February 6–15, 2025
Richard Linklater’s Before Trilogy
“A rare, knowing engagement with both the fantasies and the realities of romance … Each film is a window onto a stage of life, sharply attuned to the possibilities and disappointments of one’s twenties, thirties, and forties.”
Dennis Lim, The Criterion Collection
Before Sunrise, Before Sunset, and Before Midnight, each separated by nine years, have come to occupy a unique, possibly definitive position in Richard Linklater’s filmography. Some would say this status even extends to the broader genre of romantic drama.
The key to the movies, Linklater has said, is that lead actors Julie Delpy and Ethan Hawke also happen to be writers, directors, and musicians. The trio’s equal footing—in writing, thinking, and batting ideas around a room—has made possible the way each film adopts distinct vantage points on the evolution of the series’ main characters, Celine and Jesse. The two sequels expand on rather than repeat successful narrative approaches, to the point where Delpy and Hawke’s alter egos, both kept at a distance and seemingly knowable in seconds, occupy a rarified space.
Though Linklater’s preference is to talk about the films in general rather than personal terms, the series was inspired by experience: one night in Philadelphia, the director shared a long, intimate walking conversation with someone new. Rather than basing the films on this memory alone, Linklater invited Delpy and Hawke to rehearse and rework a script to follow three rules: no drama, total immediacy, and a balanced perspective. While early reviewers identified similarities to the comedies of Eric Rohmer, this method hews closer to the intense preparation schedule of Mike Leigh—high standards that the films, improbably, meet.
Delpy, Hawke, and Linklater have all alluded to the fact that, with nine years come and gone since Before Midnight, initial ideas for a fourth film have been rejected. For now we have three rich and reflective dialogues, and Before Midnight’s seemingly resolved ending, to consider. “I don’t know if these films are more philosophical than anything else,” Linklater has said, by way of understatement. “It’s just two people who are happy to see each other again.” On the occasion of Before Sunrise’s 30th anniversary, The Cinematheque presents that same opportunity for these three unforgettable films.
“It is hard to think of anything quite like the Before triptych in the history of American movies.”
Phillip Lopate, Film Comment
Upcoming Screenings
List of Programmed Films
Date | Film Title | Director(s) | Year | Country |
---|---|---|---|---|
2025-Feb | Before Sunrise | Richard Linklater | 1995 | USA . . . |
2025-Feb | Before Sunset | Richard Linklater | 2004 | USA |
2025-Feb | Before Midnight | Richard Linklater | 2013 | USA . . . |