This week’s (Jan 10-16/14) movie of the week is… Casablanca!

To know whether a movie is truly great, I think all criteria can be boiled down to two: 1) Does it make you think? 2) Does it make you feel? I would add a third, but it only applies to movies that have made their way into being considered “iconic.” That criterion is “Does it make you do?” Now by this I don’t mean that the movie inspires you to do something, such as watching Twilight and then deciding the next day to donate a pint of blood to the Red Cross. Rather, the “do” is something you say or do from time to time solely because of the influence a movie has on popular culture. Perhaps you’ve gotten up to leave a room and when you turned to tell the others that you’d return shortly, you decided to don an Austrian accent and say, “I’ll be back.” Or maybe in that same room some music is turned on and to be funny you strike the ol’ stayin’ alive pose. Or maybe you’re afraid to go into the water at the beach. It’s just something you do. And sometimes you haven’t even seen the movie.

The first two criteria are hard for a movie to accomplish. The third is just impossible. It just happens. The makers of the film may have wanted that, and I’m sure they all try, but it just happens. I mean, who would have thought that someone crossing the road and yelling at a driver, “Hey I’m walkin’ here!” would be iconic?

This week we honour Casablanca–a movie that has certainly accomplished the third criterion. As a matter of fact, there may be quotes from it that you’ve heard many times but had no idea it’s come from this particular movie. The most famous would probably be “Play it again, Sam,” though most of you probably already know that this was not actually ever said in the film. Bogart does say, “Play it once, Sam. For old time’s sake.” Then there’s “round up the usual suspects,” “We’ll always have Paris,” “Louie, I think this is the beginning of a beautiful friendship,” and “Here’s looking at you kid.”

I remember watching this movie with Joy over fifteen years ago with a friend who insisted we’d like it. We did, of course. I had also watched Citizen Kane because of this same friend’s recommendation, and to be honest this was the one I was hoping would get the most votes. I really enjoyed that one. It was just this year that I watched Bicycle Thieves and… well, I really can’t write anything about either of these movies because I won’t be able to stop. For now, here’s looking at you, Bogart and Bergman.

Congratulations Casablanca, this is your week.

And the Oscar goes to…Best actress: Ingrid Bergman. Best actor: Lamberto Maggiorani. He’s in Bicycle Thieves and he’s a non-actor. I believe everyone in the movie are. I love both him and the child actor who plays his son. Best quote: “Rosebud!”

To those who were either born, married, or fought in a war during the 40’s, my apologies for dissing your decade. Twenty-five weeks go by without any representation on my blog. No matter though. It’s one decade that will never be forgotten.