old, things that are cherished and important to me (On The Road, anyone?) have become over time, problematic to younger folks, and folks with better education than I. Values and views change. So perhaps it hasn't become problematic, in which case, yay team! Meanwhile, rewatch, maybe with a critical eye. Or just for the fuck of it. Anyway, I love the film and I'm glad it's not problematic to you.
posted by evilDoug at 12:00 PM on February 27, 2017 [2 favorites]


"racist and sexist baggage of its time."

Yes, agreed. But is that a PROBLEM? I see it as a learning experience, a snapshot of history.
posted by jeff-o-matic at 12:00 PM on February 27, 2017 [2 favorites]


Is this really the correct forum to debate the meaning of the word problematic? Sorry I mentioned the word, all.
posted by dinty_moore at 12:02 PM on February 27, 2017 [4 favorites]


Is this really the correct forum to debate the meaning of the word problematic?

I seriously cannot think of a more correct forum for this, but peace out.
posted by jeff-o-matic at 12:06 PM on February 27, 2017 [3 favorites]


Of course Casablanca has problems, by modern lights and by those of the time. Sam is called "boy", but that's of the era. When Rick sells his cafe to Ferrari, HE SELLS SAM WITH THE CAFE. That's awful, even by the standards of the time (yes, yes, he sells Sam's contract, still pretty gross). Everyone but the hero is a collection of their national stereotypes (maybe excepting Carl).

They are valid criticisms, and Casablanca is still lovable. Casablanca succeeds despite these issues.
posted by aureliobuendia at 12:28 PM on February 27, 2017 [3 favorites]


I came here for the ignorant and poorly-expressed opinions.
Ignorant and poorly-expressed? This is Metafilter!
I was misinformed.
posted by librosegretti at 12:29 PM on February 27, 2017 [4 favorites]


I doubt anyone sees it as a moral blueprint for how to live your life in 2017.

Allons enfants de la Patrie,
Le jour de gloire est arrivé!
posted by No Robots at 12:45 PM on February 27, 2017 [6 favorites]


But is Casablanca really becoming irrelevant faster than other classic movies of the same time period?

All the youngs have feels for the unbearable litness of Andy Hardy's Double Life now.
posted by Alvy Ampersand at 12:56 PM on February 27, 2017 [3 favorites]


I've watched Casablanca in multiple film classes. I respect it for what it is, and current events have helped me appreciate it more, but after dissecting it several times, I can't bear to watch it again. All About Eve is better written, and--as cringey as the Act I scene with the Black cook is--Sullivan's Travels works better for me as a film.
posted by pxe2000 at 1:03 PM on February 27, 2017 [1 favorite]


When Rick sells his cafe to Ferrari, HE SELLS SAM WITH THE CAFE. That's awful, even by the standards of the time (yes, yes, he sells Sam's contract, still pretty gross).

It's the same as with any similar transaction in 2017. All that changes is the signage. The employees come with the buyout. They're free to leave, of course, and so was Sam.
posted by Thorzdad at 1:09 PM on February 27, 2017 [3 favorites]


When Rick sells his cafe to Ferrari, HE SELLS SAM WITH THE CAFE. That's awful, even by the standards of the time (yes, yes, he sells Sam's contract, still pretty gross).

I do love this movie and I've seen it countless times, but if it's one thing that always leaves me slightly disappointed, it's what happens with Sam, who is maybe the most noble character in the film. Part of me wants to see him walking off into the fog alongside Rick and Renault at the end of the movie.
posted by dashdash at 1:11 PM on February 27, 2017 [3 favorites]


It's the same as with any similar transaction in 2017. All that changes is the signage. The employees come with the buyout. They're free to leave, of course, and so was Sam.

In his negotiation with Ferrari, Bogart says as much. I just watched it the other night, so I'm embarrassed i can't remember the names precisely, but he says something to the effect that Carl, Abdul, and Sasha keep their jobs, or it's no deal, and Ferrari agrees that "Rick's wouldn't be Rick's without them."

Ferrari does joke when Rick says he doesn't buy or sell human beings that they're Casablanca's leading commodity, but that's likely to establish how corrupt and cyclical he is.
posted by Gelatin at 1:13 PM on February 27, 2017 [2 favorites]


aureliobuendia: "When Rick sells his cafe to Ferrari, HE SELLS SAM WITH THE CAFE. That's awful, even by the standards of the time (yes, yes, he sells Sam's contract, still pretty gross)."

Rick does not sell Sam, or his contract, to Ferrari. He sells on the condition that (a) Sam retain his 25% equity in the business1 and that (b) Sam, Abdul, Carl, and Sasha all keep their jobs. You may be confusing the actual terms of sale with the negotiations earlier in the film when Ferrari asks, 'What do you want for Sam?' and Rick responds, 'I don't buy or sell human beings.' It seems fairly clear to me that, by the time Rick agrees to sell, Sam (and Abdul, Carl, and Sasha) have assented to stay on after the bar changes hands to ensure a smooth transition. Casablanca is indeed problematic (Ilsa does refer to Sam as 'boy'), but not, I think, in this particular respect.

1 Yes, yes, I know: 'I happen to know that he gets ten percent. But he's worth twenty-five.' But do you really trust Ferrari to tell the truth in the middle of a negotiation like this? It's Sydney bloody Greenstreet!
posted by Zeinab Badawi's Twenty Hotels at 1:13 PM on February 27, 2017 [19 favorites]


It's also worth noting that Rick's is a place for people with no where else to go, that's sort of the hook, so Sam by dint of being there may too be one of those people and concern about his staying with the place is to provide for his remaining in Casablanca.
posted by gusottertrout at 1:18 PM on February 27, 2017


Part of me wants to see him walking off into the fog alongside Rick and Renault at the end of the movie.

