Casablanca: You Must Remember This Film

Okay, this is the scene—a girl walks into a bar. Everyone is drinking and dancing; a good time is to be had by all. The piano player is playing songs everyone loves. The piano player sees the woman—he knows her from a time ago—and a look of worry passes over his face. The woman is accompanied by a tall and handsome man. The man looks special, important. The woman is left alone as the man tends to business. She sits down next to the piano player. He pretends not to see her. She engages him in conversation, and the piano player replies in clipped, terse answers—it is as if he is afraid someone will see whom he is speaking to. The camera closes in on the girl, the left side of her face softly lit, and a sparkle in her eye. She leans toward the piano player, touches him gently and requests a song. “Play it, Sam. Play ‘As Time Goes By.’” Although Sam has been expressly forbidden to play the song, he cannot deny the girl. The first notes of the song and the weariness in Sam’s voice flutter gently throughout the bar, the music freezing the place in time. “You must remember this; a kiss is just a kiss…” The bar owner comes out, indignant upon hearing the forbidden song—but he is stopped when he sees her radiant face. He knows now why Sam is playing “As Time Goes By”—and who has requested it. His heart is breaking all over again.

Perfection in film is witnessed when Ilsa Lund walks in with Victor Laszlo to Rick Blaine’s Café Américain and asks Sam the piano player to play “As Time Goes By.” The loneliness of the two former lovers, the way Sam appears frightened (he knows too well the heartache Ilsa has caused Rick) as Ilsa walks into the bar, the way Ingrid Bergman’s face seems to glow and calm Sam, the devastating reaction Humphrey Bogart gives Rick once he sees Ilsa, the perfect use of “As Time Goes By” and the way Dooley Wilson sings it—with such tenderness and alacrity (though he is mimicking tickling the ivories; Wilson couldn’t play a note—chalk the success of his part up to movie magic)—evokes in the audience memories of a melancholy song too personal for them to bear, even if this is the first time you have heard the Herman Hupfield standard. When you watch Casablanca, this scene is the one that I guarantee will suck viewers into the world of the film—unless, of course, you are already there. Were this the only scene filmed for the picture, Casablanca would be deserving of the Best Picture Oscar. That the rest of Casablanca is as good is a testament to the greatness of the film and one of the only times that the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences awarded the absolutely right movie.

Casablanca is a film where perfection looks so easy. In reality, the picture was designed to be just another movie rolled off the Warner Brothers lot. Director Michael Curtiz, a veteran director known more for his ability to work quickly rather than having a particular style (he shot over forty previous films for Warner Brothers), was the fourth-choice director on a list topped by William Wyler. Curtiz was known to have clashed with the writers over the script. The writers would point out an inaccuracy or questionable logic in the story, but Curtiz preferred to keep things moving as fast as possible, trusting that the images on screen would sweep the audience away in suspended disbelief (and Curtiz was right). The story is lauded as the best screenplay ever written—the lines are among the wittiest and funniest and most divine dialogue ever penned (on the American Film Institute’s list of 100 Years…100 Movie Quotes, lines from Casablanca occupy six positions on the list—Nos. 5, 20, 28, 32, 43, and 67—far more than any other film)—but the script was being constantly rewritten by a hodgepodge of writers, usually a sign that a film is doomed to failure. Max Steiner, who scored the film, didn’t even want to use “As Time Goes By,” originally used in Everybody Comes to Rick’s, the play from which Casablanca was adapted. Steiner wished to compose a new song, but by the time he got around to scoring the film (the score is one of the last pieces of the film to be completed, always after the final footage has been filmed) Ingrid Bergman had cut her hair for For Whom the Bell Tolls and reshoots were impossible. A much appreciated thanks goes out to Ernest Hemingway, because Casablanca is unimaginable without that song, and Steiner eventually built the score around leitmotifs from “As Time Goes By” and the French national anthem “La Marseillaise” (more on that later). A whole book could be written on how Casablanca came together in spite of itself. The film is the ultimate miracle ever created by the Hollywood studio system (the whole film, save the airport scene at the end, was shot on the Warner’s lot).

