Before Sunset

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In 1994, director Richard Linklater (Dazed and Confused, Waking Life) made Before Sunrise, a gorgeous poem of a movie about two strangers (played by Ethan Hawke and Julie Delpy) wandering around Vienna, talking, and falling in love. Ten years later, Linklater, Hawke, and Delpy have returned with Before Sunset, which reunites the same characters after Hawke has written a book about that night. Delpy appears at the final book reading of his European tour; they have less than two hours before Hawke has to catch a flight to New York...and in that time, they walk around Paris, talk, and fall in love all over again. It sounds simple, perhaps dull, but it's written with such skill and care and acted with such richness that it's a miracle of filmmaking. On its own, Before Sunset is moving and wonderful; seen right after Before Sunrise, it will break your heart. --Bret Fetzer

Customer Reviews:

Before Sunset.......2007-08-01

I enjoyed this laid back, walk through Paris, movie. It would not have been quite so meaningful if I had not seen "Before Sunrise" first. That should be a must for all viewers. It gives "Before Sunset" the needed depth.

Walk me up when it's over, will you?.......2007-07-15

I didn't care for the first one and could barely stand this one. I like movies with some excitement and fantasy in them. Where is the entertainment in this movie? If I want to see two people blabbing on and on, I could like see them in this movie. Maybe that's the point of this stupid movie. Sorry, I take the "stupid" part back. It's just a dumb movie. I am sure it works for people who might have failed in relationships, people who are lonely, or people can't communicate. The world is full of folks who actually find meanings in a movie -- any movie -- even this one.

It grew with me.......2007-06-08

I loved this movie. I remember watching the first one when I was a teenager and I loved it then. All the conversations where real and intimate. I hate movies where the two people fall in love and you can't really tell why because they hardly ever talked to each other. In Before Sunset you see how their words really effected the other person. I love the way they captured the realistic discomfort and timidness of meeting a lost love and through time seeing the longing of what could have been. Very realistic in its conversations and feelings. I loved it.

Beautiful Sequel Extends the Realism and Genuine Feelings From the First Film.......2007-05-16

I was a huge fan of Before Sunrise when it came out. I loved the simplicity and realism of two young people, who just met, walking around a beautiful European city like Vienna, and getting to know each other.

You might wonder what they have left to talk about in this film since they tackled so many subjects in the previous one. Believe me, they have plenty to talk about, and you wish that this film would never end.

The story takes place nine years after the previous film. Jesse is now a successful author who is doing a book tour throughout Europe. Paris is his last stop. He's sitting in a small book shop, answering questions from some readers, when he looks over his shoulder and sees Celine standing there. The film takes off from there as Jesse and Celine spend a few precious hours together before Jesse must be at the airport to make his flight.

Ethan Hawke (Jesse) and Julie Delpy (Celine) both co-wrote this screenplay along with the director. It's obvious that these two actors know their characters so well, that I'm sure that even they had spent those "nine years" wondering how it would end. Does Jesse come back for that six-month-later reunion? Does Celine? Do people, who really live so far away able to keep, what seems to be an unlikely promise?

I'm not going to relate anything else about the story here for those who have not seen the movie yet. This is a film where the thrill is in the journey, not the goal. Each step that Jesse and Celine make as they walk around Paris, is another step in that journey.

I recall telling friends about the first film and what it was about. They couldn't understand how a movie about two people walking around could be so good. But just like that first film, their conversations are so real and enthralling. I think part of the reason that it's so compelling is that when these two characters are together, they are themselves. There is no fakery or need to put on another face in order to impress the other. Perhaps because they are in a time crunch, they figure that there's no need to be anything other than genuine because they don't feel that they'll ever see each other again. There is a powerful scene in this film that is a recognition and a tribute to that "genuiness" and why they feel more comfortable with each other than with anyone else they've ever been with.

I've always said that sometimes the best stories are the simple ones. And this one is simple, yet again. These two simple, yet real characters, captivate the audience again with their genuine conversation that holds nothing back, and invites the audience to try and do the same.

Definition of Yummy, anyone?.......2007-05-08

This movie is a phenomenal collection to your movie library. It stars Ethan Hawke and Julie Delpy who make the perfect match on screen. The movie is not meant to be fancy pants, but laid back and conversational.

It takes place on the streets of Paris, and Jesse and Celine meet by chance again after a nine year hiatus. They converse on topics broad and small. The denouement of the previous film, Before Sunrise, is worth the wait for the this sequel. I won't spill anything, but this is definitely a delightful, funny, and intellectual watch.

Average customer rating:

Before Sunrise and Before Sunset: Turning A Diamond in the Light
We'll always have Vienna!
awesome

Before Sunrise/Before Sunset
Starring: Ethan Hawke , Julie Delpy , Vernon Dobtcheff , Louise Lemoine Torres , and Rodolphe Pauly
Director: Richard Linklater
Manufacturer: Warner Home Video
ProductGroup: DVD
Binding: DVD

General | Drama | Genres | DVD | Video

( B ) | Titles | Features | DVD | Video
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ASIN: B0002Z0ECC
Release Date: 2004-11-09

Customer Reviews:

Before Sunrise and Before Sunset: Turning A Diamond in the Light.......2006-05-25

It surprised me to read somewhere that Richard Linklater, who directed both films, did not actually have the experience of falling in love with a French woman on a train in Europe. Both "Before Sunrise" and "Before Sunset" benefit from a feeling of complete authenticity, as if the people responsible for delivering and interpreting the storyline must've "been there, done that..."

