Richard Linklater's BEFORE Trilogy (1 Viewer)

[Dick]

I purchased the Criterion box set of the three BEFORE movies, only because it was half-price during the B&N sale. I love Linklater's writing, but am not usually a huge fan of romance films.

Just finished watching the first film, BEFORE SUNRISE. I found this to be the most emotionally powerful, bittersweet romantic drama (with some great humor) that I have seen since, maybe, David Lean's BRIEF ENCOUNTER, with which it shares a few plot points.

Damn, I wish I could write dialog as well as the director did for this film. It is loaded with truthful introspection, insightful observations about human relationships, and a nostalgic feel that probably has to do with an older viewer's regrets that any chance meeting he or she might have had that was similar to this film's one-night-only affair did not blossom into a full-blown, mutually nurturing, and solidly lifelong partnership. Not one line of the script feels wrong or contrived. The Vienna locations themselves pull at one's heart.

I've decided to space these films out, and wait a few weeks before watching BEFORE SUNSET, and another couple prior to BEFORE MIDNIGHT.

The acting is sublime. Who'd have thunk that Ethan Hawke would become one of our most mature young actors, if we'd only seen his very earliest work such as that in EXPLORERS. And Julie Delpy, not a traditionally gorgeous actress, is just so natural and soulfully beautiful that it's hard to take one's eyes off her. The chemistry between the two is flawless. You want one of the two to change plans and stay with the other.

A thoughtful, memorable film that very much demonstrates Linklater's tremendous skill as both writer and director.

The Criterion presentation is wonderful...very film-like with perfect color and grain structure. The soundtrack utilizes some fine music and songs. I'm so glad I bought this!

 

[Josh Steinberg]

I saw these for the first time earlier this year (and wrote about them in my blind buys thread) - it was a beautiful film, and I think you will appreciate the increasing depth and complexity of the characters in the two sequels.

 

[Scott Merryfield]

I picked this set up as a blind purchase during a previous Criterion sale due to the discussion in Josh's thread, and both my wife and I really enjoyed all three films. It was a very pleasant surprise.

 

[AshJW]

I love the first film and like the second. I don't know the third yet.

 

[Colin Jacobson]

I love the first film and like the second. I don't know the third yet.

I like the 2nd one best - the 1st one meanders too much.

The 3rd is easily the worst of the bunch...

 

[Josh Steinberg]

The second one was my favorite of the bunch.

If I had seen the first one as a teenager, when it first came out, I might have thought differently. As a younger man, I might have mistaken some of their youthful exuberance for actual profundity and given the movie extra credit. Watching it now for the first time as a guy in my mid-30s, I appreciate everything they had to say in the first film, but I can also see the more naive worldview, the youthful way of looking at things. I think it's a completely accurate portrayal of how those people would have acted at that age, and I find it charming, but whereas I would have felt seduced by it if I had seen it when it first came out, now I just roll my eyes at a couple things and smile -- because the eye roll comes from remembering when I was that guy who would have said those things too.

There was something really magical about the second film for me. It's essentially told in real time, which works beautifully for the story being told. If you're someone like me who likes to know how long a movie is before starting it, you go into it knowing it's less than 90 minutes, so when it starts and the characters meet up, you as an audience member feeling the ticking clock, how this meeting might be the most important moment in either character's life.... it has all of the romance and intelligence of the first film, along with a kind of suspense that's normally reserved for Kiefer Sutherland in "24".

I enjoyed the third film, but the characters weren't exactly where I thought they would be, which meant their conflicts were different than I expected. It was by no means a bad film, and I suspect that as I get older and have lived through more of the milestones that the characters have faced that I might feel differently. In my thread, I believe Jose said it was his favorite of the bunch, and I think he's closer in age to the characters in the last film than I am, so maybe there is something to be said for that.

At any rate, despite being scripted, all three films give the illusion of being spontaneous improvisations between two smart people drawn to each other, and that in and of itself is an achievement.

