Honest and touching

Rating: 10/10 (21 February 2005)

"Before Sunrise" is the story of two strangers - an American tourist (Ethan Hawke) and a French university student (Julie Delpy) who meet on a train to Vienna. Their fleeting time together evolves into romantic interest and they get off the train and spend a night together touring Vienna.
The plot, however, says little about the essence of this gem of a movie. Because what we have here is one of the most true, honest looks at what happens when two strangers meet and connect - really connect - that has ever been captured on film.
All too often, we talk to people we encounter without truly listening. We anticipate what they're going to say before they even say it, and we talk about superficialities just to fill the silence. What Hawke and Delpy manage to do in "Before Sunrise" is something altogether different. They really connect, in a way that is at once fleeting but incredibly deep and meaningful.
What we're used to seeing in movies is a fast-paced plot and dialogue that carries a scene. In love stories, we rarely get to see why two characters fall in love, or what they actually talk about. Often movies skip over the happy scenes, showing characters strolling hand in hand with ice cream while a pop song plays on the soundtrack. We see them talking and laughing but we never know what it is that they are talking or laughing about. The subtle message is that it doesn't matter.
"Before Sunrise" tells us that it does matter. It matters more than anything. Because we see all the dialogue between these characters, including the awkward silences, the fillers, the so-called meaningless conversation that most other movies would skip over.
There are some tangential characters that the two encounter, and there's some scenery (Vienna is of course the setting and it's a beautiful city) but all of that is peripheral; the movie focuses on the two characters and their interactions together. There is no formula here, no neat-as-a-bow happy endings. No, these are real people, sharing their views and thoughts and hopes and dreams. We never learn much about them in terms of biographical details. They don't share their resumes the way so many strangers do when they meet. No, theirs is a connection at a deeper level.
This movie stayed with me because I felt it was so realistic and true-to-life. It's also a little sad; what does it really mean if you meet someone and connect like that and then maybe never see them again? What are we after if not a connection like that? But on the other hand, that's why it works so well. We see many instances where the two characters clash on views and outlooks and politics and philosophies, but because their time together is so fleeting, none of these things become issues. We get the sense that a long-term relationship between them would never work, but that the chance one day encounter is going to stay with them forever.
In fact, though I'm told the sequel ("Before Sunset") is fantastic, I'm reluctant to see it. I prefer to see the ending as open, because it was so perfect in the context of the film.
"Before Sunrise" is an honest, touching, wonderfully acted film that is sure to captivate anyone who sees it. Highly recommended.