I’m not going to delve too deeply into how Casablanca was created. The special features on the DVD are the place for that. Instead, as I have done with How Green Was My Valley and Mrs. Miniver, I will analyze Casablanca as it compares to the Kübler-Ross five stages of grief—in this case, bargaining.

The entire theme of Casablanca concerns bargaining. This is a film that speaks the language of deals and compromise. Kübler-Ross defines bargaining as hope that an individual can postpone or delay dealing with death by offering an exchange of a reformed lifestyle with a higher power. In the world of Casablanca, characters must bargain to survive—in a literal and spiritual sense and often both at the same time. In the film, the city of Casablanca is represented as the last station for the waylaid. For European refugees looking to escape from the Nazi regime, Casablanca is the transfer point for those wishing to journey into America (crucially, the film is set before the events of Pearl Harbor, allowing for both the plot device and for Rick to retain his cynicism). Any refugee looking to escape Casablanca needs “letters of transit” to enter neutral Portugal then into America. Therefore, a letter of transit can fetch a considerable sum, effectively placing a price on freedom. This necessity also creates a city that attracts all sorts of vices and black market activities. Refugees are easy prey for the pickpockets, gamblers, con-men and counterfeiters who make up the permanent residents of Casablanca. The scarcity of letters of transit forces those wishing to escape to make moral compromises. How far will a person go to obtain freedom? How soon will someone turn to illegal measures? What cost will they pay? These are the conflicts the characters in the film come into contact with on a daily basis.

The plot of the film really kicks in when a petty criminal, Ugarte (finely played by character actor Peter Lorre, who will forever be remembered by his nasal, desperate, whine for “Reeeeck!”), steals two letters of transit from Nazi officials, signed by none other than General Charles de Gaulle (if you ever want to know the definition of a MacGuffin, look no further than these letters of transit—they are a classic one). It is implied that Ugarte murdered the two Nazis carrying the letters, so he is targeted by Captain Renault (an unflappable Claude Rains, who steals his every scene), a corrupt opportunist and completely amoral police official working for the Vichy-controlled government in Casablanca. Renault sums up his philosophy thusly, “I have no convictions. I blow with the wind, and the prevailing wind happens to be from Vichy,” proving himself to be one who bargains exclusively with those who have the most power and will provide him with the most opportunities to get rich (Renault is no stranger to bribes in the film). What Renault doesn’t know is that Ugarte has entrusted the letters to Rick Blaine (Bogart, in his most famous role), an American expatriate who owns a popular bar, the Café Américain. Ugarte gives Rick the letters because “somehow, just because you despise me, you are the only one I can trust.” Ugarte’s rationale perfectly encapsulates how topsy-turvy the state of bargaining has become in Casablanca: the people who hate you are the least likely to screw you over.

Though Rick appears to be as amoral as Renault—saying, with utter conviction, that “he sticks his neck out for nobody” and “I’m the only cause I’m interested in”—his cynicism masks the compromises he has made for survival. The escape Rick is looking for isn’t from Casablanca; instead Rick seeks an emotional withdrawal, and the bargain he has made with himself is this: to not care about anything is better than having your heart broken. In Café Américain, politics are a taboo topic. When asked his nationality, Rick replies “A drunkard.” (This causes Captain Renault to retort, “That makes Rick a citizen of the world.”) Rick even drives away any chance he may have at love. A scene in the first act of the film has him coolly dismiss a former flame (Madeleine LeBeau). For Rick, his bargain is all about emotional survival.

