Before Sunrise

1995 romantic movie

Rating: 17/20

Plot: Two strangers on a train meet and spend several hours walking around Vienna while having conversations that real people probably wouldn't have. They might have had sex, too.

Did they have sex? I needed a phallic symbol or a Hitchockian train going through a tunnel to let me know if they did. Maybe they'll talk about it in the sequel--Before Sunset.

I'm not the biggest Ethan Hawke fan in the world. He's too twitchy. He's twitchy here, too, but Julie Delpy kind of bleeds into him and makes him better. I think he does the same for her, too. The dialogue--though not all that realistic--is really good in this, but there's a great chemistry that this entire movie balances on top of that just really works. And that kiss on the ferris wheel, probably because they were turned on by remembering that scene in The Third Man? Man, that's really something.

I have avoided this movie for years, mostly because all of the posters for it look a little like that one up there. I expected to be a little bored. However, I found myself captivated--as captivated as the two characters were, maybe, even though there is even less of a chance that I've had sex recently--from the moment these two meet. They meander through the city and meet people and have conversations in typical Linklater ways, and through the process, we learn about love and death and time.

This is the second movie I've seen in a row where characters are walking around a city I've never been to. If I would have thought ahead, I could have made turned this into a Characters Walking Around a City I've Never Been To Fest.

I can't recall characters I've seen recently who I've connected with more than these two. Their story filled me with conflicting feelings of joy and melancholy.

I'll give the sequels a spin eventually. Hopefully, I'll find out whether or not they had sex.