Neo-realism vindicated.

Rating: Null/10 (15 July 2004)

Wondrous and pensive is Richard Linklater's 'Before Sunset', but certainly a movie with its feet firmly on the ground. I felt elated and sad all at once while this film rolled before my eyes and I felt my brain working overtime trying to assimilate all the lucid dialogue that was bursting from the screen. This is one of those rare bits of cinema in which the simplistic directorial style that Linklater employed was entirely appropriate.
Several exquisitely composed establishing shots are made of Paris at the very beginning in order to prepare us for the traveling our main players will undertake. The story begins when Jesse (Ethan Hawke) is in a Paris bookstore answering questions in promotion of his novel that is based on the night portrayed in the previous cinematic installment of this story in 'Before Sunrise' (1995). An inquisitor is quite insistent on wanting to know whether or not the novel is based on an actual experience of the author's  he begrudgingly answers in the affirmative. Not soon after, he glances to the side the subject of his story, Celine  strangely looking both ravishing and child-like. Of course, after hastily excusing himself from the conference, he immediately meets up with her and they unplanningly set out on a mild excursion of the city  talking and emoting all the while.
And, basically, that's about it.
There are no special effects, no technical triumphs, no CGI (at least, none that I noticed). What we see and are enraptured by is the light, soulful and gliding talking and walking of these only two pieces to a jigsaw puzzle.
A certain tension is built up as we become more and more aware that Jesse is soon going to have to go to the airport to catch his flight. However, it is all released during the glorious last four minutes or so of the film. The two words spoken have never previously sounded as sublime.