Almost immediately, Rick’s attitude is revealed as a façade. He does, in fact, stick his neck out for his employees. Emil, his bartender, sneaks drinks to women he is trying to pick up. Carl (S.Z. Sakall), his waiter, is allowed to place refugees in contact with bar patrons who will more expediently secure their escape. Rick’s croupier runs a rigged roulette game which helps refugees secure bribe money for exit visas. The doorman Abdul is a trusted confidante. Sam, in addition to being the star piano player, is Rick’s right hand man who came with him from Paris. (Of all the Best Picture winners thus far, Casablanca is the only one which treats foreigners and minorities as equals. Sam is the first black character in an Oscar winning film to really be treated as an equal to whites. The multicultural cast is one of the tricks used by Curtiz to sell the illusion of Casablanca as a truly foreign place.) Rick himself allows certain customers to pay using IOU’s, but yet refuses to allow Germans to play games in the casino. Every member of his staff is crucial to the smooth operation Rick runs at his saloon, which on the outside appears to cater to everyone equally but masks a small resistance unit to help the needy. (One of the lies the audience is willing to forgive is how this saloon, which bleeds money, can possibly continue to operate in the red and evade closure by the Vichy officials.) Rick’s balancing act becomes truly tested when freedom fighter Victor Laszlo (Paul Henreid) walks into the café with his former flame, Ilsa (“Of all the gin joints in all the towns in all the world she walks into mine”).

Laszlo, of all the characters in the film, is the least compromising. He’s also a bit of a bore (this aspect of the character isn’t helped by Henreid’s stiff performance, easily the weakest part of an otherwise all-around strong film), and primarily functions as a foil to Rick’s cynicism. The audience is told that Laszlo is part of the Czech Resistance to the Nazis, but exactly what he does is never illuminated (and it isn’t really important). Laszlo needs to reach America to continue his work with the underground resistance, and he cannot do the work well unless Ilsa, the love of his life, is there with him (as Renault astutely observes, when Rick—before knowing he is with Ilsa—says that Laszlo needs only one exit visa, “I think not. I have seen the lady.”) Awfully convenient for Laszlo that two letters of transit are hidden in Sam’s piano, isn’t it? The only bargain Laszlo makes with Rick is to appeal directly to the better nature of his humanity.

Laszlo has some evidence that Rick is a deeper man than his bitterness suggests. Rick’s past as a freedom fighter in Spain and Ethiopia is widely known to everybody in Casablanca. Laszlo is quick to note that Rick also seems to stick his neck out for underdogs—though Rick replies that he was a mercenary in both of those fights, causing Renault to remark, “The winning side would have paid you better.” Laszlo is also aware of the bargains Rick has struck for some of the wayward refugees in Casablanca. A minor subplot involves a young Bulgarian couple trying to escape to America. The girl is offered two visas if she sleeps with Renault, but when she comes to Rick’s her husband is shown how to win at the rigged roulette wheel. Laszlo cannot help but notice Rick’s compassion. Finally, in the film’s most rousing sequence, Laszlo finds the clearest evidence yet that Rick is on his side.

Before Ilsa and Laszlo walk into Rick’s, the antagonist of the picture, Major Strasser (Conrad Veidt, a German actor who escaped Hitler’s regime and ironically made a career of playing Nazis) is also introduced. Ah, Nazis, the great bastards and villains of American cinema. Strasser is in Casablanca for one purpose: to keep Laszlo from making his escape, or better yet, kill him. Sides are immediately drawn, new allegiances are shaped. To nobody’s surprise, prevailing winds make Renault an ally of Strasser. Yvonne, Rick’s discarded girlfriend, also finds a new beau within the Nazi ranks. The day after Laszlo’s arrival, Nazi soldiers are singing “Die Wacht am Rhein (Watch on the Rhine)”, a popular patriotic German song. A furious Laszlo orders Rick to have his band play “La Marseillaise”, and Rick accedes to his request. Laszlo leads the entire saloon (save, of course, the Germans and Rick—still trying to give off the appearance that he is apolitical) in a stirring rendition of the French national anthem that sings down the Germans. Even Yvonne, there with her Nazi boyfriend, becomes so caught up in the fervor that she too joins in the singing of “La Marseillaise”, a tear in her eye. Strasser is incensed, and orders Renault to shut down the Café Américain. (This brings about my favorite line in the film. Rick asks Strasser the grounds on which the Nazis have ordered his business closed. Renault says illegal gambling. The croupier tells Renault, “Your winnings, sir.” Renault says “Oh, thank you very much,” then “Everybody out at once!”)

