Watching Casablanca (1942) in 2019

Source - Indiewire

On January 1, 2019, I sat down to watch Michael Curtiz's Casablanca (1942). It had been on my to-watch list since I watched Damien Chazelle's La La Land (2016) for the nth time in June 2018 while pausing the film to make notes. When I paid attention to Mia speaking about Ingrid Bergman in Casablanca while pointing at the studio-window in the Warner Brothers lot — and sleeping under a giant Ingrid Bergman wallpaper — I was reminded of a conversation I had had with a friend from my college theatre days. I had not taken his suggestion of watching Ingrid Bergman films seriously back in 2017 because I was busy feeling validated by “Fools who dream”.

I was hooked to my laptop screen while watching Casablanca. When the film ended, all I could think was that the film doesn’t merely has a wow- factor or THE-factor, but it has the ‘What a beauty!’-factor.  Mostly, I was impressed by the idea of everything that’s happening during the second World War being shown simply by conversations in a night club. I was amazed by the number of American films and TV series I could recall while listening to the famously quoted lines and also, the debate on Ilsa's choice, from When Harry Met Sally (1989) to Sex and the City (1998-2004).

Ilsa’s (Ingrid Bergman) choice in the film reminded me of Mia’s (Emma Stone) choice in La La Land. Casablanca is predominantly a romance set against the backdrop of World War Two with underlying themes of friendship, patriotism, choices etc. La La Land is a romantic musical with the predominant idea of choosing dreams over love as is made clear in the introductory song, “Another day of Sun”.

When I saw Ilsa giving Rick (Humphrey Bogart) the emotional licence to make a choice for her, considering she was tired of constantly having to choose between love and responsibility, I immediately thought of the scene in La La Land when Mia was tired of trying to achieve her dream. In both the cases, the female protagonist is shown to be at a helpless state. It’s the role of the male protagonists that leads to the bittersweet end in both the films. In simple words, Rick agreed to make a choice for Ilsa. Sebastian (Ryan Gosling) in La La Land, chose to be a catalyst for a decision that has to be Mia’s.

I have always been a firm believer that Seb and Mia have been each other’s catalysts in achieving their dreams. They could understand what having a dream meant and hence shared a partnership that they mutually ended in the pursuit of what they desired. I was attracted to this short-term relationship in the film because it reminded me of the fleeting nature of love and the act of forgetting and loving again as opposed to unrequited love or a love that lasts forever in some of the poems in Pablo Neruda’s Twenty Love Songs and A Poem of Despair. The idea that there are things more important than finding the love of one’s life intrigued me.

This idea is portrayed in Casablanca as well. The film begins with the introduction of pain in separation and then shows the romance that once was in Paris. When the lovers finally get together again, the theme of patriotism, the desire to be a part of a free state takes over. The dream of a country without war is prioritized over love. While Mia chooses the offer for a film in Paris over love, Ilsa becomes a tool to support the larger dream of freedom. It is interesting how Paris has been used to bring together lovers in one film, while it has been used to separate lovers in another. 

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I pondered upon the idea of Ilsa as a tool or strength, as mentioned in the film, for a leader during World War. It definitely doesn’t seem fair now, in 2019. But, when I consider that Ilsa chose to let the decision for her life be made by Rick, she fairly voiced herself. Although she didn’t agree with Rick’s decision, who kept her under a delusion for a while, she understood the call for the nation as opposed to the call of her heart. The bittersweet effect of “We will always have Paris” in Casablanca coincides with what I call ‘The Last Smile’ in La La Land, meaning, their love has had its time but there’s more to look forward to or to be done in life.

A lot has changed in films between 1942 and 2016, one of them being redefining gender roles in a romance. Casablanca continues to be an American classic, and La La Land might be remembered as the film that won the Academy award for Best Picture for a few seconds among other things, if not as a classic. The important bit is perhaps to see these films objectively. I took more than a year to be objective about La La Land and almost a month to control the initial urge to bash that one decision in Casablanca while falling in love with the film in first watch.

If you haven’t seen the films, I’d strongly recommend watching them.