I assume Tim Schaefer feels the same way, because the second act of Grim Fandango is a pretty heavy-handed (in a charming way) Casablanca pastiche where at the end the Rick and Sam analogues sail away to have an adventure.
posted by Copronymus at 1:20 PM on February 27, 2017 [5 favorites]


Rick does not sell Sam, or his contract, to Ferrari. He sells on the condition that (a) Sam retain his 25% equity in the business1 and that (b) Sam, Abdul, Carl, and Sasha all keep their jobs. You may be confusing the actual terms of sale with the negotiations earlier in the film when Ferrari asks, 'What do you want for Sam?' and Rick responds, 'I don't buy or sell human beings.' It seems fairly clear to me that, by the time Rick agrees to sell, Sam (and Abdul, Carl, and Sasha) have assented to stay on after the bar changes hands to ensure a smooth transition.

You know what, you're right (and a few other posters are as well). Serves me right for posting from memory.
posted by aureliobuendia at 1:31 PM on February 27, 2017 [3 favorites]


Apparently someone deployed the problematizer up thread.
posted by Pembquist at 1:36 PM on February 27, 2017 [3 favorites]


I'm shocked, shocked to find discussion of problematic faves in this establishment!

look, I've been sitting on that one for like two hours, I only have so much self control
posted by dinty_moore at 1:42 PM on February 27, 2017 [22 favorites]


Now I need to do a test viewing on my daughters and their friends.

The weird thing is, the way I've been taught it is that Casablanca is a pop culture icon, rather than "a good film", meaning that I am allowed to enjoy it and know parts by heart, but it is not comparable to say, Stalker. I'm fine with that, and won't argue.
posted by mumimor at 1:53 PM on February 27, 2017 [3 favorites]


aureliobuendia: "You know what, you're right (and a few other posters are as well). Serves me right for posting from memory."

No worries: I had to pull out my DVD of Casablanca to check my intuition, and I poured myself a whiskey because I knew I'd be doing some hard work (scrubbing back and forth to check the dialogue), and as a result I'm now basically just straight-up watching the rest of Casablanca while drinking Jameson's in my slippers. I tip my glass to you, Colonel!
posted by Zeinab Badawi's Twenty Hotels at 1:58 PM on February 27, 2017 [11 favorites]


I love Casablanca, but there's a sense in which Laura Miller is right that the movie is so much better known and more "indelible" than other films of the period -- and that it carries so much cultural weight as being the "quintessential product of the Hollywood studio system" (as though that's a horrible thing) and "a cult object for a generation or two of cinephiles, particularly young men" -- that it is very hard to see it with fresh eyes, even if you squint really hard. Still, the idea that it's somehow less relevant to people now because of the receding memory of the "radiant dreams" of World War II or whatever is stretching it. Casablanca's not less relevant because of WWII receding in importance, it's less relevant because most movies that are older than 10 or 20 years old are irrelevant and totally out of context to people who never grew up watching many movies, period, especially older movies. Movies themselves are not so much of a thing as they once were, and they may never be again.

The thing that struck me when Casey Affleck made his little remark last night that "[o]ne of the first people who taught me how to act was Denzel Washington" was that with Affleck's win, Denzel still hasn't won an Oscar since Training Day in 2002. That's an eternity in social media years. In fact, I'm sure someone looking for clicks could put up an argument why any cultural-landmark film you can name that was made 10 or 15 or 20 years ago is no longer relevant because of the post-9/11 landscape, changing mores, generational swings, or any number of other great-sounding reasons.
posted by blucevalo at 2:08 PM on February 27, 2017 [5 favorites]


I didn't realize that it had really lost that much prestige.

With 99% of the people who love and respect the film, it hasn't, but every decade adds more classics to the list of great films, so the top 100 is in constant flux.
posted by Beholder at 2:14 PM on February 27, 2017 [1 favorite]


a cult object for a generation or two of cinephiles, particularly young men

I missed that bit in the article when I skimmed it, and that actually might represent a big part of the problem of the alleged loss of standing. Classic Hollywood movies are, from my haphazard studying over the years, in general enjoyed much less by men than they are by women, while at the same time women are considerably less likely to engage in online discussions and ratings of movies than are men, so some of the effect may be less about Casablanca losing its status as the online world not being able to accurately reflect mass appreciation of cinema due to so much of the centers for ratings and discussion being dominated by young men who actively quest to push movies like The Dark Knight to the top of the whatever charts they are looking at. There is, I suspect, more involved with the gender splits then that, regarding both "classic" movies and movie portals, but I haven't the desire to go into that rant right now.
posted by gusottertrout at 2:24 PM on February 27, 2017 [5 favorites]


I have now finished my nth rewatch of Casablanca and I have nothing useful to add to the superb conversation above except that I have also just looked over the cast list, and I'm ready for the version with Hedy Lamarr as Ilsa and Ella Fitzgerald as Sam. I hear there's a Free French battalion over at Brazzaville; they might have a copy.
posted by Zeinab Badawi's Twenty Hotels at 2:48 PM on February 27, 2017 [4 favorites]


Funny how I remember Casablanca as being an old dusty movie when I was a kid in the '70s and realizing now that it was only about 35 years old at the time. So roughly the same age as The Thing or Bladerunner is now.
posted by octothorpe at 2:53 PM on February 27, 2017 [10 favorites]


it carries so much cultural weight as being the "quintessential product of the Hollywood studio system"

I think you've hit the nail on the head here - Auteur theory (and its undeniable slant/bias towards men) continues to rise in prominence and value; Casablanca is really the antithesis to that in so many respects. I think this idea indirectly threatens a lot of the sacred cows that a generation of critics and audiences have set up, ie "how can you make a great movie without a singular and arresting vision from one or two men?"

