Propaganda in the movie Casablanca Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 1750 words

Propaganda in the movie Casablanca - Essay Example Such an approach is something of an arrogant approach. This is of course due to fact that the individual who engages within such an interpretation is of the opinion that films of several decades past could not have had the skill or finesse of incorporating such nuanced and non-lateral forms of propaganda within their storyline. However, as this brief analysis will discuss, the fact of the matter is that even films of over one half century ago were expertly able to integrate nuanced forms of propaganda within their storylines and integrate them with the viewer. The key differential that must be understood is with regards to whether or not the viewer ultimately understood what they were consuming was propaganda or not. In such a way, such a representation of propaganda within films such as Casablanca serves as a type of gold standard for propaganda due to the fact that the viewer may very well be unaware of the fact that the information that they are consuming has strong elements of pr opaganda built into it. ... However, instead, the Germans are portrayed as fully human; albeit unemotional and unnecessarily egotistical. Moreover, one of the most effective means by which propaganda is elucidated within the movie is with regards to the sinister threat that such a worldview and violent empire poses to all of humanity. As a means of affecting this particularly sinister understanding of what the Nazi regime embodied, the filmmakers purposely allowed for a languishing pause between Colonel Strasser’s question and Rick Blaine’s response with regards to what a German invasion of the United States might look like. To the viewer within 2013, such an eventuality seems all but preposterous and impossible; however, the propaganda effect that this necessarily had upon the viewer of the film must necessarily have been much different. This of course brings the analysis to the vitally important understanding that propaganda within film cannot and should not be related solely with regards to wha t might strike the current viewer as propaganda. Rather, it must be understood within regards to the way in which propaganda would have been understood and integrate with the audience of the time. Ultimately, the answer to such a question is that the audience of the time would find such a mental image highly troublesome and likely would have engaged with this subtle portrayal of propaganda to a much greater degree than they would have likely responded to a more overt style of propaganda. Another vitally important way in which propaganda is related within the film Casablanca is not with regards to any specific image, dialogue, or scene. Rather, one of the most