Why the sun never truly sets on this 30-year-old romance classic

Valentine’s Day may be weeks away, but it’s never too early to start thinking about romance films that set your heart afire. Perhaps the greatest cinematic love letter of the last three decades, and one of the finest depictions of sudden young amore the movies have to offer, is Before Sunrise, directed by Richard Linklater and written by Linklater and Kim Krizan, which debuted in theaters 30 years ago today. Starring Ethan Hawke as Jesse and Julie Delpy as Céline, this is the tale of an American man and a French woman who meet on a train traveling through Europe. Jesse persuades Céline to get off the train with him in Vienna, where they spend a single night wandering the city, sharing philosophical conversations, and forming an intimate connection. Exploring themes of love, human connection, and the fleeting nature of time, the film captures the profound bond that develops between two strangers in a brief but unforgettable encounter.

To hear our CineVerse group discussion of Before Sunrise, conducted earlier this month, click here. To listen to the latest episode of the Cineversary podcast, which commemorates Before Sunrise’s 30th birthday, click here.

Before Sunrise is an easy movie to root for and embrace in large part because it’s such an underdog success story: It’s a low-budget, under-the-radar indie that nobody saw coming but has gathered such momentum over the past three decades as a terrific word-of-mouth favorite among so many film fans. Yes, it proved to be a success based on surprisingly good box office returns relative to its $2.5 million budget as well as positive critical reception early on (still true, as evidenced by a 100% fresh Rotten Tomatoes score). But more importantly, the movie has come to represent a kind of dark horse cinematic triumph that demonstrates – despite limited resources, lesser names at the time, and little ballyhoo out of the gate – the power of quality over quantity, of craft over crass commercialism in a subgenre, the romance film, brimming with mass-marketed mediocrity.

Before Sunrise’s formula for brilliance is three primary ingredients: spot-on casting, outstanding performances, and, most importantly, exceptional dialogue, as very little in the form of plot or action happens. Because we need to believe in the discourse and find it credible, the writing required a balanced approach from a man and a woman; hence, Linklater enlisted the aid of a female screenwriter (Krizan), who especially helped with Celine’s lines. Written entirely by a man, this film may not have resonated as strongly or plausibly. Being so reliant on its two main characters to captivate us, the key to this picture’s success was to have a stellar script in hand (mission accomplished) and then everyone else gets out of the way so these two gifted actors can do the heavy lifting, which is exactly what happens.

According to film reviewer James Berardinelli: “For this film to work, (Hawke and Delpy) have a threefold task: embrace their characters; attract each other; and connect with the audience… The rapport between Jesse and Celine is so lacking in artifice that at times the viewer feels like a voyeur. We are privy to everything, including the sort of ‘unimportant’ dialogue that most films shy away from.”

As is true in so many great films, these actors seem born for these roles. Hawke organically imbues Jesse with a worldly but tolerable cynicism, and Delpy effortlessly inhabits the more romantic and soul-searching Celine. They exhibit undeniable chemistry, as evidenced by the record store scene. The rhythm and timing required for that nonverbal interplay to seamlessly work speaks to the talents of and shared trust between Delpy and Hawke.

What also elevates Before Sunrise to the upper echelon is how it’s unpredictable in ways large and small. An example of the former is how, at the finale, we are left to guess if they will ever meet again. An instance of the latter is how, despite an early scene where Celine and Jesse are invited by two Viennese thespians to later attend their play, they never do. This superbly written and acted film has the luxury of completely discarding that earlier play invite setup, which many viewers may have expected to have a later payoff.

Pulling off a winning romantic drama is certainly no layup. Many viewers who frequent this aisle have expectations for Harlequin novel-esque wooing, torrid sex scenes, and stirringly soppy interplays between stock characters. Before Sunrise is a revitalizing new entrée on a mostly stale menu. Granted, the plot is threadbare—very little happens. But instead of turning to a proven yet overused formula, the filmmakers bank on two interesting personalities and well-written conversations. The emphasis is on believable human interactions over a crunchy storyline. And this work isn’t limited in its appeal to only Gen Xers, the demographic represented by Celine and Jesse. The issues and questions these young twentysomethings discuss remain evergreen and relevant to adult couples of almost any age.

