The Before Trilogy (1995-2013)

[James Luckard]

Originally Posted by LPMA

There's also no reason for Hawke to be up-to-date with the negociation process.

Yep, I'm going to stay guardedly optimistic at most.

[format916]

before midnight was so underwhelming. especially that last act in that ugly hotel room.

[Mandalorian]

Originally Posted by format916

before midnight was so underwhelming. especially that last act in that ugly hotel room.

It's my favorite of the three.

[Ray Jackson]

Originally Posted by format916

before midnight was so underwhelming. especially that last act in that ugly hotel room.

It's just as good as the first two imo.

But the reality is that it's just not as enjoyable to watch an older couple teetering on the brink of divorce as it is to watch two young people get to know each other for the first time and fall in love.

There's so much hope and optimism in Before Sunrise and Sunset.

In Before Midnight you get to watch that hope and optimism get crushed by the reality of time and age.

[Bucky]

Originally Posted by Ray Jackson

It's just as good as the first two imo.

But the reality is that it's just not as enjoyable to watch an older couple teetering on the brink of divorce as it is to watch two young people get to know each other for the first time and fall in love.

There's so much hope and optimism in Before Sunrise and Sunset.

In Before Midnight you get to watch that hope and optimism get crushed by the reality of time and age.

I agree with this. I love Before Midnight, but it is difficult to watch sometimes because I feel invested in the couple and hate seeing them fight.

[Bates_Motel]

Originally Posted by LPMA

There's also no reason for Hawke to be up-to-date with the negociation process.

Exactly my point. So anything he says should be taken with a grain of salt. But I'm all in if it happens.

[cakefactory]

This topic reminded me that I bought all three of these movies on a whim about a year ago and never watched them, so I just watched Before Sunrise. I was blown away, this movie connected with me on all kinds of levels and it brought back tons of really beautiful (and some simply painful) memories of the mornings at the airport after your last day visiting a girlfriend, or those nights you just don't want to end that are just sort of surreal and amazing where you connect with someone you never see again (or if you do it's just not the same). This movie was completely gorgeous and it's the first thing I've seen in a couple years that I wouldn't hesitate to give a perfect rating. I am now so worked up over the whole thing that I might stay up till 5 am just to watch the next two. What an incredible experience, and it's so low-key and non-manipulative! The dialogue and characters are so immediately affecting and rich.

I'm partly so surprised cause I actively dislike Dazed and Confused and have never connected with any aspect of it in the few times I've watched it. :P

EDIT: Just finished Before Sunset, and I have never been so mad at a movie for ending before. There's just not enough time spent with the characters. What's there is basically flawless, once again, but I involuntarily exclaimed WHAT when the end credits happened. DAMMIT. I think I preferred the first one cause it has more time spent with the characters and there was no "this ended too soon!!!" feeling with it, but this one had the lacerating scene in the back of the car, and Celine's dancing at the end there is just heart-melting. What an incredible pair of movies. I will have to watch the third one tomorrow. Gotta say, spending 10 bucks on this double feature DVD is one of the best returns on investment I've ever made in my trillions of dollars of DVD/Bluray spending.

[tylergfoster]

Originally Posted by cakefactory

I will have to watch the third one tomorrow.

The third one is quite different. It's tough. Good, but steel yourself.

[DaBargainHunta]

Originally Posted by cakefactory

I will have to watch the third one tomorrow.

Can't wait for your reaction!!!

[Doctor Jack]

Originally Posted by LPMA

There's also no reason for Hawke to be up-to-date with the negociation process.

Take your negativity elsewhere. Only good vibes allowed in this thread.

[WinterLand]

If the "Before" movies does indeed get released by Criterion I will for sure purchase them, no questions asked. However if it is a box-set I will admit I am so fuzzy about it that if a fourth movie (or even more) will be made then I will skratch my head couse it might not look right on the shelf.

Yes I admit it is truly a "first world problem".

Another issue though is that I like these movies so much that I have problems watching any kind of special features regarding them because I do not want my personal impression of the movies to be changed by for example audio commentary, interviews etc, the reason for this is that these movies hits way to close for me as a person as I always think about a woman I met years ago, I have a hard time watching any of them without either tearing up or flat our crying, and it really hurts.

[DaBargainHunta]

Originally Posted by WinterLand

If the "Before" movies does indeed get released by Criterion I will for sure purchase them, no questions asked. However if it is a box-set I will admit I am so fuzzy about it that if a fourth movie (or even more) will be made then I will skratch my head couse it might not look right on the shelf.

Yes I admit it is truly a "first world problem".

By the time there's a fourth movie, will Blu-Ray even still be the latest and greatest format?

[ShellOilJunior]

Originally Posted by LPMA

There's also no reason for Hawke to be up-to-date with the negociation process.