Ethan Hawke and Julie Delpy inhabit their roles to a point of perfection. Delpy creates such an indelible image of a young Parisian woman (with Left Bank leanings) that she could not be anything but. And Hawke incarnates perfectly the type of inquisitive, literary, and (romantically) self-centered young American male who stands a chance with a woman such as we find in Delpy. The 2nd film opens with Hawke doing a reading from his own novel on the second floor of Shakespeare & Co., wedding beautifully character and setting, as Hawke is exactly the type of young American who would be at home in George Whitman's Left Bank bookstore.

An American, I spent my youth and then some in Paris. In fact, I met my wife, who is French, on a train, which is the way Hawke and Delpy meet in the first of these films. And like our two protagonists, during our ride together we wrapped each other in words and our own special dialogue, which is the right word, as we were busy creating a moment which would have no place in real life: this was, after all, only a train ride.

We knew we would never see each other again, which meant time was both our prison and our liberator, confining the duration of our experience yet setting us free within it. And, that's how things stood for four or five years, until chance (nudged along) brought us together, again.

One more thing about the 2nd film. Linklater, Delpy, and Hawke create a paean to Paris, a song of enrapture for the city that succeeds like nothing else since Hemingway and Fitzgerald lived there in the early 1920's. Unstated, it's all in the afternoon and evening light, which seems to dissolve off the screen in total realness.

The film was like an exquisite French meal of the sort you can easily find when dining out in Paris with French friends. You leave completely satiated. What has satiated you, though, beyond the food and wine which have touched your palette, is the conversation you've had with your company, built over several courses and all the pauses between. It's the conversation that you share and create together that lifts a good meal and wine to greatness. This is a relevant note as this pair of films is carried on dialogue as much as it is on beauty.

Neither film could be better; they're as good as it gets.

We'll always have Vienna!.......2005-11-04

Before Sunrise and Before Sunset are atypical twists on the theme of "The one that got away". In the summer of 1994, Texas native Jesse meets a young Frenchwoman Celine on a train bound for Paris and both on impulse spend 14 hours in Vienna talking through the night like Jean-Paul Sartre and Simone De Beavoir (except they actually LIKE each other). It's an intellectual match and a chemical attraction between two early 20-something adults who still have the idealism of the moment that youth is known for. At the end of their long night of goodbye Jesse and Celine depart at the train station and promise to meet up in six months time for Christmas. Before Sunrise ends with a the question of whether they did in fact, reunite in Europe.

In 2004 we get the answer. Missed connection. Bad timing and the reunion in Paris a decade later. Older, into their 30's, and significant life events behind them, Jesse and Celine pick up where they left off. Jesse went to meet Celine in Vienna but she was stuck in Paris due to her grandmother's funeral. While Jesse and Celine repeat their Vienna moments in Paris, they discover all the times they missed each other over the years in New York City. Jesse is in a loveless marriage with a young son who keeps him there. Celine has her life in Paris and is still a singleton. Before Sunset makes you wish with an intensity that they met up in Vienna in 1994 and also that they don't blow this second chance.

Perfect for a lazy Saturday afternoon when you're in the mood to ponder "what might have been". Even though Julie Delphy wrote soundtrack songs for both films, one song really seems to summarize what the twin films key message seems to convey - Bad Timing, that's all by Blue Rodeo.

Bad Timing lyrics:

Hey it's me what a big surprise
Calling you up from a restaurant
Around the bend
Just got in from way up North
I'm aching tired now
And I could use a friend
Might be a fool
To think that you do
Want to see me again

I Know it's been awhile since I talked to you
Nothing wrong
Just nothing ever goes as planned
Many times I thought I'd call
Didn't have your number in my hand
I know it's true
You'd never do
The same thing to me

I never meant to make you cry
And though I know I shouldn't call
It just reminds us of the cost
Of everything we've lost
Bad timing that's all

And maybe soon there'll come a day
When no more tears will fall
We each forgive a little bit
And we both look back on it
As just bad timing that's all

Used to have so many plans
Something always seemed to turn out wrong
Never could catch up to you
Moving on and doing all you've done
I don't know why
The harder I try
The harder it comes

I never meant to make you cry
And though I know I shouldn't call
It just reminds us of the cost
Of everything we've lost
Bad timing that's all

And maybe soon there'll come a day
When no more tears will fall
We each forgive a little bit
And we both look back on it
Just bad timing that's all

We each forgive a little bit
And we both look back on it
Just bad timing that's all

awesome.......2004-12-03

for every true romantic, for every student whose gone abraod and met someone. sometimes it just works

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Before Sunrise/Before Sunset
Starring: Warner 2pak
Manufacturer: Warner Home Video
ProductGroup: DVD
Binding: DVD

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Average customer rating:

A Noir Wrapped in a Fable
A must see for Dostoevsky and cinema lovers!

