I was born and raised in Jimmy Stewart's hometown of Indiana, PA. When I was a little kid back in the '70s, there were two older movie theaters in town. When "the mall," opened on the outskirts of town around 1980 or 1981 with its 4-plex, it was just a matter of time before the downtown theaters folded. One of them burnt down, but the other was on the ground floor of a multi-floor office building, so it was basically mothballed with the old ticket booth and marquis sign and lights staying in place.
Probably around 1985 or 1986, somebody recognized the nostalgic value of the old-school theater and leased it out for a showing of Casablanca on a big screen. I was a healthy teen male with pretensions of sophistication and took a date. Every male was dressed in suits or dinner jackets and the ladies in dresses and fancy gowns to watch "Casablanca," as it was meant to be seen, on a big screen in a classic old theater that still had a stage below the screen, theater seats with cast iron art deco aisle end caps, and a recessed orchestra pit.
If you're familiar with the movie you know there is some time taken at the beginning to set the atmosphere in Casablanca, and establish the notoriety of Rick's Café. The first time Bogart appears on screen, he's seated confidently behind his desk in his inner sanctum at the club, and the camera turns to reveal him in his immaculate white dinner jacket.
At that moment in the film, EVERY woman in that theater, my date included, let out a brief, almost imperceptible gasp, however, due to the collective and simultaneous nature of all those gasps in near perfect unison, it was quite noticeable.
It made quite the impression on me as a 16 year old male with aspirations of someday having that kind of effect on women, but to answer your question as to, "what Ilsa ever saw in Rick," I would simply answer:
"The same thing every other woman did."
her post just left me speechless....only thing i can think is she didnt watch the entire movie, and she missed the PARIS sequence entirely. Theres a very good reason why Rick is so cynical and bitter..or “grumpy and grouchy” as she said. I mean..THATS LITERALLY THE HEART AND SOUL OF THE MOVIE!!. In the early 90’s, i took a girlfriend to see it at the amazing FOX THEATER in Detroit...place was jam packed. In the lobby, they had the piano that Sam played in the film...couldn’t believe how small it was...but yea, thats the only way to see this amazing film. Def the greatest “lost love” movie ever...
The only time I experienced that in a theater was Gone With The Wind, when Clark Gable was shown at the foot of the staircase, watching Scarlett ascend the stairs.
When I was in my teens in the sixties I had a white dinner jacket. Wearing one in the right setting is like wearing a sword in military dress uniform — beyond cool.