The Before trilogy is a series of three American romance films directed by Richard Linklater, starring Ethan Hawke and Julie Delpy. Set and filmed in 9-year intervals, the films chronicle the relationship between Jesse and Céline at three periods of their lives.
- Before Sunrise (1995)
- Before Sunset (2004)
- Before Midnight (2013)
There were discussions of a fourth film, but it did not come to fruition in 2022. Delpy said in an interview, "We — all three of us — agreed that we couldn’t come up with something good for a fourth one."
All three films contain examples of the following:
- Ambiguous Ending: No film provides a definitive answer on where Jesse's and Céline's relationship will go.
- Extremely Short Timespan: All of them take place in under a day.
- Forever Fling: Jesse and Céline's relationship hinges entirely on having known each other for a single day.
- Idiosyncratic Episode Naming: All films in the trilogy are titled Before [Time of Day].
- Maybe Ever After: All three films end on a hopeful note about Jesse and Céline's relationship, but major obstacles exist.
- No Antagonist: Except for the pressure of how little time they have in the first two movies. They do argue and antagonize each other heavily in the third, but still love each other.
- Realistic Diction Is Unrealistic: The flow of the dialogue is very naturalistic, as Jesse and Céline often talk over each other, interrupt themselves to say something else, there's a lot of "um"s and "eh"s and similar sounds, and you could make a drinking game out of how often they say "y'know".
- Seinfeldian Conversation: The focus of the movies. The romance between Jesse and Céline is developed through their rambling conversations about stuff. The trolley scene in Before Sunrise is a particularly good example, as the two of them talk about things that bug them, their first sexual encounters, and reincarnation (among other things) all in the space of five minutes and one shot.
- Speech-Centric Work: All three films are very conversation-centric.
- Walk and Talk: Featured in all three films, though in different amounts.
- Women Are Wiser: Averted. Céline is just as philosophical, and sometimes just as fucked up, as Jesse.