This idea of collaborative, iterative/incremental filmmaking is of course one that is still largely in practice today and many filmmakers call that out, but it undermines many critical approaches to a text. It also plays into broader stereotypes about the artistic process, artist as lone genius etc etc.

It doesn't help that the studio system - what's left of it, at any rate - mainly throws up utter shite these days, even as mass entertainment.

It's interesting, are Marvel movies the closest thing we have to a traditional studio system now??
posted by smoke at 3:04 PM on February 27, 2017 [5 favorites]


Casablanca is the Citizen Kane of movies.

Haha good line but I don't really think it's right. Orson Welles was very self-consciously trying to make a great movie when he made CK, and by all accounts he did; I have told numerous people who don't understand the importance of CK that you really need to see some of the movies made before it to understand just how much it advanced the art of movie making. (A good foil is the Howard Hughes 1932 version of Scarface which was a great movie in its own right, but which looks amateurish and stiff next to CK.)

Casablanca by contrast was just trying to entertain and sell tickets, and it became what it was because of a superb synergy among the skilled pros who made up its moving parts. You can't really point at anything Casablanca invented that hadn't been seen before, as you can with so many things in CK. It's just that everyone involved with Casablanca did their job superbly, and all those jobs dovetailed without any of the clashes that usually arise when a random group of people try to collaborate on a large project. It was a perfectly ordinary film of its day, but just worked outstandingly well.
posted by Bringer Tom at 3:59 PM on February 27, 2017 [6 favorites]


I must have seen the 50th anniversary print when it was re-issued on the big screen in 1992. At 16, I loved it wholeheartedly, but I'd been primed for it by a family that had been exposing me to classic films all my life. I already knew Claude Rains from the Adventures of Robin Hood and Bogart from The Maltese Falcon and The African Queen. But I only knew Ingrid Bergman from the Murder on the Orient Express, filmed when she was nearly 60. So that was a revelation.

I haven't seen it in many years, but it's definitely been referenced a bunch by friends on social media recently, what with the Nazi-thwarting and all. Clearly time for a re-watch!
posted by merriment at 4:12 PM on February 27, 2017 [2 favorites]


>>The Underpants Monster: A couple of months ago, I was watching a documentary (oh, how I wish I could remember the title, so I could link to it!) about people in the German film and theater industries who fled to the U.S. while the Nazis were in power and went to work at American studios.

>Was it this one?
posted by non canadian guy at 11:31 AM on February 27 [+] [!]


I believe so! Thanks!
posted by The Underpants Monster at 5:48 PM on February 27, 2017


Still, the idea that it's somehow less relevant to people now because of the receding memory of the "radiant dreams" of World War II or whatever is stretching it. Casablanca's not less relevant because of WWII receding in importance, it's less relevant because most movies that are older than 10 or 20 years old are irrelevant and totally out of context to people who never grew up watching many movies, period, especially older movies.

Point

Counterpoint
posted by non canadian guy at 6:11 PM on February 27, 2017 [1 favorite]


But simply the firehose of film experiences that are available now means that it's more difficult for older films to come to the forefront unless there's a specific reason to seek them out.

I think this has a lot to do with it. You can find endless entertainment on Netflix and similar, depending on your tastes and your quality requirements. That's great to an extent, but it means there's little reason to venture outside the comfort zone of whatever's trending in a category or what your service is recommending. That unfortunately doesn't leave a lot of room for exploration, which is a real shame, because there's a ton of great films out there.

What I think also doesn't help is that many people have a weirdly skewed view of what older movies are like. I get the impression many think the movies of the '30s/'40s in particular are low-fi early film experiments, with jittery reels and no sound (it's almost like they're transposing reality backwards by about 20-30 years). I think the average person who hasn't seen e.g. It Happened One Night or Foreign Correspondent or The Thin Man or Philadelphia Story or The Maltese Falcon (etc, etc) would be shocked at how well they hold up, both in terms of how good they look and how sophisticated the visual language being employed is.
posted by tocts at 6:55 PM on February 27, 2017 [5 favorites]


it means there's little reason to venture outside the comfort zone of whatever's trending in a category or what your service is recommending

This is certainly a big part of the problem. I didn't see Casablanca until about 10 years ago, when I was in my early 40's, and it was because a more film-aware friend got wind that I hadn't ever seen it (he was shocked, SHOCKED I tell you) and he insisted on screening it for me. And it was awesome.
posted by Bringer Tom at 7:18 PM on February 27, 2017


What I think also doesn't help is that many people have a weirdly skewed view of what older movies are like.