 

[Mike Frezon]

I had heard a lot about these films...and I picked them up during this past B&N sale figuring they would be a sure thing for me and Peg.

After we watched the first one, we weren't even sure we wanted to watch ether of the others.

But we watched the 2nd...and the question about whether we'll watch the third film has grown even greater.

Neither of the first two films spoke to us at all. Just a lot of fast-moving dialogue...not really moving anything forward or drawing us into the characters. We especially thought the writing was weak. As far as we were concerned, the big question of "would they or wouldn't they" just wasn't that big a question. Kinda "whatever." Personally, I found Ethan Hawke to be really irritating in these...his acting was horrible and he really took me out of the film. Julie Delpy, OTOH, was terrific. I found her to be really believable in the first two films and am left to wonder why I haven't seen her in more.

Peg specifically thought the dialogue was unnatural and made her feel like it wasn't "real life." Like they wouldn't be saying those things to each other. All contrived. I don't buy the idea that I might have liked the first film more if I had seen it when I was younger. I can appreciate the enthusiasm and youthfulness of young people even in my advanced years!

Oh well. You can't please all the people all of the time. I really wanted to like these.

About the only positive thing to comment on (besides Delpy) were the locations (Vienna and Paris). Those were beautifully incorporated.

 

[Josh Steinberg]

Mike, I can completely understand these movies not being everyone's cup of tea. Frankly, I watched them primarily because they were favorites of my wife; I didn't expect to enjoy them nearly as much as I did.

But I just wanted to comment on your comment about how the dialogue didn't seem realistic to you. To that, I just want to say, I promise you there are people that regularly converse like that. So much of their conversation in the first film sounded like me at that age - the interesting thing to me was that both characters at times spoke for me, it wasn't that I was like just one or the other. If you didn't have conversations like that in your youth, I agree, seeing the film at a younger age probably wouldn't have changed anything for you.

Now we need to find the movie where I say "people don't talk like that" and then you get to tell me that that's what your regular conversations are like

 

[Mike Frezon]

I promise you there are people that regularly converse like that.

Ugh. The dialogue was rather...empty.

Josh: I've been reading your posts here on the forum for quite a while. I cannot imagine that your conversations are really quite as inane or banal as the conversations in these films!

 

[Josh Steinberg]

My wife might disagree with you there

 

[bujaki]

I am 67, way older than the characters in the 3rd film; but I have lived those years so I can empathize with the couple, with their past and with their future. That's why I find the final film to be the most mature and most moving of the trilogy.
This trilogy is a flat out masterpiece.

 

[Dick]

Like Jose, I am 67. Since childhood I have resisted heavily romantic films that don't have funny plots (FATHER GOOSE, TOOTSIE, ROMAN HOLIDAY, etc. do, for instance), or melodramatic undertones (as had LOVE ME OR LEAVE ME and A STAR IS BORN), perhaps because the humor and/or intense dramatic thrust keeps some serious regrets about life choices I have made at arm's length. But straight romantic dramas like AN AFFAIR TO REMEMBER just don't spin my wheels, as I cannot find anything in them to relate to.

BEFORE SUNSET is not ostensibly a comedy, but it has humor resulting from the intelligent and philosophical banter of the leads with dialog I find irresistible, as I did with Linklater's two rotoscoped projects, WAKING LIFE and A SCANNER DARKLY, not to mention DAZED AND CONFUSED and others. But unlike those others, this one gets under my emotional skin.

Watching SUNSET I was able to quite easily relive feelings I recall having had as a very young adult when I was able to connect with someone who simply electrified my soul ("smitten" would be one word that applies), and for whom I felt an almost instant chemistry that had the potential of flowering into an enduring friendship if not a passionate romance ("Love at first sight" or perhaps "lust" would not be inappropriate to describe some of those early encounters). The film makes me ache a little in that regard, and that makes it one of best "romantic" films I've ever seen. So many regrets of lost opportunities in 20/20 hindsight. I think that is one of the elements of SUNSET'S plots.

