Strangers on a train

Before Sunrise (1995)

Rated: R

Runtime: 105 minutes

Stars: Ethan Hawke, Julie Delpy

Director: Richard Linklater

Plot: Jesse (Ethan Hawke) and Celine (Julie Delpy) are two strangers who meet on a train that is headed to Vienna. Jesse is on his way to the airport to fly back to the United States after a “trip”, and Celine is on her way back to Paris after visiting her grandmother. Two people talking the entire movie … that’s it.

Rating—out of 5 basketballs: 5

Tournament Seed: 1—one of the top 4 teams in the tournament. Has played at a high level all season and is deserving of its “easier” path to the final 4. Most people pick 1-seeds to advance far into the tournament and are most likely to win the championship.

I know this isn’t a basketball movie, but with it being June 16^th and all, I couldn’t resist reviewing my favorite movie, which just happens to take place in one night on June 16^th (don’t be surprised if you see an October 26^th review of Back to the Future … it’s gonna happen). I am hoping for a Criterion release of this movie; there are so many special features they could have, the current DVD release only has the movie trailer. Also, the cover of the movie is boring, the movie poster captures a more magical feeling that the movie evokes.

Where do I start with my favorite movie of all time? I could give you the short review: “Meet a French girl on the train, fuck her, and never see her again,” but I don’t think that would do it justice. It begins innocently enough when a woman moves into a seat across from a man on a train. He convinces her after a short while to get off the train with him and walk around Vienna all night before his flight leaves in the morning. For the next hour and forty-five minutes topics such as couples, childhood, fears, reincarnation, parents, relationships, technology, and differences between men and women are discussed in various locations such as a train, a bridge, a tram, a cemetery, a ferris wheel, a church, a bar, a restaurant, an empty park, or just the streets of Vienna. My feeling is that the first impressions the two have of each other are not very great. Celine thinks Jesse is a dumb American, and Jesse fakes being interested in what Celine has to say because he is bored and just wants to talk more about himself and sound intelligent. But the beauty of the movie is that the more they find out about each other, the more they like about the other, and one minute you think Jesse is more in love with Celine and the next minute it is Celine who is more in love with Jesse.

I think the moment where we first see Celine change is when Jesse tells a story about rainbows and his great-grandmother’s ghost. Jesse’s change, I think, happens when Celine tells a story about a 13-year-old girl buried in the cemetery that is known as the final resting place of suicides who jumped in the river and are never identified. But there are so many scenes of awkwardness that it is hard to know what they are feeling. After meeting two men on a bridge, Jesse and Celine plan to attend a play about a cow, but they soon forget this plan after sharing their first kiss in a ferris wheel during a beautiful sunset. There are very few encounters with other people, but they do have their palms read and find out they have different opinions on fate. They have a bit of a fight over it, but decide that conflict isn’t so bad, but only after Celine calls Jesse a “rooster prick”. We also discover that Celine is more of a romantic when a poet by the water writes a poem containing the word “milkshake” (a word decided on by Jesse and Celine), which results in her loving it, but Jesse believing that the poem was already constructed and the poet just plugged the word in. After sharing a story about her grandmother, Celine tells Jesse that she often feels like a very old woman. Jesse reveals that he feels like a very young boy; which might explain the next scene where Celine catches Jesse checking out another girl while walking into a bar.

Finally, while playing pinball and drinking beer, the question “Are you dating anyone?” is finally asked. Celine has recently become single after the guy she was dating said “she loved him too much”. When it’s Jesse’s turn to answer, he tries to change that subject … and then he says, “big confession”. It turns out that Jesse’s “trip” was to visit his girlfriend, who is now his ex-girlfriend. They broke up after realizing that her studying in Europe had caused her to not want him around anymore. Yay! We can finally relax; we now know they are not cheating on their boyfriend/girlfriend. They play a funny game of pretend phone calls to their friends explaining where they are. Celine points out Jesse’s assets and faults, Jesse describes Celine as a Botticelli angel, and they both realize they haven’t talked about seeing each other again after tonight. They try to make up reasons why they will not see each other again and decide that “tonight is our only night” and they shall say their goodbyes now to take the awkwardness out of the rest of the evening.

They quickly make a plan to steal some wine glasses and buy some red wine. Jesse convinces a bartender to give him a bottle of wine and he will send him the money later, while Celine gathers up two glasses and puts them in her bag. They lie in a park drinking the wine and Jesse tries to steer the conversation towards them having sex. Celine just wants to be kissed, though she wants to have sex but doesn’t think it’s a good idea. Things then get a little handsy, the camera pans to an empty bottle of wine, and … cut. No!

It is now morning time and Jesse and Celine dance to a harpsichord and Jesse takes a mental picture of Celine to “never forget you or all of this”. It is quickly becoming the end of their time together. As they get to the train station, it is a frantic rush to say goodbye and get on the train, but neither knows what to say. Finally they realize they do want to see each other again! They will not call or write each other, but they decide to meet in six months from now, June 16^th, on track 9, 6:00 at night, December 16^th. They kiss, Celine gets on the train and Jesse walks away. The movie ends as Jesse and Celine are shown on separate trains; obviously retracing the steps of everything that happened that night. Jesse smiles, Celine smiles, and the camera fades into the credits.

I have seen this movie at different stages of my life and every time it has affected me in different ways. Of course the obvious question is do they meet again? I think after the first time I saw it I wanted to know, but then as time went by, I was ok with not knowing. It adds a bit of mystery to the movie that most movies don’t have. When I saw a trailer for a sequel almost 9 years later I could barely contain myself. I was finally going to get an answer. I felt bad at first for the people who hadn’t seen the first one and now knew that they would meet again. But then I realized that even if you are aware that there is a sequel, there is still the beauty of not knowing how/when the circumstances lead to them seeing each other again. Some say a sequel was not needed but I think a quote from Celine sums it up best:

Celine: “Isn’t everything we do in life a way to be loved a little more?”

…more!

There are 2 scenes in the movie that I love to talk about. One is about 16:30 into the film. It is a shot of Jesse’s and Celine’s feet as they walk through the train station; I have always wondered if there was a deeper meaning to this, and if I ever meet Linklater I will ask him.

The other is about 27:00 into the film. Jesse and Celine are flipping through some vinyls at an old record store. Celine picks a record and they decide to use the listening booth to check it out. This is my favorite scene in any movie that I have ever watched … it is just the two of them with the music playing, trying to stare at each other while not getting caught by the other, so they look away at the last moment. I believe that this is the most honest depiction of what people are really feeling/doing when they are with someone alone for the first time and they both feel like this could really go somewhere. Every time I watch it, I get goose bumps. The song playing is called “Come Here” by Kath Bloom, and it is a perfect choice for this scene.