Though I’d never admit it, suffering as I am from a touch of the cynicism of its male lead, one of my favorite movies is Before Sunrise (1995). Ethan Hawke and Julie Delphy are firing on all cylinders, and Linklater’s ability to capture something essential about the rhythm of romantic conversations—especially the delicate entwinement of sincerity and subterfuge taking place during any first date—and the costars’ onscreen chemistry combine to create something deeply true. Céline reflects on this truth towards the end of the film:
“I believe if there’s any kind of God it wouldn’t be in any of us, not you or me but just this little space in between.”
It’s the little spaces that are sacralized by one’s attempts to truly know another. Yet if this is the case, these spaces must be just as important to the attempt of interpersonal understanding as the presence of the other person. Over the course of the film, as Céline and Jesse each negotiate their own cultural differences, this space becomes the city of Vienna; far from being a static setting, the city personifies itself in a million different little ways, from the record store where Jesse steals a furtive glance at Céline, who feigns a look away before returning the glance, only for him to look away in turn; or the winding cobblestone streets guiding their effortless conversations; or the people: the poet, the palm reader, the bartender, each an unwitting ambassador of Austrian culture for these two lovers.
In Vienna, I’ll be learning German for six weeks at the Internationales Kulturinstitut, so I think that before long I’ll also be able to engage in the conversations which were so integral to Before Sunrise. I hope to find the spaces that once briefly struck Céline as divine.