Casablanca

Directed by Michael Curtiz (1942), Starring: Humphrey Bogart & Ingrid Bergman, Winner of the Academy Award for Best Picture, Best Director, and Best Screenplay, PG

Join The Colonial Theatre in celebrating the 80th anniversary of Casablanca, the story of Rick Blaine, a cynical world-weary ex-patriate who runs a nightclub in Casablanca, Morocco during the early stages of WWII. Despite the pressure he constantly receives from the local authorities, Rick’s cafe has become a kind of haven for refugees seeking to obtain illicit letters that will help them escape to America. But when Ilsa, a former lover of Rick’s, and her husband, show up at his cafe one day, Rick faces a tough challenge that will bring up unforeseen complications, heartbreak, and ultimately an excruciating decision to make. An undisputed masterpiece and perhaps Hollywood’s quintessential statement on love and romance, Casablanca has only improved with age. In Roger Ebert’s words, “Seeing the film over and over again, year after year, I find it never grows over-familiar. It plays like a favorite musical album; the more I know it, the more I like it. The black-and-white cinematography has not aged as color would. The dialogue is so spare and cynical it has not grown old-fashioned. Much of the emotional effect of “Casablanca” is achieved by indirection; as we leave the theater, we are absolutely convinced that the only thing keeping the world from going crazy is that the problems of three little people do after all amount to more than a hill of beans.

“Nobody lights a torch like Ingrid Bergman’s Ilsa or carries one like Humphrey Bogart’s Rick.”— Michael Wilmington, Chicago Tribune