If Hawke has been approached about doing an interview/commentary for a potential release then it makes sense why he'd know. Some of these things move very quickly. It wasn't long ago Paramount won the court case for rights for La dolce vita. The Criterion release quickly followed. For all we know the "trying" part is done and this is further along than we think.

Of course I could be wrong but it's my guess.

[FilmFreakosaurus]

Originally Posted by ShellOilJunior

If Hawke has been approached about doing an interview/commentary for a potential release then it makes sense why he'd know. Some of these things move very quickly. It wasn't long ago Paramount won the court case for rights for La dolce vita. The Criterion release quickly followed. For all we know the "trying" part is done and this is further along than we think.

Of course I could be wrong but it's my guess.

Hawke and Delpy are co-screenwriters with Linklater and have become creative partners on this ongoing series (much like Truffaut's Antoine Doinel life arc), so I would think Hawke would be very much in the loop.

[MTRodaba2468]

Originally Posted by WinterLand

If the "Before" movies does indeed get released by Criterion I will for sure purchase them, no questions asked. However if it is a box-set I will admit I am so fuzzy about it that if a fourth movie (or even more) will be made then I will skratch my head couse it might not look right on the shelf.

Yes I admit it is truly a "first world problem".

The sequels have been released in approx. 9 year intervals. If Criterion is, in fact, releasing a box set, and it comes out this year, it'll be a complete set for at least seven years.

I feel it's worth it to be able to watch the films in HD over the next few years, even if the set doesn't match later on...

[cakefactory]

Originally Posted by DaBargainHunta

Can't wait for your reaction!!!

My initial reaction was it retroactively ruined the first two...I was just feeling utter dismay through the entire hotel room scene and it felt like watching your parents split up or something. It was like Scenes from a Marriage, or something, though thank god it never went into the vicious physical violence and detailed sexual humiliation that one did. I really like Scenes from a Marriage, but that is an entirely different experience, obviously, and wasn't what I was expecting to get with this one. It looked like the movie was going to end at the part where it starts showing shots of all the scenery in the room. I was completely relieved that the movie backed down on this and gave us that more hopeful postscript. Julie Delpy's ditzy character she brings out again at the end was so funny, even though by the end I certainly wasn't laughing!

It is ultimately hopeful, but again what I really wanted was just another hour or two of these characters talking, not a truly vicious fight which carries on for so long and then leaves us just as it looks like the clouds are starting to lift. I loved these characters so much and being deprived of more of them in the comforting presence they are in the first two movies was painful. This is purely an emotional reaction which has nothing to do with the quality of the movie.

I think I'll have to think on it some more. I thought about the second movie all day and decided I might have liked it just as much as the first one, but this third one...I think it's just not for me at this stage of my life, I'm still too much of a hopeless romantic or something. It certainly wasn't a bad movie in any way, shape or form, it just really ruined what I'd built up in this tiny amount of time with these two characters. I think if I'd actually been familiar with these two movies for years before this one came out it might have been even harsher, but maybe not since the development of their relationship wouldn't have felt so sudden. I'll probably feel differently about it tomorrow, but I think it's just as likely I'll rewatch the first two over and over again to try and forget about this one cause the first two were such warm, loving little movies and this one was....not quite so much.

[lolwut]

Originally Posted by cakefactory

EDIT: Just finished Before Sunset, and I have never been so mad at a movie for ending before. There's just not enough time spent with the characters. What's there is basically flawless, once again, but I involuntarily exclaimed WHAT when the end credits happened. DAMMIT. I think I preferred the first one cause it has more time spent with the characters and there was no "this ended too soon!!!" feeling with it, but this one had the lacerating scene in the back of the car, and Celine's dancing at the end there is just heart-melting.

I felt the same way, it was perfect up until the

[Show spoiler]abrupt ending

!

[ShellOilJunior]

I think 'Sunset' is the best of the 3 films. Its immediacy does it for me. The film makes no false steps and the ending is perfect.

[James Luckard]

Originally Posted by lolwut

I felt the same way, it was perfect up until the

[Show spoiler]abrupt ending

!

Different tastes, I guess. That scene and line are my favorite ending in all of world cinema. Literally.

If the rule is to leave a scene as early as possible, than that scene does it more brilliantly than any i have ever experienced. That one line of Hawke's at the end decides their entire future, nothing more is needed.

That said, when I first saw it, it was at a screening, and I literally heard people saying afterwards that the film should have

[Show spoiler]shown his empty seat in the plane, to show that he didn't go home, lol.

[James Luckard]

Originally Posted by ShellOilJunior

I think 'Sunset' is the best of the 3 films. It's immediacy does it for me. The film makes no false steps and the ending is perfect.

Agreed. Also, it has the highest stakes. There's an urgently ticking clock, in real time, and the weight of ten years of hopes and dreams ride on every decision made. It was more edge-of-your-seat for me than any $200 million action movie. In MIDNIGHT, as brilliant as it is, I just didn't feel that tension.