This is definitely a thing, IME. My spouse was unable to get past his conceptions of the period to be able to watch a Fred Astaire movie (one I had put on while talking about how much I loved Fred Astaire) with any charity of interpretation. And it wasn't even a matter of running up against the incidental and omnipresent racism, sexism, and antisemitism common to movies of the time, he just couldn't deal with the manners and demeanor.
posted by Lexica at 7:19 PM on February 27, 2017


Yeah, many people I know in my age group (mid-thirties) have this aversion to classic movies. Even just movies made before about 1985, which is when our first film memories were forming. It's various elements that turn them off: the "old-fashioned" acting styles, lesser visual quality, black and white-ness (this is a big one), special effects, and pacing. (I love Casablanca and many other classics, for the record.)

It's a shame but modern movies have set expectations that some people just can't set aside to approach a classic film with an open mind. And as others have mentioned, with so, so many movies out there to watch, it seems to take a certain personality to want to go back to the classics. Probably the same personality that wants to sit down with a 19th century novel, rather than whatever YA vampire series is currently popular.

Yes, I realize how snobby that sounds!
posted by good in a vacuum at 7:41 PM on February 27, 2017


One of my favorite movies--definitely top five.

The remarkable thing about Casablanca is that essentially every character was a cliche, yet it avoids being trite. Of course, one of the things that makes it so endearing is that there are so many quotable lines. My favorite is "I am shocked, shocked to find there is gambling going on in here."

Another remarkable aspect is that the movie was made when the outcome of the WWII was still very much in doubt. That context is quite difficult for us to appreciate now.
posted by haiku warrior at 8:10 PM on February 27, 2017 [8 favorites]


Things are very bad there. The devil has the people by the throat.

...I replied recently when asked about the USA
posted by bonefish at 10:16 PM on February 27, 2017 [7 favorites]


> Another remarkable aspect is that the movie was made when the outcome of the WWII was still very much in doubt. That context is quite difficult for us to appreciate now.

uhhhhhh
posted by You Can't Tip a Buick at 11:41 PM on February 27, 2017 [2 favorites]


I think you've hit the nail on the head here - Auteur theory (and its undeniable slant/bias towards men) continues to rise in prominence and value

It's true, I think, that Curtiz and by extension Casablanca is done no favors by the auteur theory in no small part due to some fundamental incoherence in how the theory was developed and applied. As a general tenet, the idea that the director is the most significant creative force in the making of a movie is largely correct, except when it isn't. In the case of Casablanca it is both true and not simultaneously.

For most film goers, including hardcore cinephiles, categorizing or cataloging experiences in some fashion in order to form comparatives to expand their enjoyment of the film is a signal demand in what they appreciate and view. For most casual film goers this is often by sorting out their choices by genre or stars, while for an "auteurist" its by director. Each of these elements work in roughly the same way, where one's past appreciation is used as a measure for one's current understanding of what is being viewed. It provides a focus for what you are watching and a way to catalog those experiences into a larger whole which then, ideally, acts as an intensifier of the experience as the current movie gains added meaning by what one has brought to it and how that focuses one's attention.

In this way film viewing is largely genre based, where genre may mean films linked by actor or director or subject matter or something more esoteric that serves as a connection for the viewer to what they are seeing. Watching John Ford films, in the auteurist sense, gains in continued appreciation as one connects what is taken as Ford's concerns and methods from film to film and by dint of paying attention to those things appreciates them more. With an actor, its similar, one uses their past performances as a sort of genre guide to their future performances and builds expectations based on the characteristics the viewer believes they've showed over time and through that is more attentive to nuance within narrower bounds or gives more leeway to expression since it is coming from a place the viewer is familiar with. Viewers can, of course, be disappointed when a performer strays "too far" from their expected boundaries and confuses the viewer, just as a director can do if they make something different than expected or film can disappoint thematically if it doesn't adhere to the viewers sense of norms. Attention shapes appreciation and appreciation is heightened by attention, it's a self fulfilling cycle if things fit the viewers expected pattern while altering it just enough to provide novelty or something extra.

With Curtiz this is a problem since he doesn't have a clear set of concerns or methods like a director like Ford. In part this is due to Curtiz not having the same sort of control over his projects that Ford developed, the auteur theory is often as much a measure of power and control in that sense as anything else. Ford started out making a fairly wide variety of films, and up until Stagecoach, he might have been seen as a talented but not exceptionally remarkable director given all the experimenting being done in the 20s and 30s. Lewis Milestone, for example, could easily be seen as the more daring and creative director up through the thirties, with a number of bold and successful films to his credit, All Quiet on the Western Front, Rain, The Front Page, and Hallelujah I'm a Bum are an exceptional string of films showing a strong style that are every bit as notable as the films Ford worked on in that same time frame. Ford, however, seized more control over his productions and narrowed his focus to a smaller set of interests which he mostly continued to examine over the rest of his career, which makes his body of work more immediately rewarding to examine for "themes" and visual techniques.

Curtiz, didn't narrow his focus. He kept working on a wide variety of vastly different kinds of films, from action adventure films like Captain Blood and The Adventures of Robin Hood, to musicals like Yankee Doodle Dandy and Night and Day, to melodramas like Mildred Pierce, bio pics and so on. This wasn't uncommon for Hollywood, many very talented directors did the same, perhaps sorting through assignments and choosing the ones that interested them at times, but also taking what the studio wanted to give them to work on at other times.

