I can't beleive that some people here are having trouble connecting with this movie. I first saw it when I was in high school some 17 years ago at the ripe old age of 16. While I couldn't watch it in the mindset of its original audience who were living with the reality of WW2, I was blown away by what a fantastic film this is.

What's amazing about the script that others here have praised(Triple HHH, Slade, etc.) is that so many people worked on it, often with pages being rushed from the typewriter straight to the set. All too often when multiple hands are working on the script, the results are none too pretty. (For more on the behind the scenes stories on te film's creation check out Aljean Harmetz's excellent "Round Up The Usual Subjects" and screenwriter Howard Koch's "Casablanca:Script and Legend".) I have a great admiration for the script as I spent a summer adapting it for a radio theater production for my college radio station. (Ever try to break a three act play in half?)

Back in the late 60s and early 70s, when Bogart had a surge of post-mortum popularity, it was his anti-hero Rick Blaine that was singeled out as the role that most interested a new generation of fans living during that time of social unrest.

For a movie that was viewed as yet another B-picture being cranked out of the Warner Brothers factory based on a failed stage play, Casablanca is one of the very small handful of perfect films.