Before Sunset

9 years on from their one night affair Jesse and Celine meet at a book signing.  Unlike in the first, this film is even tighter constrained, just two hours til a flight. The film is basically in real-time aside from some smart cuts. Just like the original, every line of dialogue feels jammed with meaning and feeling. There’s less wonder and a whole lot more baggage. Each of them desperate in their own ways to share all that’s been troubling them. It’s remarkable how well these characters come alive and seamlessly carry on the torch. I can’t help but feel like the actors are really playing themselves and I’d be curious to know just how true that is. It is true that the movie is less hopeful than the first. But still it’s also true that they are not so different from how they were either. It’s not a personality that has changed but a personality shaped through experiences and the stressors of living.  Only an hour and 20 minutes this raced by and I’m left longing for more. I feel somewhat unsatisfied but that is probably more to do with how much I liked it. That’s another marvel of this, in how as a viewer you intimately feel each minute inexorably pass by and you hope for some miracle that it can go on longer just as they do.