Not the love of one's life but love of life itself!

Before Trilogy
Before Sunrise (1995)
Before Sunset (2004)
Before Midnight (2013)

Director: Richard Linklater


This must surely be a very ambitious project. In a way, it is real-life experimentation. It tells about how life treats two individuals over a span of 18 years. It shows how two 23-year-olds look all doe-eyed at life and again at 32 and 41. At each time, we get an idea of how they see life is ahead. They embrace it with so much zest, thinking that they know why their elders get it all wrong. They thought they had discovered the secret why so many from the generation before were so miserable and vowed never to repeat their mistakes. They could see as plain as day what and where they went wrong. They knew they would never prey to these situational demands.

Jesse, an American student, met Celine, a French lass, aboard a Eurail train heading to Paris. Striking a conversation, they clicked as they shared similar values. They made an unscheduled stop at Vienna and spent the whole evening talking and talking about everything under the star. Literally under the stars as they spent the night in the park. The morning after, they parted ways, promising to meet at the exact station in 6 months. That was in 1994.

Their second meet happened nine years later, in 2003. The earlier scheduled date did not materialise as Celine had to partake in her grandmother's funeral. It was a time before people had instant messaging. Both had made it a point not to exchange contact numbers anyway. Jesse is now an accomplished author on a book tour in Paris. He is now married with a child back home in New York, whilst Celine is still wandering around wondering what to make of life. She finds relationships too complicated but finds solace in caring for the environment and social courses. She works with an environmental NGO. Their few hours of tête-à-tête before the flight ended up with Jesse wilfully missing the flight. 

Ethan Hawke and Julie Delpy in all three films.

Another nine years later, Jesse sends off his firstborn home at the airport in the third film. Jesse's son is leaving after spending summer with his father. Yes, Jesse has divorced his first wife and decided to marry Celine and settle in Paris. They have a pair of twin girls. As they reach the tail end of their summer vacation, their otherwise blissful union hits a bump. Celine is contemplating a career change. She has to choose between a French Government post and a higher paying one in Chicago. Jesse wishes that she chooses Chicago as the job is in tune with her life ambition. Celine thinks Jesse chooses Chicago as he wants to be staying close to his son and possibly work towards custody of his son. That is when the battle started. It spiralled into a feminism war and equality, etcetera.

The irony of it all is that they end as the very similar couple that they vowed they would not be in their later years.

At the end of the day, it's not the love of the
other person matters. It's the love of life.

A few lessons of life are learnt here. Invariably love turns sour. Couples have to invest time and effort to be in love as the default button says go out and spread the love. Life is no fairy tale for that someone special to morph from nowhere to assume the role of Prince Charming. Fairy tales are grim satires of life, not an imagined utopia.

The thought of someone complementing and completing the (better) other is ludicrous. The speech 'You complete me' is a subtle invitation to indulge in the act of experimenting with the lock-and-key mechanism. It is a biological process, not a transcendental one.

Life in modern times is stressful. With so many societal expectations to meet, one lifetime is not enough. If surviving through the hard knocks of life is not challenging enough, there are gender roles to be fulfilled. Conversely, there is a push for gender empowerment as well. With all these boxes to be checked, to say that the modern man is stressed is an understatement. With all these swords of Damocles hanging over our heads, how will one attain peace at heart and mind? Only when there is peace in oneself can one find a genuine connection with others.

This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License.