Linklater and company aren’t aiming for melodramatic emotional manipulation or trying to trick you with some heavy-handed twist at the end. There is no sex scene, and we’re not even sure if they consummated the relationship, which is quite astounding when you consider that almost all movies of this stripe eventually include a bedding-down sequence and some degree of nakedness. (Sadly, this film remains rated “R,” even though there is no nudity or violence and only sparse profanity. That’s myopic and unfortunate, as it limited Before Sunrise’s original theatrical run audience to adults only, when teenagers could have certainly enjoyed and learned from this picture. In 2025, this remains an excellent film for adolescents to watch, regardless of that restrictive rating.)

Before Sunrise is set in naturally picturesque and colorfully vibrant Vienna, but it doesn’t go out of its way to romanticize that city or use it as a travelogue-like backdrop where the viewer expects the characters to fall in love because they’re surrounded by an abundance of natural beauty and venerated culture. It's admirable that the filmmakers don’t try to exploit the fact that this is set in a foreign city and use its famous landmarks, art, or architecture to over-sentimentalize or color its characters or situations.

Like other Linklater films, including Slacker, Dazed and Confused, Before Sunset, and Before Midnight, this narrative occurs over a single day, without giving us the benefit of a prologue, epilogue, or flashbacks. This scenario creates an emotional urgency and immediacy, fueling Jesse and Celine to make the most of their limited window. Additionally, the movie benefits from an eclectic score that includes timeless classical works by Beethoven, Vivaldi, Strauss, and Bach as well as contemporary rock and alternative music.

Before Sunrise’s reach and influence extended across the globe in the years since its release. Consider the multiple works it helped inspire:

• In the Mood for Love (2000), Wong Kar-wai’s exploration of unspoken amore and fleeting moments.
• Lost in Translation (2003), Sofia Coppola’s meditation on the longing and emotional connection between two characters in a foreign city.
• Once (2007), an Irish musical romance that follows two strangers who form a deep connection over a short time before parting.
• 2 Days in Paris (2007), Julie Delpy’s film that explores relationship dynamics with humor and realism, influenced by her collaboration with Linklater.
• Certified Copy (2010), Abbas Kiarostami’s story of a man and woman wandering a European town that captures the raw intimacy of Before Sunrise.
• Weekend (2011), Andrew Haigh’s British indie that ruminates on fleeting intimacy and meaningful conversations between two men over a weekend.
• Blue Jay (2016), a black-and-white picture about former lovers reconnecting.
• Columbus (2017), Kogonada’s introspective film about two people bonding over architecture, which mirrors the quiet conversations and emotional depth of Before Sunrise.

Among several predecessors that may have influenced Linklater and his collaborators are:

• Brief Encounter (1945): This classic tale of a fleeting love affair shares themes of brief connections and bittersweet romance.
• The Clock (1945): This romance about a single-day love story in New York shares Before Sunrise's real-time structure and exploration of brief, intense relationships.
• Letter from an Unknown Woman (1948): Max Ophüls' exploration of fleeting love, the emotional weight of brief connections, the passage of time, unspoken emotional depth, romantic idealism, and the use of setting as a character predate Linklater’s film.
• The Third Man (1949): The atmospheric depiction of post-war Vienna in this noir, and its famous Ferris wheel scene (the same Ferris wheel used in Before Sunrise) may have inspired Linklater’s choice of a similarly evocative European setting.
• An Affair to Remember (1957): Its theme of romantic ideals and a promise to reunite echoes Before Sunrise's open-ended conclusion of trust in love.
• Annie Hall (1977): Woody Allen’s blend of humor, depth, and reflective storytelling likely influenced Linklater’s conversational style and emotional exploration of relationships.
• Manhattan (1979): This film’s focus on intellectual dialogue and the use of cityscapes as a romantic backdrop mirrors Before Sunrise's approach.
• My Dinner with Andre (1981): Its dialogue-driven narrative, centered on a philosophical conversation, likely shaped Before Sunrise's emphasis on character-driven exchanges.
• Chungking Express (1994): Wong Kar-wai’s poetic exploration of fleeting love and serendipitous encounters parallels Before Sunrise's focus on ephemeral moments.

