This is a brilliant cinematic masterpiece. The story flows wonderfully and the cinematography is great. You see the change in women’s role onscreen though to one of being subservient. This is happening in war time to boost the social status of the men fighting. We also see the emergence of the anti-hero. Humphrey Bogart arguable leads the generation of anti-hero after doing High Sierra and Maltese Falcon, now Casablanca cements his role as the leading anti-hero of his generation that will dominate the 1950s.
The film’s tracking shots are timed to coincide with the pace of the movie. It times really well with the story of the lost romance. We get these great dolly-ins to Bogart sitting in his restaurant and shots that move through the crowd to find him and Bergman. And the last shot of the film has the camera tracking back and up and away to this epic wide finale of the two of them walking away onto the plane that will take them out of Casablanca. This script is incredible and the film really shows you the true power of story over everything else. This is about people and not about film mechanics. That’s why to me this film is so much greater than Citizen Kane which is about film form rather than about the characters transformations and relationship within the film.