Rick’s act of patriotism has cost him his business. Rick sees the writing on the wall; Nazi occupation in Casablanca is only going to make things increasingly difficult for him. He has however arranged for the Café Américain to be sold to Signor Ferrari (the corpulent Sydney Greenstreet, a frequent costar of both Bogart and Lorre), who describes himself as “the leader of all illegal activities in Casablanca, I am an influential and respected man.” Although Ferrari runs an establishment—The Blue Parrot—that is the chief competitor of the Café Américain, like Ugarte, Rick trusts Ferrari precisely because he is his rival. Again, the safest negotiation one can make in Casablanca is with one’s enemy (and Rick also knows that Ferrari will look out for his staff, especially Sam, of whom Ferrari says “It wouldn’t be Rick’s without him”). The most dangerous bargain Rick has left is with the person he loves most—Ilsa.

Curtiz uses an extended flashback to Rick and Ilsa’s time in Paris to fully flesh out the background of their relationship. The most important thing the viewer is left with is that Rick is still impossibly in love with Ilsa (“Here’s lookin’ at you, kid.”), and Ilsa, though married to Laszlo, still loves him. Ilsa tries to use the relationship to her advantage. The film has established that sex can be used to buy freedom, and the rekindling of a sexual relationship is implicit when Ilsa comes to Rick alone. When that doesn’t work, Ilsa draws a pistol on Rick, but is unable to shoot, proving to Rick her love for him. Ilsa offers him this bargain: “You have to think for both of us. For all of us.”

Rick, now holding the upper hand in negotiations (and lest the audience forget, he is still in possession of the letters of transit), is free to determine Ilsa’s fate. I think everyone who has seen Casablanca has asked themselves: Why doesn’t Rick use the letters for himself and Ilsa and leave with the love of his life? Ilsa certainly has nothing to lose. By this point in the film, it is assumed that she will receive one of the letters. She will be safe. She will leave Casablanca with a man who loves her. And why wouldn’t she want to be with Rick? After all, he’s proven himself to be capable of protecting her, she knows he truly loves her, and facetiously, Rick is the more exciting man than Laszlo—and just as noble. Who isn’t charmed by him? If Rick gives the papers to Laszlo, he will certainly be doing right for the cause of resistance, but he will be left in Casablanca a wanted man without his livelihood, his heartbreak amplified. Rick’s bargain now has life-changing consequences: leave with the woman he loves or sacrifice that love for the greater good. Which is more important—love or freedom?

The ending of Casablanca has seeped into pop-culture consciousness through osmosis. Everyone knows that Ilsa gets on the plane to Lisbon with Laszlo (and if you haven’t seen Casablanca, sorry to spoil it, but I must ask you—why the hell haven’t you seen this masterpiece yet?). The tension created in the film is phony, because ultimately the Hays Code which governed morality in films at the time would have never allowed a married woman to abscond with a single man—it is a testament to the skills of Curtiz, Bogart, and Bergman that the audience is kept on the edge of their seat when the outcome is so obvious and by now so well known. It is the new bargain Rick makes with himself that gives the ending resonance. Ultimately he knows that “the problems of three little people don’t amount to a hill of beans in this crazy world” and that Ilsa will regret not boarding the plane with Laszlo. Regret becomes the emotion that Rick also does not want to feel. He knows that if he goes with her then Laszlo will likely die. Rick knows that if he takes the letters and leaves with Ilsa he will feel regret over the loss of an important life. He is also then able to reconcile his memories of their relationship. No longer will Rick’s memories of Ilsa bring him sorrow. (“We’ll always have Paris.”) Because he has sacrificed his love for the greater good, Rick is able to find happiness in his memories and his soul is at ease. In his new bargain, Rick listens to his conscience.

Appropriately, Casablanca concludes with the two craftiest bargainers—Rick and Captain Renault—walking off into the fog together. (“Louis, I think this is the beginning of a beautiful friendship.”) Renault, who in the final act is utterly played by Rick, finds a bargainer worthy of future co-conspiracy. After all, he witnesses Rick murder Major Strasser. Renault’s response—“Round up the usual suspects.” He knows that justice in Casablanca is best levied by leaving a crime unsolved, and that the prevailing winds will now blow him over to Rick. Inaction leads to a minor redemption for Captain Renault. I love that it isn’t a sunset the two men walk off into, but a fog. Their future is uncertain, but as the film fades to black the audience is left with a sense that no matter what fate awaits Rick and Renault—and since the audience has the benefit of knowing world history, it can be safely assumed that the adventures that the pair will embark on will be perilous—they will be able to bargain for both survival and a clear soul.

