Casablanca (1942)

"Here's looking at you, kid."

Casablanca is, of course, a bit like Citizen Kane in that its reputation should be a yoke around its neck. How can any film be as good as Casablanca is said to be? The film's enormous reputation means it can, surely, only disappoint.

Well, actually, no. I don't care if I recognise the famous lines from seeing them spoofed on, of all things, Red Dwarf- this film really is superlative. It is, I suppose, a romance and it is, I suppose, centred around a love triangle. Yet the characters, in a wonderful marriage of script and performers (Bogart and Bergman are extraordinary, but so is the entire cast), have all the emotional realism and complexity of characters in a literary novel. There's no melodrama here, only nuance- I love how Victor is well aware of what happened in Paris, but is not so crass as to confront Ilsa, or to doubt her love for him. And Ilsa is torn between love for two human but genuinely good men, both of whom, in their way, face a harsh and brutal world with integrity.

Like today, this is an era- the opening narration calls it the Second World War, already, in 1942- where the jackboots of far right extremism, with its contempt for humanity, for checks and balances, for integrity. All three of the characters in the triangle have had their lives deeply damaged by said jackboots, and all three perceive the world with a certain weary cynicism. Yet all three of them, ultimately, believe in something better and make sacrifices in that noble aim. One can live in a cruel world, blighted by tyranny, and be a flawed human being within that world, with conflicting feelings and loyalties- and still behave with integrity. Rick sacrifices not just his happiness but, it seems, his ife.

Yet just as fascinating are Yvonne, who sleeps with the jackbooted enemy only to be dumped, and realise where her loyalties truly lie during the extraordinary Marseillaise scene, which made this Englishman shed tears for la Republique, and of course Louis- the cynical, corrupt police chief who seems to flirt with collaboration throughout but redeems himself at the end.

This is a great, great film, but it's no forbidding and formidable edifice; it's grippingly watchable simply because of its characters, with the subtext very much arising from them. Let's not call it the greatest film ever made; it's far too good for such shallow concepts.

The Maltese Falcon (1941)

“You... you imbecile. You bloated idiot. You stupid fat-head, you."

This film may be a remake, and I may have a policy of not seeing remakes before originals, but you have to draw the line somewhere; the original version of this is ancient and obscure, and in any case I’d say both are just different adaptations of the same novel so the argument doesn’t apply.

This film is, I hope you’re not surprised to read, jaw-droppingly good. I’m well-verses with the works of Raymond Chandler, but less so with Dashiell Hammett whom I haven’t read at all. The genre, and Spade himself, feel very much straight out of the splendid novels of Chandler, though; femme fatales; a jaded, cynical, witty but secretly moral hero; people trying to get along in an imperfect and sinful world; hats and/or cigarettes everywhere. And at the centre of it all is the sublime Humphrey Bogart. To my shame, this is the first film of his that I’ve seen. It won’t be the last.  And the entire cast is superb.

The film is brilliantly shot, too, by the young John Huston; there are some particularly brilliant shots. I noticed that when Sam picks up the phone to hear of Archer’s death we first see only the phone, then his hand. Only later do we see Sam’s face.

The plot is complex but clearly told and engaging; the dialogue is amazing; the characters gripping; the conclusion deeply satisfying. This is a movie everyone should see.