Casablanca-Review Tom Zarnick "Big Tom", Slippery Rock Film Analysis Student Blogger

Casablanca – Review

Tom Zarnick “BIG TOM”, Slippery Rock University Film Analysis Student Blogger, Monday 10 June 2013 18:25 EST

It’s Big Tom back for another review of a Classic Hollywood Cinema style of film making “Casablanca.” I’m glad to see our generation watching these classic films. Casablanca has realism, with some aspects of the film documenting the period of time when Casablanca was filmed, and the film also has some formalistic styles expressing the psychological truths conveyed by distorting the surface of the material world. The realism style of film are evident in the film in the scenes of the German soldiers in uniform, when the Czech Resistance leader mentions being part of “The Great Movement” and again in the scene where German soldiers have taken over Sam's piano and are singing a German Nazi song and when Laszlo defies the Germans by ordering the band to play the French anthem. The formalism style of film is evident with memorable lines of dialogue when Capitaine Renault says “You may find the climate of Casablanca a trifle warm.” Then Major Strasser replies, “Oh, we Germans must get used to all climates, from Russia to the Sahara. But perhaps you were not referring to the weather,” and again when Ferrari asks Rick “What do you want for Sam?,” and Rick says, “I don't buy or sell human beings.”

Consequently, I would have to agree with my Film Analysis Professor, Dr. Permenter, in saying that Casablanca is right in the middle of that spectrum between extreme formalism and extreme realism.

I can see why some viewers would describe Casablanca as a Film Noir style film primarily in terms of light, or the lack the of it and the grays, black-and-white cinematography, and in terms of moods in the tensions, fear, mistrust despair and insecurities of the time period of 1942, set during World War II.

Then again, Casablanca was released in 1942 and color film didn’t become commercial wide spread until the 1940’s. The other elements that I mentioned could make Casablanca a Film Noir.  In contrast, as a beginning film student, my opinion is that Casablanca has many comedy lines. Casablanca focuses on a theme of a chaotic world, but with a cynical humor, that many viewers do find humorous. In Roger Ebert’s September 15, 1996 review of Casablanca, he talks about how the “opening scene dances with comedy.” This is the kind of humor I enjoy. For instance when Capitaine Renault shuts down Rick’s café for gambling and then immediately collects his winnings. And again when Rick says, “And remember, this gun is pointed right at your heart,” and Renault replies,” That is my least vulnerable spot,” as a wisecrack.

I could go on and on with my thoughts about the narration, how the opening of the film starts with a slow-spinning globe and a zoom-in shot toward Western Europe to set the location, the high key lighting, which produces bright, even illumination and very conspicuous shadows, which is often used in comedies…