SHADES OF DAY - Director's Cut

Manufacturer: CustomFlix
ProductGroup: DVD
Binding: DVD

General | Art House & International | Genres | DVD | Video

( S ) | Titles | Features | DVD | Video

General | Foreign & International | Stores | DVD | Video
ASIN: B000B6LZO8
Release Date: 2006-06-20

Product Description

"Shades of Day" is a suspenseful Hollywood fable based on Feodor Dostoevsky's classic novella "White Nights"(considered one of the greatest love stories ever written), but here transferred to modern day Los Angeles. It's the first part of our "Dostoevsky-L.A" project, which also will include "Crime and Punishment, LA" and "Idiot, L.A". The film crosses and re-crosses the thin line that separates tragedy from comedy. It introduces us to the enchanting Linda, whose life is centered around a planned reunion with her former lover Paul. Her plans change in remarkable ways as she encounters an extraordinary cast of characters, including a new lover and a movie producer who is pursued by the Mafia. The feature is scripted by award winning Vitaly Sumin and playwright Jeff Bergquist and shot beautifully on Kodak film stock by award winning cinematographer Gus Blaudziunas. Reviews: Advance looks by selected critics have already established "Shades of Day" as a film to see: "The film has a magical look... Quite an achievement!" Jonathan Dana, producer, former Director of Acquisition and Development for Samuel Goldwyn Company. "Crisply shot, the film has a gritty quality that captures the struggling underside of L.A. In some ways it is Director Sumin's hymn to Los Angeles." Wade Majors, film critic - ENTERTAINMENT TODAY "Stunning visuals! . . ." Francesca Elizabeth Miller, film critic - IN L.A. MAGAZINE, NIGHTLIFE TONIGHT "Camilla Bergstrom as Linda is a real find. She has a haunted, enigmatic appeal that lights up the screen." "Phillippe Bergeron, who plays 'Gary', almost steals every scene in which he appears. He has a particular talent for mugging at the camera that is both poignant and hilarious." NEW!!! "SHADES OF DAY" IS INCLUDED BY GERALD PIROG, PROFESSOR OF RUTGERS UNIVERSITY, NEW JERSEY IN HIS SPRING 2006 CINEMA COURSE (FOR MORE INFO SEE WICKI BELOW ON THIS PAGE) IMPORTANT: SUITABLE FOR INTERNATIONAL AND USA PLAYING (REGION 0).

Customer Reviews:

A Noir Wrapped in a Fable.......2005-10-18

Highly entertaining and deeply affecting, this film is full of surprises. It's a noir wrapped in a fable. It has a magical quality, but the magic derives from its extraordinary characters rather than supernatural forces. And while it's character driven, "Shades of Day" manages to achieve an almost epic quality. This directorial legerdemain can be attributed to both the richness and variety of the film's iconic Los Angeles locations and to the magnitude of its themes----sex, love, betrayal, greed, and death. But director Sumin never forgets that the cinematic seeker of truth must also be an entertainer; he juggles his seemingly weighty themes with a circus-like sense of fun and adventure.

The film is beautifully shot and edited from a script by Sumin and playwright Jeff Bergquist. The title appears to be a canny reversal of "White Nights," one of Dostoevsky's finest stories. This is a case of a film being "inspired by..." in the best sense of the word. Sumin projects his understanding of Dostoevsky's story through the kaleidoscope of his own considerable imagination.

At the film's center is the astonishing performance of Camilla Bergstrom. With her portrayal of the many-faceted Linda, she demonstrates a dramatic principle that's rarely embodied in romantic films these days---namely, that in order for a love story to truly move an audience, the audience itself must be made to fall in love...

This is a fascinating film, not to be missed.

A must see for Dostoevsky and cinema lovers!.......2005-09-29

A must see for Dostoevsky and cinema lovers.The acting overall is very good especially by the actress (Camilla Bergstrom) who plays the lead part. She gives a great performance and has a real star quality too. This is underlined by the beautiful cinematography which is very well integrated into the story. We felt some enchanting fairy tale like energy in this semi-noir movie, which takes you to a fascinating poetic universe.

"Shades of Day" is based on Dostoevsky's novella "White Nights", and it's a multi layered, highly entertaining love story with a surprise ending.The film contains some thriller elements (after all, one of the heroes gets killed by the Mafia) matched with deeply erotic impulses. There are some really funny parts too! And you don't have to read the book since the movie stands very well on its own. But if you did read it (we've read it after we've seen the film) you may find (like we did) that the transformation of Dostoevsky's essential classical structures from the European St.Petersburg to modern day Los Angeles provides you with an unexpected pleasure. The director, who, we assume, may be Russian, knows not only his Dostoevsky, but everyday life in Hollywood as well. We loved this film.

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