Armato, Casablanca

In Casablanca, our protagonist (Rick) attempts to take no stance on the developing war, preferring instead to stay neutral for what he claims are business purposes. Makes sense. If he were to take a side, people of the opposite faction might stop going to his bar.

As an American living in Casablanca, he adopts his home country's attitude toward the war. This seems like an odd trait for an expatriate. Normally those who expatriate in war times do so because they believe their country shouldn't be involved in a war that it is involved in or the other way around. Either way, the individual disagrees with his government, so he finds a place that is governed more to his liking. In Casablanca, Rick's atitude towards the war is hardly distinguishable from the U.S.'s.

In the shot pictured above, we've flashed back to Rick's and Ilsa's affair in Paris. This flashback explains what, if not politics and war, is at the forefront of Rick's mind: Ilsa.

Dominant: The dominant is the front of Humphrey Bogart's face
Lighting Key: The lighting is pretty low, but almost evenly balanced. What I mean by that is there are even amounts of bright areas and dark areas in this shot. Balanced, like Rick's politics.
Camera Proxemics: Intimate
Angle: Straight on
Density: Pretty dense, there is hardly empty space in the shot. The screen is almost entirely taken up by Bogart and Bergman's faces.
Form: Closed
Framing: Tight
Character Placement: Bergman takes up the right of the screen, Bogart the left, and if we consider the pair a single object, we could say they are placed in the center.
Character Proxemics: Intimate. They are clearly about to exchange a kiss.

McCay Blog Prompt for Casablanca

Apply the Political Expediency Theory to one scene in Casablanca, and do a mise-en-scene analysis to support your application of the theory.

Nolley- Casablanca

While Casablanca has some politic aspects it appears to be more of a love story. Throughout the film, Rick makes several changes that add to the idea of the film being a true love story. World War II is mentioned all through the film, but the audience is always drawn back to the conflict between Rick and Ilsa. From the minute Ilsa steps into the film it is obvious there is some sort of tension. Sam immediately looks at her and seems perplexed with why this woman has come into the cafe. It them becomes evident that there is some definite history between Ilsa and Rick. This takes all focus off of the imposing war. With the introduction of Ilsa, the film transforms into a mysterious love story. This is not to say that World War II is completely discarded as a topic of the film, but it becomes the topic of less interest after the Rick and Ilsa conflict is introduced. The interweaving of love and war is an excellent way to keep an audience interested because it has both social and personal conflict which captures the interest of a broad spectrum of people. Casablanca is a very successful film that has aspects of war story with an emphasis on love story. Overall I thoroughly enjoyed the movie and felt like it was very successful in keeping me interested. By the end, I really began sympathizing with Rick and was hopeful that things would work out for him, but knew in the end that he did that right thing, and that was more respectable than anything that could have happened.