Julie Delpy & Ethan Hawke in Before Sunrise
Last night saw Richard Linklater's film Before Sunrise (missed it, strangely, six years ago). A perfect film: the framing, the screenplay, the acting. A loquacious film (as the Guardian said) about two people communicating, learning about each other and talking about everything and anything: love, death, sex, men, women:
'I really believe that if there's any kind of God, he wouldn't be in any one of us - not you, not me, but just this space in between. If there's some magic in this world, it must be in the attempt of understanding someone else, sharing something. Even if it's almost impossible to succeed, but who cares, the answer must be in the attempt.'
One one level it's a film about serendipity: those chance encounters that make moments special (here, the riverbank poet, the basement harpsichord player).
Update 29 August: saw Before Sunset last night. Not really as good as the first film, though still some good lines. The spark between the two was present only intermittently, and the film took a while to get started. Perhaps the impact was less because, unlike the first film, this was primarily about the disillusionment that comes with experience.
Memory is a good thing if you don't have to deal with the past.
Other great loquacious films: Blue In The Face, Smoke, My Dinner With Andre.
- Before Sunrise: review by James Berardinelli
- IMDb: Before Sunrise
- IMDb: Before Sunset
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