I think the reason Casablanca has resonated so deeply with audiences is because that despite its ultimate artifice, the film recognizes that its audience also makes bargains, deals and difficult choices on a daily basis in order to survive. The characters in the film mirror the audience watching them, and this is why the film has rooted itself so deeply in the consciousness of American popular culture. Certainly in 1943, Americans could no longer afford to be in denial about the war and the time for being angry about the rotten state of the globe had come to pass. It was now time to deal with it. As time goes by, our world continues to grow more complicated, and Casablanca will continue to resonate. Most movies—and certainly most films that win Best Picture—wish to provide audiences with a sense of grandeur, romance, and escape from reality. Undoubtedly, Casablanca succeeds on all of these fronts. Long after the lights have come up in the theater, long after the DVD has stopped playing, this film sticks with you because—like Victor Laszlo—it dares to pierce right through the masks we wear and the bargains we make and says that human beings are people of conscience, righteousness, and good. Casablanca wants everybody to be like Rick Blaine.

Readers, the bargain I will strike with you is this: you must remember Casablanca.


DETAILS

Casablanca (1943*) (The film gets an asterisk because it first premiered in New York City on November 26th, 1942. However, Academy rules state that for a picture to be considered for an Oscar within a calendar year, the film must be released in Los Angeles County by December 30th in its year of eligibility. Since Casablanca went wide the following January, it was thus eligible to compete against films released in 1943. Mrs. Miniver should consider itself lucky.)

Director: Michael Curtiz

Starring: Humphrey Bogart, Ingrid Bergman, Paul Henreid, Claude Rains, Conrad Veidt, Peter Lorre, Sydney Greenstreet, Dooley Wilson, S.Z. Sakall, Madeleine LeBeau

Studio: Warner Brothers

Total Oscars: 3 (Best Picture, Best Director—Michael Curtiz, Best Adapted Screenplay—Julius J. Epstein, Philip G. Epstein and Howard Koch) out of 8 total nominations (Best Actor—Humphrey Bogart, Best Supporting Actor—Claude Rains, Best Cinematography, Best Editing, Best Score—Max Steiner)


NEXT BLOG: Going My Way

Mrs. Miniver: Life During Wartime

In watching the Best Picture Oscar winners, it is sometimes difficult to completely shed any preconceived notions I’ve had of certain films. I thought Wings would be a chore to get through because it is a silent film, when it turned out to be captivating and delightful. Before heading into Mrs. Miniver, all I had heard of the film was that it was a “women’s weepie”—a genre I do not usually rush to see—filled with melodrama and tragedy. I discovered that melodrama is only a small part of Mrs. Miniver. The film is, in fact, a skillfully made piece of propaganda—and I mean this in the most complimentary way—that was designed, in part, to provoke America into action.

As I explained out in my last post, I am using Kübler-Ross’ five stages of grief as a basis for analysis for five successive 1940’s Best Picture winners. In 1941, the Oscar was awarded to How Green Was My Valley, a nostalgia driven drama. I argued that nostalgia was a form of denial, and the picture represented a country who would prefer to remember an idealized past instead of dealing with a complicated present. Mrs. Miniver is undoubtedly a propaganda film, the aim of which is to provoke an emotional response. I would say that any sort of provocation is an act of anger, and there was certainly anger motivating filmmaker William Wyler when he made Mrs. Miniver.