At the same time, it's hard to deny Curtiz's abilities given how important so many of the 170 films he made are to film history or just how enjoyable they continue to be to watch if one is open to the experience. At the same time, unlike Ford or Howard Hawks, Curtiz made a number of movies that don't stand out as all that significant. Some seem tied to news events of the time or to celebrities that no longer carry much meaning while others are in genres that don't get much respect or have much "serious" study in the main cinephile circles. For example, during one stretch of five films, Curtiz made two with Danny Thomas, one a bio-pic about songwriter Gus Kahn and his wife, portrayed by Doris Day, entitled I'll See You In My Dreams, which is a fine little tearjerker but not the kind of film or stars that people are looking to find meaning in anymore, two were with Will Rogers Jr., one a biopic of Rogers Sr and the other an attempt to make Jr a star like his old man, which didn't happen. The fifth was a John Wayne/Donna Reed film called Trouble Along the Way, which is interesting, I mean I think it's pretty great, but it's also a mess from most conventional angles, refusing expected pleasures and opting for less tidy and easily resolved solutions instead.

I mention all of that to get to this; auteurism is strongly tied to themes and themes are based in language, or at least discussed through language to be understood, which places the director at least partially in the role of screenwriter. When people talk about John Ford, they talk about reoccurring themes in his films that creep up again and again because they were of interest to Ford and he choose films about those themes. With Curtiz, much of that thematic connection is lost since he didn't choose his films in the same manner as Ford, so there is less clear connections to discuss and therefore less clear continuing ideas to pay attention to in watching his body of work and thus less opportunity for a Curtiz "genre" to form itself in one's mind and be enriched in the same way as with Ford.

Curtiz is rather famous for not being fluent in spoken English. He never wholly learned it to his comfort and was often caught making malapropisms. He could, however, read English and understood it well enough to also be noted for the research he put into his films, so, my theory is that for Curtiz themes aren't so much in language, which his films have many more "voices" by dint of not being as concerned with the spoken word in its meaning, but more in the effect of speaking and even more in action, both of the cast and with his camera. So in this theory, Curtiz doesn't translate into the same kind of consistent thematic voice as someone like Ford because his films literally speak so differently from one to the next. Curtiz instead gave more concern to the relationships within the films absent the words, or in the case of Casablanca perhaps one might say despite the words which are a polyglot of different versions of accented English.

Curtiz shows considerable interest in flawed characters, people who don't always do the right thing, or who need to learn to do it through working past their flaws when the story is a more heroic one. Yet Curtiz also allows his cast members a much wider range of expression than many directors do, there aren't the same kinds of Curtiz "types" like with Hawks, he allows the actors their own voices and focuses instead on how they interact with each other. He isn't shaping to a unified whole where all the cast is singing from the same song book, but lets each find the tune most suitable to them. This also seems to allow the screenwriters more leeway in their words, with his films sometimes being eloquent and wordy, sometimes clumsy and muted. With top notch screenwriting, such as in Casablanca, this provides immediate and satisfying pleasure as the words themselves are a joy and each actor is allowed their manner of delivery. While in other films there may not be such immediate pleasure, but there is often a different sort of appreciation one can gain that comes from characters speaking clumsily if that too fits the totality of the concept from the writer's point of view.

It's instructive to watch Passage to Marseille made two years after Casablanca with much of the same cast. The tone of the movie and the way the actors express themselves is vastly different, with most of the pleasures and feel of Casablanca absented for a more bitter or even ugly view of the war. Bogart is downright shocking, I mean actually shocking, not Renault style, in his brutality, so the film is a defiance of expectation and, in a way, of genre by not fitting closely with the more romanticized perspective of Casablanca. Yet at the same time the movie is also pretty interesting in its own right, not the least reason being its story is a multiple layered flashback, which one flashback is set in another which is set in another which set in another for five nested layers of the past at one point, where memories keep expanding from memories. It's fascinating and worth seeing if one takes pleasure in how films are constructed.

I could go on with some of Curtiz's other films, like the awesome and nutty horror film Doctor X, or teh sexy shipboard crime romance thriller Mandalay, or even just the performances Curtiz gets from such a diverse cast of stars he's worked with, from John Garfield to Errol Flynn, Joan Crawford to Doris Day, there's a lot of interest in his body of work even absent strong "themes". But as I've gone on at considerable length I'll just add that a director can be an "auteur" and still a collaborator if one is consistently bringing out the best from the material one is working with, but far better to dump the idea of "auteur" in its incoherence save for trying to appreciate those artists behind and in front of the cameras for their long histories of good work as what it is, not by how one can name and catalog it.
posted by gusottertrout at 2:14 AM on February 28, 2017 [19 favorites]


What a beautifully constructed and erudite analysis, gusottertrout. Thank you so much for sharing it.
posted by smoke at 3:28 AM on February 28, 2017 [1 favorite]


There are some directors that echo the model you describe, though neither so profligate nor so excellent. James Mangold has a history of highly varied studio films, for example. I'm always interested in what he puts together, because it's usually competent at the least and, sometimes surprising.
posted by smoke at 3:36 AM on February 28, 2017


For me, best epitomized by the scene where he's talking with Renault, and Major Strasser, and the jig is obviously up, the Nazis are coming in and taking over and there's not a thing a small time bar owner can do about it but sneer in the face of the enemy and bide his time.

Claude Rains, in Casablanca

posted by Sebmojo at 5:48 AM on February 28, 2017


Thanks smoke, much appreciated. You're right about Mangold, and there are a number of directors currently working that could work in something like the old studio system, though they'd need to learn to work much much faster than current trends allow. (Actually directors used to working on TV schedules would probably do fine with the tempo since tv shoots are much shorter.)

