*Editors note: The Times Cinema is theater in Milwaukee, WI - Casablanca plays on the big screen at various venues throughout the world.

How strangely appropriate that “Casablanca” returns to the Times Cinema the same week as “Knocked Up” hits theaters across the country. For one can see tiny hints – very tiny, mind you – of the same philosophy at work in both films.

Judd Apatow’s “Knocked Up” (a fine, at times hilarious comedy that we’ll be reviewing next week in TimeOut) is about a couple brought together through a mistake – a drunken night of lust that results in an unlikely pregnancy that both stand up and decide to embrace. But we wonder, through a good majority of the film, what the two really think of each other. Sure, they are soon-to-be-parents, and they are obliged to treat each other with care and respect, but the further they move down the road of parenthood, the more their emotions fluctuate, change and mature.

Really, all great romances – comedies or not – have this in common: The end of the journey cannot be assumed, and the emotions between the two romantic interests cannot be distilled down into one or two words.

Granted, this is not the case with of most of today’s teenage-friendly romances, between the cute girl and guy, some quirky and others charming, who say exactly the right thing at exactly the right moment. These are movies that serve a purpose, namely serving as a slight diversion for dating couples looking for a pick-me-up, but will always bear the title of forgettable and shallow.

The far more interesting, and the great romances, are those that keep something hidden from the audience, that match their more uplifting sentiments with a fair amount of emotional mystery. No romance has done that better than “Casablanca,” and perhaps that’s the reason it continues to regularly be regarded as the best film ever made and surely the highest-ranked romance in the history of cinema.

Every time you return to it, there’s something new to behold, something new to discover, and as the Times has started to make it something of an annual tradition to bring Humphrey Bogart and Ingrid Bergman back to the big screen, I have been surprised by how differently the film has affected me.

A few years ago, what I noticed most was the cynicism of the Rick (Bogrart) character, how callous, detached and outright mean he is – and how little emotion he shows, beyond the dramatic ending when he sends Ilsa (Bergman) off into the horizon without a definite declaration of love. But at the time, I had broke up with a girlfriend of five years – a girl I thought I would marry – and I was looking at Rick, and this movie, in terms of how a heartbroken man suppresses his pain.

Last year, as the film returned to the theater, I was regretting the painful ending of a different relationship, and I found myself sympathizing far more with the Ilsa character, who this time I saw as a far more sympathetic character trying to find a way to pave over mistakes of her past, and heal hearts that she had hurt.

And this year, as I popped the wonderful “Casablanca” DVD back in to the player (complete with one of the best commentary tracks I have ever heard, provided by the great critic Roger Ebert), I found myself more moved than ever before by the tragedy that overtakes “Casablanca’s” final act. A man and a woman who love each other are forced to part ways, to turn their backs on each other, because of the political circumstances of the moment – and they are so crestfallen by this fact that they cannot even be honest to each other about their feelings or regrets.

This year, I find myself more in love than I have ever been in my life, and I think I brought that emotional state to the movie this time, seeing Rick’s tough act, and Ilsa’s emotionless façade merely as camouflage,, masking a deep reservoir of emotional longing and pain that they cannot bring themselves to face. This time, I saw them as the most passionate of lovers brought together at the wrong time and the wrong place.

And this is why “Casablanca” works the wonders it does. It allows you to bring your experiences to the table, and to see the world of Rick and Ilsa as however you prefer to see it. We know they were once in love in Paris, as World War II threw them to the wind, but are they still in love today, in the wild west of Casablanca? Does Ilsa really have feelings for her new lover, or is she more a political supporter? Is Rick the hard, crusted-over man he appears to be, or is it an act because his heart was once broken?

For that matter, what about the ending? Is it an act of love? Political allegiance? Something of a conscience poking through Rick’s slicked-back hair and pressed suit?

Every great romance in our lives starts with something of a mystery. Does he feel the same way about me? Did she notice what I noticed? Are we a good fit? That’s the game of romance that intrigues us, and leads us to daydream about our beloved. It’s what keeps things interesting, fresh, lively. And that’s why “Casablanca” continues to endure some 65 years later. It teases us and intrigues us, rewards us and gives us the cold shoulder. It’s a movie we have fallen in love with, that we continue to look deeper into in hopes of discover its true feelings. For my money, I hope the Times keeps showing it every year, for I see something new on the screen every time I hand over two hours of my life to the strange world that is Rick the bar owner and Ilsa the political activist on the run. As time goes by, it’s even more of a masterpiece.

by: Steven Snyder steven@zertinet.com, Published 2007-06-07