William Wyler was born Wilhelm Weiller in 1902 in the Alsace region of France, which at the time was part of Germany. His family was Jewish, and his mother was a relative of Universal Pictures founder Carl Laemmle. In 1921, Wyler immigrated to America, where he worked in the New York offices of Universal. Wyler worked his way up through the ladder to become a successful director in Hollywood. In 1928, he became a naturalized citizen of the United States, and he became known as a director with relentless passion and perfectionism. He was notorious for demanding multiple takes from his actors, with often no reason aside from he did not think the performance was good enough or that he simply wanted to see it again. Despite his reputation, throughout his career Wyler’s films were magnets for critical acclaim. Actors and crew who have participated in his films garnered more Oscar nominations than any other director in film history. Wyler himself holds the record for the most nominations received for Best Director—at twelve—and won three times. Relentless perfectionism is what motivated Wyler as a director and a human being.

The United States entered World War II on December 7th, 1941, when the Japanese bombed the U.S. Navy at Pearl Harbor. Europe was thrust into World War when Adolf Hitler invaded Poland in 1939, though the continent had dealt with the rise of fascism for much of the 1930’s. Europeans were far quicker to realize the danger this threat presented to the globe. Americans preferred to have an isolationist policy in regards to the conflicts in Europe. Although the Germans and Italians declared war on the United States only four days after Pearl Harbor, U.S. military presence was not truly established until the end of 1942. Many of the filmmakers working in Hollywood were, like Wyler, immigrants who fled to the United States and became citizens. Wyler openly despised the Nazis, and fully admitted he made Mrs. Miniver to show that an isolationist policy would cause more harm than it prevented. The film is rooted in righteous indignation. Wyler was able to channel his anger into art.

Yet as the film begins in the summer of 1939, it is more concerned with the banalities of everyday life for the British upper middle class than it is with spurring a nation to war. Mrs. Fay Miniver—magnificently played by Greer Garson, the Meryl Streep of the 1940’s with five consecutive Best Actress nominations in the decade (she also received a nomination in 1939 and another in 1960)—is first seen in the film going on a shopping trip. She is well known in her neighborhood, and she buys a fancy hat. Mr. Clem Miniver (Walter Pidgeon, who would co-star with Garson in eight films), her architect husband, also makes an impetuous purchase—a new car. The Minivers return home to their two young children, Judy and Toby. After their kids are asleep, husband and wife question if they are spending their money unwisely, but they come to the conclusion that they are in a position to afford the little luxuries. I found it difficult to fully empathize with this family at the beginning of the film. After all, these are people who can afford cooks and servants and also have a private boat launch along the Thames.

Another subplot introduced early on in the film is an annual flower show, where for the past 30 years the top prize in the rose competition is always won by aristocratic Lady Beldon (Dame May Whitty). Lady Beldon has some serious competition in the rose grown by Mr. Ballard (Henry Travers, best known for playing the angel Clarence in It’s a Wonderful Life). The stationmaster names his rose after Mrs. Miniver because he admires her beauty, and anyone who sees the flower agrees that not only is it aptly named, but it also has the best chance in years to unseat Lady Beldon from her domination of the rose competition. The day after the Minivers made their extravagant purchases, they meet their eldest son Vin (Richard Ney, whom Garson married after the film, and although he plays her son Ney was only eleven years younger than Garson), who is returning home from Oxford for the summer holiday. Kay, Vin and Clem all attend a dance later that evening, where Lady Beldon’s granddaughter, Carol (Teresa Wright), asks Kay to dissuade Mr. Ballard from entering his rose in the competition. Vin is quick to judge Carol as pompous, but Carol ends up being rather well grounded. Vin, in contrast, is the arrogant one, having returned to the village from Oxford with a know-it-all-attitude. However, Vin and Carol do recognize a mutual attraction, and they soon fall in love.

For the first half of the film, Wyler creates a world of banalities. Shopping trips, flower competitions, young love—these are hardly the subjects of a wartime propaganda film. As the film plays out, these details become crucial in establishing the world the characters live in. The audience has the foreknowledge that this perfect world will soon be thrust into chaos, and drama is created by seeing how these people will react in the story. Soon enough, news of the Hitler’s invasion of Poland reaches Britain. Later, at Sunday services, the sermon of the vicar (Henry Wilcoxon) is interrupted by the news that England is now officially at war with Germany. Vin decides to join the RAF. The villagers are encouraged to make preparations to defend themselves against air raids. Some, like Lady Beldon, don’t take these warnings seriously, but soon enough, all the homes have bomb shelters, emergency kits, and evacuation plans. Despite the chaos of the war looming, Vin does propose to Carol, and everyone tries to live as normally as possible.