I just watched the movie Steve Jobs and was reflecting on Danny Boyle likely being a good example of a sort of modern version of the old A film directors, Tom Hooper, in a different vein, too shows the ability to work with heavy dialogue scripts of the sort that were thought of as prestige pictures before directors were allegedly supposed to have strong personalities of their own. Sam Mendes reminds me a little of the A+ kind of directors like William Wyler, who, inexplicably, isn't considered much of an auteur despite his strong visual sense and unerring knack for picking interesting movies. Mendes isn't quite as strong in that latter sense, but he too gets knocked for making what Manny Farber called White Elephant art instead of the grittier and allegedly more personal "termite" art Farber preferred, a value many cineastes have taken on as their own.

Along with that are the directors and writers who also seem to have a deeper attachment to classic Hollywood. The Coens ape that writing style frequently with their punchy dialogue as does Sorkin, though without the sense of irony or distance of the Coens. Wes Anderson too likes that style of dialogue and with his use of stock players seems to have some affinity to the Preston Sturges manner of filmmaking, though with an added dose of an almost Kubrickian fetish for complete control of the entire creative process.

So it's an interesting mix, with some directors being able to switch genres and styles easily, Steve Soderbergh made a point of that purposefully trying to follow in that classic model, while other directors seem like they couldn't make a movie that carried their signature even if they tried. I mean Scorsese's great but every film he makes is pretty unmistakably his, or at the least exhibiting a point of view from outside the story itself, that of its maker. So that seems to me to be the real tension in film appreciation from those who care about it in any detail, the tension between films that bear a definite personality of the maker's view of the story and the films that seem more to hold their own counsel, with the story itself dictating its terms of presentation.

There is, of course, a wide gulf between those two poles where most filmmakers work, showing something of their methods and concerns while trying to either efface themselves or put the story first to those who want to add a little extra flare to otherwise perhaps too conventional of works. Neither method in itself, I think, need be considered "better" just having different manners of approach and requiring different methods of appreciation to enjoy.
posted by gusottertrout at 6:22 AM on February 28, 2017 [1 favorite]


gusottertrout took a bit out of my sail (always good as usual)! But here's my 2 cents. I think mumimor and others have the right take - Casablanca as pop culture icon with a massive cultural weight, rather than "a good film" (like the director's fun & equally iconic Adventures of Robin Hood). When I was in university, 20+ years ago, that is how it was taught to me (hence my confusion in the posted article - because I think its been in active decline a long time). When we watched it in class (projected film no less), my too cool for school classmates and I (almost all men) savaged Casablanca in our discussions afterwards. In hindsight, while I'm still not a huge fan of Casablanca (Third Man, which has some similar themes, is a much better film for instance) it is pretty hard to deny its staying power. I wonder if part of its appeal is that everyone seems to be making the same movie - no stylised acting choices, direction is not overly showy but competent, the script uncomplicated & serviceable but mature and the film seems to capture that zeitgeist of that time so well. The director Michael Curtiz had a long career incidentally and made a lot of pictures, so if you like this check out some of his other stuff. Mildred Pierce (out on Criterion recently) for instance I think might be his actual best picture. That's a film that has stayed with me. I kind of like his Kennel Murder Case as well (mostly for William Powell though) which should be easy to find as it is public domain I believe.

Funny mumimor should mention Stalker... in the same class where I was taught Casablanca the biggest hater also loathed Stalker and would frequently and derisively call it "a science fiction masterpiece" with a barely concealed sneer. Which likely didn't enamored him with the instructor who idolised Tartovsky (and Russ Meyer but that's another story). Hater's pinnacle of cinematic excellence? James Cameron's True Lies.

the firehose of film experiences

While I think this is true, I think it should be clear that while there are a lot of places to find films legally they are not always complete catalogues of director's or actor's work. As an example, the young woman who works for me wanted to watch some early Joan Crawford films - she managed only to find a handful of available films and most being the more famous of her films. That results in a narrowing of our understanding of film, imposed by rights issues and disinterest by the provider & the viewer.
posted by Ashwagandha at 7:53 AM on February 28, 2017 [1 favorite]


It's a shame but modern movies have set expectations that some people just can't set aside to approach a classic film with an open mind. And as others have mentioned, with so, so many movies out there to watch, it seems to take a certain personality to want to go back to the classics. Probably the same personality that wants to sit down with a 19th century novel, rather than whatever YA vampire series is currently popular.

Agreed. The consensus seems to be that if there's no CGI and no exploding cars, why waste two and a half hours of your time?

Yes, I realize how snobby that sounds!

Not the least bit "snobby." (Nor "elitist.") Don't apologize for preferring quality.
posted by scratch at 8:46 AM on February 28, 2017


It's a shame but modern movies have set expectations that some people just can't set aside to approach a classic film with an open mind. And as others have mentioned, with so, so many movies out there to watch, it seems to take a certain personality to want to go back to the classics. Probably the same personality that wants to sit down with a 19th century novel, rather than whatever YA vampire series is currently popular.

I mean, yes and no.

For one thing, we teach people how to read a 19th century novel in school. Even if you're reading something that you weren't taught, you still probably have absorbed a little of the context and are used to things that have possibly changed - quirks in dialogue, sentence structure, various euphemisms for sex in Henry James novels, ect. You might be able to remember that Dickens was paid by the word or that in the 18th century, everyone pretended that they were writing in Latin so nobody ever ended a sentence. The average person has at least some exposure to the context of older literature in the way that you don't really get exposure to the context of older films unless you specifically set out to study it.

