COMPLETELY SELF-REFERENTIAL

La Marseillaise

Let us go, children of the fatherland
Our day of Glory has arrived.
Against us stands tyranny,
The bloody flag is raised,
The bloody flag is raised.
Do you hear in the countryside
The roar of these savage soldiers
They come right into our arms
To cut the throats of your sons,
your country.

To arms, citizens!
Form up your battalions
Let us march, Let us march!
That their impure blood
Should water our fields

The action in Casablanca takes place on December 2, 3 and 4, 1941. Although I probably watch the movie a couple of times a year, I always make a point of watching it the first week of December. Thus, there I was on the treadmill this morning, tearing up to La Marseillaise, as I do at least once a year, thinking again that only great art could cause that reaction.

That Casablanca is great art I have no doubt. Although Michael Curtiz' direction is most often dismissed as workmanlike, his instructions to Ingrid Bergman -- that it wasn't sure who Ilsa would end up with so she should play it down the middle between Rick and Laszlo -- results in a great performance in a key role. A great movie is so fragile a concoction that, had Bergman played up to one or the other, the whole edifice might have come crashing down. The fact that Curtiz was most likely lying (there was no chance that Ilsa would stay with Rick) only adds to the credit due him. The context does, however, increase my enjoyment of Rick's line, to Ilsa when she returns to the Cafe the first night and asks to tell him a story the ending to which she does not know, that she should just start in and maybe an ending will come to her. That he then calls her a whore, about as subtly as it can be done, only emphasizes that the script, too, is unusually good.

The usual question asked about Casablanca is who does Isla love. She loves Rick (as does everyone in the movie except Major Strasser), but that's irrelevant. She is devoted to Laszlo. The key to understanding the major plot is the minor plot involving the Bulgarian couple. Once you start looking for them, you realize that they pop up all over the movie. They are in the line at the beginning looking at the Major Strasser's plane, they are in the prefect's office when Victor and Ilsa come in, she is the "visa problem" that interrupts Louis' meeting with Strasser and they are meeting with S. Ferrari when Rick comes in to the Blue Parrot to get his cigarettes. When the wife asks Rick's permission to sleep with Renault in order to get an exit visa, something she would do only out of her love of her husband, she presents Ilsa's dilemma in a lower key. When Rick intervenes and lets the husband win at Roulette, the end of the movie is cast in stone. He will not let Ilsa make her sacrifice -- staying with him to save Laszlo and his work -- any more than he would let the Bulgarian woman sleep with Renault.

This also deals with one of the more common criticisms of the movie; Ilsa's supposed passivity. She does tell Rick to do the thinking for both of them, a line almost as jarring to modern ears as her references to Sam as "boy". But this is anything but passivity. She is determined to save Laszlo, as he would save her if he could. (Everytime I watch the movie, I see something new. This morning I realized just how pivotal is the private talk between Ilsa and Laszlo in the Blue Parrot, which makes clear that Laszlo has risked his life for her and that the two of them accept that turn about is fair play.)

Ilsa actively seeks to get the letters of transit to save Laszlo. She does not passively turn over all the decisions to Rick. Rather, she runs through a number of ways to convince Rick to give them over. Appeals to idealism, greed and their past love fail. Her threat to shoot him fails. Finally, she agrees to pay for the letters of transit with the only coin she has: herself. It is unclear if she understands the subtle deal she is making. By allowing Rick to choose her future, she is putting herself under his protection and Rick, being Rick, can not then betray one he is duty bound to protect. What Ilsa gives to Rick is not her body, but her future and, consciously or not, this saves them both.

Part of the beauty of the script, though, is that it can be understood on many levels. It is the story of three little people. It is also an allegory about America's entry into WWII. Rick is America. Weary, cynical, with an idealistic past but unwilling to get involved. Rick says that he sticks his neck out for noone. Ferrari tells him that isolationism is no longer a viable foreign policy. Ilsa, Laszlo, Strasser and Renault are the various faces of Europe. Old enemies, old allies and new victims, all eager to know what American will do. Will America act selfishly or will it act idealistically? Of course, by 1943, when the film was released, that ending was already known. Casablanca was rushed out to coincide with the American landing in North Africa and the fighting for Casablanca, which is what led to its initial success. It is, of course, no accident that the movie is set during the first week of December, 1941. [As Mike Morley reminds me in the comments, the nicest bit of allegory is Rick's statement that "they're asleep in New York. I'll bet they're asleep all over America."]

Finally, the script has one of the great McGuffins in movie history. The McGuffin, which I'll define as what the characters think the movie is about, in Casablanca is the letters of transit. The plot opens with the murder of the German couriers to get the letters and is driven, throughout, by Laszlo's need for them in order to escape the Germans. The whole idea is, of course, entirely absurd. I always like to imagine the scene in which Laszlo, having obtained the letters, presents them to Major Strasser, introduced as one of the reasons the Third Reich enjoys the reputation that it does.