The actors' joyous but ultimately bittersweet, night-long interactions are deliberately episodic and meandering, for how else could this have played out? On the surface the film is about nothing more than a happenstance couple's few hours together exploring Vienna, but during the course of a single afternoon and evening, their spontaneity and ongoing discussion evolves into an unrequited passion. That they later realize (as almost a throwaway) that they hadn't even attended a play for which they'd been given free passes is one small detail that, when compounded with many other small details, adds up to an organic whole that feels very, very real to me.

Mike and I hold almost polar opposite opinions of this film, apparently, and I have difficulty relating to his reflections of it, as he must have of mine. Personally I find the dialog of this film utterly believable and I remember having had discussions similar to those of its characters many times while in high school and college, when we young adults were tunneling our way into the adult world with naivete and pretension as we tried to find our respective places in society and with the people we were attracted to. I find the disparity of Mike's and my opinions fascinating to me from a sociological standpoint, and just another reason why this forum is so valuable, and why BEFORE SUNSET is such a discussion-worthy gem.

 

[AlexF]

I was "lucky" enough to watch each of these when they came out... and I'm a similar age to the characters in each of them.

As such, I don't really have a favourite out of any of them, as they each speak to me in a different era of my life. Having said that, the original is the one I go back to most, if only because it was the first one, and there's always that bit of extra fondness for that.

While some of the circumstances can seem a bit contrived, all three present very realistic (to me) conflict, dialogue, and resonance between the two main characters, and any other character in the films (especially the third) ends up feeling very incomplete and ill-defined, but that's also partly because the films all focus (and detail) our two main characters, and everyone else simply moves in and out of their lives... just like in reality.

 

[Winston T. Boogie]

Before Boyhood Richard Linklater allowed us to watch two characters grow and age before his cameras...only he did it in three films over about 19 years rather than one film. He may be best remembered going forward for these films where we get to see the same actors in the same parts over many years. It made me wonder a bit why people found Boyhood such an achievement when Linklater had already done the thing where we get to see actors age in their roles...in Boyhood he just condensed it into one film. For Ethan Hawke these films really capture his life as an adult actor and his aging process in full as he appears in the Before trilogy and Boyhood spending quite a few years growing older for Mr. Linklater's cameras.

I do like these films and I do think it makes a difference that I saw them when they were released and so actually had to wait several years, as the characters do, to see them reunited in each film. It probably helps that a couple years after seeing Before Sunrise I actually did meet a woman briefly, we instantly fell for each other, discovered she was moving to Paris and chased her there to attempt to win her heart and convince her to return with me to the states. So, I have spent quite a bit of time wandering around European cities with a beautiful very intelligent woman having conversations deep into the night and often the next day. Vienna was one of the cities I have wandered around with her...although the film I was thinking of when I wandered around Vienna was The Third Man not Before Sunrise.

It should be noted that Hawke and Delpy were allowed a great deal of freedom in creating these characters and their arc over the years and that some of their dialogue is improvised. So, despite how you feel about the dialogue in the films it was an attempt to be...well...as authentic as possible to the people making the films.

While the first two films present the romance and the "sweet" with their first meeting in Sunrise and their reunion finally taking place after years had passed in Sunset with the discovery that whatever it was between them was still there, the final film presents us with some of the bitter...a couple after years of marriage and where that has taken them. I think a problem with the third film for a lot of people is they did not want to see or experience the bitter. They wanted the magic of the first two films. Jesse and Celine are still wandering around beautiful European locations but the exuberance of their youth has hardened and their great romance has wilted into routine. This was probably an attempt by the filmmakers to be true to the reality of life but not what romantic moviegoers likely wanted to see.

 

[Mike Frezon]

It should be noted that Hawke and Delpy were allowed a great deal of freedom in creating these characters and their arc over the years and that some of their dialogue is improvised. So, despite how you feel about the dialogue in the films it was an attempt to be...well...as authentic as possible to the people making the films.