The other thing is that the process of reading hasn't really changed dramatically in the last few centuries. Ebooks and amazon have improved access, and serialized reading mostly went away, but that's about it. Before then, you can make the point that we were more likely to read out loud, more limited access to books, and the onset of the novel, but that's going back a ways. But how we watch film has changed immeasurably - being able to pause, being able to easily rewatch scenes. The need for visual spectacle is driven because you need a reason to convince people to not just watch whatever it is you're talking about on Netflix six months later.

And I mean, there's obviously been innovations in publishing over the last century, but nothing like the innovations as to how films are created.

So it's a lot easier to pick up a 19th century novel than someone who didn't grow up with late night Marx Brothers reruns to pick up and watch an early 20th century film.
posted by dinty_moore at 9:32 AM on February 28, 2017 [2 favorites]


Also, there's nothing wrong with tastes changing - old movies aren't objectively better than new ones or anything like that. The current means of movie production are incredibly flawed, but the studio system wasn't exactly great either. It's just acknowledging that tastes do change, and if we do want people to enjoy older films, there has to be some exposure and effort in that direction.
posted by dinty_moore at 9:46 AM on February 28, 2017


So it's a lot easier to pick up a 19th century novel than someone who didn't grow up with late night Marx Brothers reruns to pick up and watch an early 20th century film.

But see, I think this is kinda what I'm saying is part of the problem -- this assumption that what came before is so deeply different as to be actively difficult to get into.

Let me be clear: I'm in my mid-30s. I'm a livelong lover of movies, but I really only started watching "old" movies (pre-1970s) a few years ago. I admit maybe I'm an outlier, but for me personally, the big surprise was that the vast majority were easy to follow and to enjoy. All of my concerns about pacing were vastly overblown -- yes, it's different, but no, it's not unbearable. All of my concerns that maybe I wouldn't understand the cultural references, similarly so -- either they were obvious, or it didn't matter.

So, while it could be useful to give people more of a primer, I honestly think the problem is not so much that these older movies are difficult to get into without help, but that they are perceived as being so, and thus people don't even give them a first chance.
posted by tocts at 10:58 AM on February 28, 2017 [1 favorite]


they are perceived as being so, and thus people don't even give them a first chance.

I wonder if it is also partially about context. If I'm made to feel like I "have" to watch something I might be less inclined to like it or even want to watch it as one might do with some kind of healthful food (boiled kale vs a lovely kale stew). But if presented in the context of entertainment, getting past the "it looks old and fuzzy and there's no colour" attitude might be easier. For instance, my young son watched some silent comedies recently where there was live improvised music played along with them and he loved them.
posted by Ashwagandha at 11:20 AM on February 28, 2017


There should definitely be more classic movie-watching in school from 1st grade onward. Just like 19th and 20th writing is essential reading for every student today, 20th century film-making is. When kids watch current (good) film/TV/streaming series, they are only getting half the value if they don't know the classics. I know that half value is great, but I really wish schools would acknowledge that film culture is as important as literature.
This goes for other aspects of 20th century culture as well of course: music, dance, the visual arts. And it is highly political — these days, even here in liberal Scandinavia, parents would freak out if there was a movie a week at school. Once or twice a school year is enough, and it must be reasoned with all sorts of externalities. When I show movies at university (not the film department), there is a sense amongst both students and colleagues that I am winging it. Don't even ask what happens when I do collaborative teaching with the Music department. And I'm at an art school.

I get what you are saying about health food, Ashwagandha, but I also think good teachers can create a learning atmosphere where literature, film, art and music can be places of freedom and respect. That was my own experience as a kid with huge issues at school and I hope I can pass that on to my students, both at the art school and at my new job teaching engineers.
posted by mumimor at 11:54 AM on February 28, 2017 [1 favorite]


Casablanca is one of the five films I own on DVD. Because how can you not own Casablanca?
posted by ersatz at 11:38 PM on February 28, 2017 [2 favorites]


At the UU church we used to go to I ran the movie nights often with classic movies and I remember someone joking during the showing of Casablanca, "Hey this dialog is all cliches" because so many lines have gotten embedded into our language. Even if you've never seen it before, you'd already heard so many lines from it.
posted by octothorpe at 4:39 AM on March 1, 2017 [4 favorites]


Mildred Pierce (out on Criterion recently) for instance I think might be his actual best picture. That's a film that has stayed with me.

I agree - that is a fantastic movie, another one of my favorites. If you haven't seen it, do!
posted by Miko at 5:08 AM on March 1, 2017 [1 favorite]


So, while it could be useful to give people more of a primer, I honestly think the problem is not so much that these older movies are difficult to get into without help, but that they are perceived as being so, and thus people don't even give them a first chance.

It can be both. I think it's safe to say that certain expectations and tropes for cinema have changed in the last 75 years, and people in this thread have commented that those changes are enough to be a barrier for some people - the difference in acting, the pacing seeming off to a modern audience*, or someone telling you that they fall asleep through black and white movies. But while it's a barrier, it's not an insurmountable barrier, and yeah, it might be built up as much larger in people's minds.

Effort taken to make sure that people are conversant in old films doesn't necessarily mean a pamphlet and a homework assignment, it can just be enough social incentive that someone doesn't turn it off in the first fifteen minutes, or even chooses to watch it in the first place. Doing this en masse for a society generally means teaching them as part of general education, but there's other ways this can be accomplished, especially on a smaller scale.

