Cinema Tuesdays Review

In the only Special Feature on the new DVD of "Before Sunset," director Richard Linkater and actors Ethan Hawke and Julie Delpy marvel at how they were allowed to film a sequel to the little-seen but much-loved romance "Before Sunrise." After all, the 1995 film grossed just over $5 million domestically. However, it has become a cult hit on video, which is where I first discovered it.

To briefly summarize "Before Sunrise," two twentysomethings, Jesse (Ethan Hawke) and Celine (Julie Delpy), meet on a train in Europe. Jesse is on his way to Vienna, where he'll take a flight home to America the next morning; Celine is on her way to Paris. They strike up a conversation on the train. Jesse senses a connection between him and Celine, and he convinces her to get off in Vienna, to continue the conversation. And for the rest of the movie, they talk, and talk, and talk. Their conversation is about the things you wonder about in your twenties, and it's full of starry-eyed Generation X-style optimism (yes, not all Generation Xers were sullen slackers). While they may not "fall in love" in the traditional sense, it's obvious there are some very strong feelings that have emerged after their night together. As they part, they agree to meet again in Vienna six months later. Do they? The sequel, "Before Sunset," answers that question, and others you may not have thought of.

It's nine years later, and "Before Sunset" opens in a Paris bookstore, where Jesse is on the last stop of a book tour to promote his new novel, based in part on that night in Vienna long ago. Celine shows up at the store toward the end of his Q&A session. For those who haven't seen the previous movie, the opening minutes include a few scenes from "Before Sunrise." The first thing you notice about the two actors when you see them again is how thin they are, compared to 1995. Either they've both become vegans, or life is already taking its toll.

This time around, Jesse has to catch a plane back to America at 7:30 p.m. And so, in the next hour and fifteen minutes, in basically real time, the two characters recount their night in Vienna, reveal what they have been up to for the past nine years, and re-establish a little bit of the romantic connection they once had.

"Before Sunset," like its predecessor, is filled with talk. There are long takes, where the camera doesn't cut away from the actors for minutes at a time. Prior to filming, when the idea of a sequel was first hatched, Hawke, Delpy and Linklater exchanged emails with bits of dialogue that could be used in the film. An intense two-week rehearsal session preceded the actual filming, and the result is a continuous filmed conversation that doesn't seem forced or staged.

I don't want to spoil any of the film, but I will say that it ends on a perfect note, one that made me chuckle out loud to myself when I saw it in the theater. Like a fictional counterpart to Michael Apted's "Up" documentaries, which follow a group of British citizens every seven years, I could see us visiting with Jesse and Celine on film throughout their lives. Maybe we'll see "Before Noon" or something similar in 2013, and "Before Sunset" will be not a sequel, but the second chapter in a series of deliriously romantic films about the life journey we're all on.

11/12/04

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