I was aware of that, Reggie, before I watched the first two films...and I honestly found myself thinking that if the words they were saying were a result of the actor's improvisations...then Linklater should have spent more time (at least) giving them an outline from which to work so that there would be some character development and not just the blatherings of a couple of people on what-have-you. It all seemed rather tedious and disjointed to me and without purpose. I never thought their discussions were interesting or did much to draw the two just-mets together.

Its been a couple weeks now since we've watched the films. I wished I had written about them closer to our viewing...but, sadly, much of these films has already faded from my memory. I would have liked to have included some specifics about things which really didn't work for me. I asked my wife for some comments (which I included above) but she found them less than memorable herself.

 

[Mike Frezon]

While the first two films present the romance and the "sweet" with their first meeting in Sunrise and their reunion finally taking place after years had passed in Sunset with the discovery that whatever it was between them was still there, the final film presents us with some of the bitter...a couple after years of marriage and where that has taken them. I think a problem with the third film for a lot of people is they did not want to see or experience the bitter. They wanted the magic of the first two films. Jesse and Celine are still wandering around beautiful European locations but the exuberance of their youth has hardened and their great romance has wilted into routine. This was probably an attempt by the filmmakers to be true to the reality of life but not what romantic moviegoers likely wanted to see.

And now this rather intrigues me. It sounds like the problem many people have with the ending of La La Land (which I thought was terrific). And I need to finish what I've started anyway...

So I will probably slip in the third film some night when the timing is right.

 

[Winston T. Boogie]

I was aware of that, Reggie, before I watched the first two films...and I honestly found myself thinking that if the words they were saying were a result of the actor's improvisations...then Linklater should have spent more time (at least) giving them an outline from which to work so that there would be some character development and not just the blatherings of a couple of people on what-have-you. It all seemed rather tedious and disjointed to me and without purpose. I never thought their discussions were interesting or did much to draw the two just-mets together.

So, this is a comment you might find amusing, Mike...

A French friend of mine (female) said to me after having seen the first two films "It seemed clear that the thing that attracted these two people to each other was they shared a level of self-absorption that was disturbing and upon recognizing this they fell in love because they could only love someone as self obsessed as they each were."

I laughed and said "Well that sort of kills the romantic aspect of these pictures." and she replied "How is it romantic to fall in love with yourself?"

So, there is that...

 

[Bryan^H]

Watching SUNSET I was able to quite easily relive feelings I recall having had as a very young adult when I was able to connect with someone who simply electrified my soul ("smitten" would be one word that applies), and for whom I felt an almost instant chemistry that had the potential of flowering into an enduring friendship if not a passionate romance ("Love at first sight" or perhaps "lust" would not be inappropriate to describe some of those early encounters). The film makes me ache a little in that regard, and that makes it one of best "romantic" films I've ever seen. So many regrets of lost opportunities in 20/20 hindsight. I think that is one of the elements of SUNSET'S plots.

Well said.

 

[Winston T. Boogie]

And now this rather intrigues me. It sounds like the problem many people have with the ending of La La Land (which I thought was terrific). And I need to finish what I've started anyway...

So I will probably slip in the third film some night when the timing is right.

Well, if you found one of your big issues that the dialogue in the first two films was a bit too flighty and hard to take the third film features the dialogue of a married couple that has grown a bit tired of each other. So, it is not all philosophical romantic musings and is much more down to earth.

The same French friend said to me "You knew two people so in love with their own bellybuttons could only come to a bad end."

Which again made me laugh...

 

[bujaki]

The centerpiece of the third film is the lunch party with the older and the younger couple.
The young couple are a mirror to Jesse's and Celine's past, just as the older couple are a foreshadowing of what the future might be for Jesse and Celine after their present turmoil: the calm after the storm and before sunset. That's what I'd like to see in their future: the maturity of the acceptance of their own limitations and of the other