The night of Vin’s proposal to Carol, he is summoned back to his airbase. Because the Minivers own a boat, Clem—along with thousands of other Britons who own private vessels—is ordered to help with the evacuation of British soldiers in Dunkirk, France. Rumors abound of a German soldier who parachuted out of his plane and landed in the village. Sure enough, Kay—alone in her home—is approached by the injured German. He holds her at gunpoint in her own kitchen, demanding to be fed. His injuries catch up to him and Kay is able to subdue the soldier and confiscate his revolver. As the police come to take him away, the German soldier rants about how England will fall to the might of Germany, just as Poland and Holland did. Kay responds by slapping him. Thereafter, Clem returns from Dunkirk and the family learns that Vin is also safe. When Vin returns home, Kay secures Lady Beldon’s approval for Vin and Carol’s marriage and the do so.

While the young couple are away for their honeymoon, the stage is set for the most harrowing and effective sequence in Mrs. Miniver. Air raid horns have sounded and the Miniver family is spending the night in their bomb shelter. It is hardly larger than a tool shed, and one gets the impression that if the shelter were to take a direct hit, everyone inside would perish. More than anything, Kay and Clem want to preserve a sense of normalcy for their youngest children, Toby and Judy. As the children are put to bed, Kay knits and Clem reads a passage from Lewis Carroll’s Alice in Wonderland pertaining to the joys of childhood. The passage lulls the children to sleep, and Kay then wonders if Carroll would have ever figured that his novel would become so beloved decades after it was written. I found this to be tremendously effective, because at their core, despite their many blessings, Kay and Clem are simply two people reading a bedtime story to their children and marveling over its enchanting power. What parent hasn’t wondered this?

It is at that point that the bombing intensifies. At first, Kay and Clem do their best to ignore the buzzing of planes flying overhead and the cacophony of the explosions, but the shelter becomes shaken and the children awaken frightened. The power in the bomb shelter is soon cut off, and the family huddles together, desperately clinging to one another, knowing full well that the only chance they have to make it through the night is to pray that a bomb does fall anywhere near them. Random luck will determine if the family survives; they have no choice but to hold one another. Wyler films the entire bomb shelter sequence in one incredible take, and the sound effects really hold center stage and seem to shake the frame apart. When the family is clinging together only the whites of Garson’s eyes illuminate the screen. It is the most desperate moment for the family in the film, and Wyler does an incredibly effective job of placing them alone, in the dark, with utter chaos enveloping them.

I was not prepared for the visceral reaction I had to watching the bombing sequence. I watched the film late at night, in my darkened living room, while my wife and daughter slept. The power of the scene shook me to tears. I think because now that I am both a husband and father, it was easy for me to feel as vulnerable as Kay and Clem Miniver. I have no doubt that audiences in 1942 felt the same, and we have the brilliance of William Wyler, Greer Garson and Walter Pidgeon to thank for it (not to mention the two fine young actors playing Toby and Judy). With the bomb shelter sequence, Wyler succeeds in placing his audience inside the film, and the emotions the characters experience become our own.

Despite that harrowing sequence, the final act of the film does find time for levity. The flower competition gathers the entire village together, and the climax of the show pits Mr. Ballard’s Mrs. Miniver rose against Lady Beldon’s championship flower. The judges, each terrified of Lady Beldon and the power she wields in the community, have again awarded the top prize to her. Kay convinces Lady Beldon that the judges are only choosing her rose because of her status, not because her rose is indeed better. Lady Beldon announces that the Mrs. Miniver rose has won the top prize, and an extraordinarily humbled Mr. Ballard tearfully accepts. With his victory, the entire village finds cause to celebrate, but it is short-lived, as the air raid sirens have again sounded. On the way home, Kay and Carol are driving together when a plane falls from the sky. It glances off the car and fatally wounds Carol.
The final scene in the film has the entire community attending service in their bombarded and hollowed out church. The vicar delivers a memorable and stirring speech that I will reprint in its entirety:

“We, in this quiet corner of England, have suffered the loss of friends very dear to us—some close to this church: George West, choir boy; James Ballard, station master and bell ringer and a proud winner, only one hour before his death, of the Belding Cup for his beautiful Miniver rose; and our hearts go out in sympathy to the two families who share the cruel loss of a young girl who was married at this altar only two weeks ago. The homes of many of us have been destroyed, and the lives of young and old have been taken. There is scarcely a household that hasn't been struck to the heart. And why? Surely you must have asked yourself this question. Why in all conscience should these be the ones to suffer? Children, old people, a young girl at the height of her loveliness. Why these? Are these our soldiers? Are these our fighters? Why should they be sacrificed? I shall tell you why. Because this is not only a war of soldiers in uniform. It is a war of the people, of all the people, and it must be fought not only on the battlefield, but in the cities and in the villages, in the factories and on the farms, in the home, and in the heart of every man, woman, and child who loves freedom! Well, we have buried our dead, but we shall not forget them. Instead they will inspire us with an unbreakable determination to free ourselves and those who come after us from the tyranny and terror that threaten to strike us down. This is the people's war! It is our war! We are the fighters! Fight it then! Fight it with all that is in us, and may God defend the right.”

The congregation then rises to sing, “Onward, Christian Soldiers,” and a formation of RAF planes can be seen flying in a V formation through the bombed-out hole in the roof of the church. Propaganda? Certainly, and so highly effective that Winston Churchill declared the film did more for the war effort than a “flotilla of destroyers”. President Franklin D. Roosevelt incorporated the vicar’s sermon into leaflets about morale building and was translated into many languages and dropped over enemy lines. The public was also captivated by the film. Mrs. Miniver became the highest grossing picture for MGM, it was a hit on both sides of the Atlantic, and it was easily the highest grossing picture of 1942. The American magazine Film Daily polled 592 critics as to the best film of 1942, and 555 named Mrs. Miniver. By November of that year, the United States was wholly involved with on the European front of WWII.

One of the main criticisms Mrs. Miniver has faced is that its propaganda is too slick; that the film exists solely for purposes of manipulation. My response is to say film is manipulation. We enter a dark auditorium with the purpose of allowing a story to carry us away. Audiences yearn to feel emotional. We want to laugh. We want to cry. We want to be inspired. Wyler—who made Mrs. Miniver fully intent as a way to funnel his anger at America’s isolationist policy into the viewing audience—made a film that slowly sneaks up on its viewers, drawing them into an England concerned with dance parties, flower shows and above all keeping up appearances. When each of these comforts are taken away, Mrs. Miniver shows us characters that react with dignity, pride, and grace while also leaving them with a call to arms, that the true battles and tests of character were yet to come.

Sixty-eight years later, a lone viewer in a small apartment—one fully aware of the outcome of history—was also manipulated. The potency of the propaganda within Mrs. Miniver has not waned. The genius of Wyler’s direction and the artistry of the acting (the film was the first for receive five acting nominations, one in each category)—especially from the magnificent Greer Garson—will keep the fires contained within the film well stoked.


DETAILS:

Mrs. Miniver (1942)

Director: William Wyler

Starring: Greer Garson, Walter Pidgeon, Teresa Wright, Dame May Whitty, Henry Travers, Richard Ney, Henry Wilcoxon

Studio: Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer

Total Oscars: 6 (Best Picture; Best Director—William Wyler; Best Actress—Greer Garson (*an interesting sidebar: Garson’s acceptance speech was the longest in the history of the Oscar ceremony, clocking in at over 5½ minutes); Best Supporting Actress—Teresa Wright; Best Adapted Screenplay—George Froeschel, James Hilton, Claudine West, and Arthur Wimperis; Best Cinematography, B&W) out of 12 nominations (Best Actor—Walter Pidgeon, Best Supporting Actor—Henry Travers, Best Supporting Actress—Dame May Whitty, Best Editing, Best Sound Recording, Best Special Effects)


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