It's like trying to get a friend to watch a foreign film, or anime or anything outside of modern American blockbusters. It helps to know their tastes a little bit and do some curation before they dive in. Maybe answering a couple of questions about how they're using voice overs or why that guy suddenly has a nosebleed.

*Though really, one of the best ways to get people to watch an older film is to mention their 90 - 120 minute airtime. You don't need a three and a half hour time block!
posted by dinty_moore at 7:03 AM on March 1, 2017 [1 favorite]


Heck, a lot of old films meant for double features don't even clock in at 90 minutes. Detour, one of my favorite Noirs is only 67 minutes long.
posted by octothorpe at 12:00 PM on March 1, 2017 [2 favorites]


One of the things I've noticed about movies, as compared to other art forms, is that difficulty in enjoyment is often considered less acceptable because, in the view of many, movies are only to be enjoyed, so any perceived failure to provide that expected pleasure is the "fault" of the film, not the capacity of the viewer.

With a book, there is a notion that reading is itself work, for many, so the ideas in print are not expected to make themselves clear to all immediately. Things like knowing the definitions of lots of words are aligned with intelligence directly in many cases, and with work in looking them up in others. This makes difficulty in reading not felt necessarily to be the fault of the book, but at least partially due to the inadequacies of the reader, so it can be seen as almost an elite pleasure in some circles, a pretentious one too sometimes, but one where ideas and thought are more directly realized.

Movies, on the other hand, are visually relating human interactions that "should", by some beliefs, be understood by all at first glance. Intellectualism is a perversion of that relationship, and older movies, while perhaps understandable, simply do not have much to say to people today since their situations, attitudes, and context is so different than our own. Most won't say there can't be pleasure from older movies, they simply don't think there is as much relevance and likelihood of it in most cases due to the distance between then and now.

The idea of movies becoming more accessible and enjoyable through modest effort seems pointlessly arcane and against the very nature of movies. It's almost an insult to suggest to some that there can be more to film than simple surface enjoyment as that is definitely pretentious on the face of it. I've come across far more people who feel downright insulted by a film they don't understand immediately and often won't trust those who do claim to like it for that very reason; putting on airs. Hell, articles by famous film critics have been written saying much the same thing. So, yeah, I completely agree that we need to do more in teaching people about modern visual media since the attitudes surrounding it are really unhealthy.

Watching Casablanca won't prove or change anything by itself, but expanding people's acceptance of even slightly different methods of communicating would be a step in the right direction.
posted by gusottertrout at 1:25 PM on March 1, 2017


Prompted by this thread, a couple of days ago I watched Casablanca for the first time ever.
  1. Enjoyed the hell out of it from start to finish.
  2. I thought I knew everything about the movie coming in, but I was genuinely surprised by how Renault was a serial rapist.
  3. Are we supposed to think for even a second that Ilsa would ever seriously consider leaving Victor Laszlo for Rick? Like, even bracketing off how Rick almost having got everyone killed through playing stupid games instead of just forking over the letters of transit right away, Laszlo is a genuine hero, and Rick, until the last scene, is someone who's good at running a hustle but who can't quite figure out how to live his values.
  4. Also Humphrey Bogart isn't attractive.
  5. Also more broadly, I can't see how this could ever be interpreted as a movie about a romance. It's a movie about fascism, and what fascism does to women and men. I wish I would have watched it at least once before global fascism rose again, just to give myself a fighting chance of interpreting the movie as being about a love triangle in wartime, instead of just being about the war.
posted by You Can't Tip a Buick at 3:46 PM on March 2, 2017 [4 favorites]


Are we supposed to think for even a second that Ilsa would ever seriously consider leaving Victor Laszlo for Rick? Like, even bracketing off how Rick almost having got everyone killed through playing stupid games instead of just forking over the letters of transit right away, Laszlo is a genuine hero, and Rick, until the last scene, is someone who's good at running a hustle but who can't quite figure out how to live his values.

From When Harry Met Sally:
Sally: You're wrong.
Harry: I'm not wrong, he wants...
Sally: You're wrong.
Harry: ...he wants her to leave that's why he puts her on the plane.
Sally: I don't think she wants to stay.
Harry: Of course she wants to stay. Wouldn't you rather be with Humphrey Bogart than the other guy?
Sally: I don't want to spend the rest of my life in Casablanca married to a man who runs a bar. I probably sound very snobbish to you but I don't.
Harry: You'd rather be in a passionless marriage.
Sally: And be the first lady of Czechoslovakia.
Harry: Than live with the man you've had the greatest sex of your life with, and just because he owns a bar and that is all he does.
Sally: Yes. And so had any woman in her right mind, woman are very practical, even Ingrid Bergman which is why she gets on the plane at the end of the movie.

(years later)

Sally: Hello.
Harry: You sleeping?
Sally: No, I was watching Casablanca.
Harry: Channel please.
Sally: Eleven.
Harry: Thank you, got it. Now you're telling me you will be happier with Victor Laszlo than Humphrey Bogart?
Sally: When did I say that?
Harry: When we drove to New York.
Sally: I never said that, I would never have said that.
Harry: Alright, fine. Have it your way.
posted by sallybrown at 7:15 PM on March 2, 2017 [2 favorites]


see now I'm really wondering how my interpretation of the movie would have been different if I had watched it before nazism came back into style.
posted by You Can't Tip a Buick at 5:18 AM on March 3, 2017 [4 favorites]


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