Strasser: You are an enemy of the Reich. You cannot leave.
Laszlo: But I have these letters of transit. They cannot be rescinded, or
even questioned.
Strasser: Oh, excuse me, sir. Let me show you to your seat.

Casablanca is about everything and nothing, and makes me misty eyed at the playing of La Marseillaise. No wonder Roger Ebert calls it "the movie."

MORE: I forgot to mention the following:

There is a theory out there that what distinguishes great American literature from other literatures is a homoerotic subtext. This argument is made, most famously, in Leslie Fiedler's infamous article, "Come Back to the Raft Ag'in Huck Honey!" Casablanca is great American literature in at least this respect, having not one but two homoerotic subplots. There is, of course, Renault's puzzling line, made only seconds after being introduced to Ilsa, that Rick is the kind of man that, "if I were a woman and I weren't around, I should be in love with Rick." He then says to Rick that the way Ilsa was speaking about Rick "made me extremely jealous." This is generally understood to mean jealous of Ilsa, though they had just met and their relationship was bound to be hostile. It is more easily understood as meaning jealous of Rick. Finally, there is Rick's famous closing line.

Equally odd is the relationship between Rick and Ugarti. In this relationship, Rick is dominant and Ugarte is desperate for Rick's admiration even though Rick despises him. Was Ugarte's motivation the money he would get from selling the letters of transit, or was it to impress Rick? He certainly mentions the latter more than the former. It is also a little odd that, having escaped from and shot at the officers arresting him, Ugarte runs directly to Rick and grovels to him, pleading to be saved. But oddest of all is what Rick says as he sits up waiting for Ilsa that first night: "They grab Ugarte and she walks in. Well, that's the way it goes. One in, one out." Given what we know about the relationship between Rick and Ilsa, what the heck can he be talking about?

Another nice touch in the script is some parallel dialogue that, upon repeated viewings, gives us insight into Rick and Ilsa. For example, in the Paris cafe, just before the German occupation, Rick suggests to Ilsa that they get married in Marseilles. She knows that Laszlo is injured in Paris and that she is going to have to abandon Rick, but also that she must get him out of Paris. She responds "That's too far ahead to plan." Rick then jokes that they can be married by the conductor on the train. Ilsa says: "I love you so much and I hate this war so much. Oh, it's a crazy world. Anything can happen. If you don't get away, I mean, if, if something should keep us apart, whereever they put you and whereever I'll be, I want you to know . . ." She can't go on.

Later in Casablanca, though earlier in the movie, Yvonne asks if she will see Rick that night. He responds, "I never make plans that far ahead." This makes perfectly clear the extent to which Ilsa scarred him. Similarly, when Ilsa decides that she is Rick's price for the letters of transit, she says the following in response to Laszlo's declaration of love: "Yes, yes I know. Victor, whatever I do, will you believe that I, that --". Laszlo stops her, "-- You don't even have to say it. I'll believe." Here, we see again the constant mirroring, but with a difference. In Paris, Ilsa stays with Laszlo, but pretends that she will go with Rick to save him by getting him out of Paris. In Casablanca, Ilsa agrees to stay with Rick in order to save Laszlo.

In this way, what happens in Casablanca is redemption for Ilsa. She needs redemption because in Paris she betrayed her love for Rick. Her betrayal was not leaving Rick. She left Rick for her husband, to whose important work she is critical. She could not do otherwise. Her betrayal was manipulating Rick by not telling him about Laszlo and giving him the chance to choose noble sacrifice. It is by finally telling Rick to think for both of them, by allowing Rick to make the choice he should have been allowed to make in Paris, that Ilsa is redeemed and Rick is reborn.

MORE MORE: I've got to stop, but only after I add one more thing. When Ilsa threatens to shoot Rick to get the letters, he tells her to go ahead, she'd be doing him a favor. I'm tempted to say that this is Bogart's best line reading of his career, but it's probably closer to the truth to say it's the best line ever written for him. His trademark classic Hollywood "stand and deliver" method is so flat, so bleak, that the line is not at all bravado, but a simple statement of fact. This might explain why Rick's plan to get Laszlo and Ilsa out of Casablanca is suicidal, calculated to leave him standing there watching the plane with one very annoyed Prefect of Police. That Louis throws in with him, rather than arresting him, is just luck. Of course, gaining Louis' wonderful friendship just as he loses Ilsa proves him right once again: "Well, that's the way it goes. One in, one out."

Posted by David Cohen at December 2, 2003 7:54 PM