Casablanca, it's probably one of your two or three favorites. If you've never watched it, shame on you. There are very few movies that can be involved in a "best movie ever" argument. Sure, you can argue that the original Halloween is the best horror movie of all time and you can argue that the original Arthur is the greatest comedy of all time. You can even mistakenly argue that Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid is the greatest western of all time. But none of those can compare to Casablanca in a "best movie ever" discussion. So here are 12 reasons why Casablanca is OBVIOUSLY the greatest movie of all time. In fact, Casablanca occupies the top three spots in the greatest movies of all time - that's how great it is.
1. Humphrey Bogart as Rick Blaine
It almost feels redundant to write about how a movie is improved with Bogie in it. Humphrey Bogart is my favorite actor. He should be yours. He is the #1 male star of all time according to the American Film Institute (AFI). If you don't like him, you probably haven't seen Casablanca or The Big Sleep or The Maltese Falcon or The African Queen (for which he won an Oscar) or The Caine Mutiny or Key Largo or The Treasure of the Sierra Madre ("We don't need no stinking badges.") or We're No Angels or... Oh, just go watch a Bogart movie and come back to this article so we can talk properly. Not only is Bogie great, but so is his character Rick Blaine. I want to be Rick Blaine. Rick is noble, principled, generous, straightforward, tough, secretive, respected, unpredictable, wealthy, loved by his friends and employees, and irresistible to women. I want to run Rick's Cafe Americain. I want my shot at Ilsa. I want to drink as much as Rick and not feel the effects. The only thing I would do differently is not smoke. As Captain Louis Renault told Ilsa Lund near the beginning of the film, "If I were a woman...I should be in love with Rick." I agree.