Particular Linklater qualities shine through. Beyond the natural dialogue, minimalist narrative, and storytelling (mostly) in real-time, the director makes several insightful choices that enhance Before Sunrise. He doesn’t try to be flashy or artsy-fartsy by going for complicated setups, experimental framing, elaborate camera movements, or grandiose editing choices. Instead, Linklater and crew keep the visuals simple in terms of shots, edits, and camera placement. In fact, he utilizes many extended takes that let the characters dominate the frame and command our eyeballs, allowing us to linger longer on them and identify the shared vibes without excessive editing manipulation. Case in point: the long, unbroken shot on the back of the tram that stretches over several minutes.

The cinematography is subtly crafted, with long takes and smooth tracking shots that let the actors' performances take center stage. This understated approach creates a sense of intimacy, almost as if we're right there beside Jesse and Celine, quietly observing an authentic moment between two people.

Linklater’s well-documented collaborative process also brings out rich, multidimensional performances from Hawke and Delpy, allowing their characters to feel alive and deeply relatable.

Of course, there’s the closing montage to consider as further proof of Linklater’s talents; recall how the camera revisits many of the spots previously traversed by Celine and Jesse, now empty of any human occupants, which showcases this director’s innate flair for visual storytelling and emotionally tethering the audience to his characters.

For a film so predicated on philosophical ideas, Before Sunrise has a high bar to clear in the themes department, which it does effortlessly. What is this picture about? Plenty. For starters, seeking permanence in a world of impermanence, inevitable change, and death. “(The) couple’s conversation is preoccupied with death, transience, and the fragility of life,” wrote Slant Magazine critic Dan Jardine. “The couple search for evidence of things that can persist. Staying awake in defiance of that harbinger of mortality—the night—hoping to cheat the death of each day by stealing the time that they shouldn’t even be having together, their conversations inevitably swing back to all the proofs that they see around them of the ephemeral, particularly in the realm of human relationships, where nothing sticks, where disintegration and collapse seem to be the norm.”

The film examines the temporal constraints of our existence and the fleeting nature of time. The ephemeral 12 hours the characters spend together underscores how quickly life goes by and how fast an opportunity can pass. Time itself is a thematic element and motif constantly revisited (and it’s thematically fitting that these time-obsessed young characters are placed within a timeless Old World city).

Recall how Jesse refers to their brief encounter as a kind of time travel experiment. Jesse later remarks: “It's all these people talking about how great technology is, and how it saves all this time. But, what good is saved time if nobody uses it?” Speaking about a dead girl’s gravesite in the cemetery, Celine says: “She was only 13 when she died. That meant something to me, you know? I was that age when I first saw this. Hmm. Now I'm ten years older and she's still 13, I guess.” Jesse comments: “I mean, just once, I'd love to see, some little old lady save up all her money, to go to the fortune teller, and she'd get there, all excited about hearing her future, and the woman would say, ‘Um-humm. Tomorrow, and all your remaining days will be exactly like today. A tedious collection of hours.’”

One particular conversation suggests that the couple is trying to thwart time and explore beyond the confines of temporal existence, even if momentarily. Jesse: “I feel like this is, uh, some dream world we're in, y'know.” Celine: “Yeah, it's so weird. It's like our time together is just ours. It's our own creation. It must be like I'm in your dream, and you in mine, or something. Jesse: “And what's so cool is that this whole evening, all our time together, shouldn't officially be happening.” Celine: “Yeah, I know. Maybe that's why this feels so otherworldly.”

Ponder how Jesse quotes W.H. Auden and his poem As I Walked Out One Evening: “O let not Time deceive you/You cannot conquer Time/In the burrows of the Nightmare/Where Justice naked is/Time watches from the shadow/And coughs when you would kiss/In headaches and in worry/Vaguely life leaks away/And Time will have his fancy/To-morrow or to-day.”

Criterion Collection essayist Michael Koresky wrote: “Before Sunrise…flies in the face of other youthful love stories for the thematic prominence it gives to the passage of time. Most twentysomethings think they’ll live forever, but the one-night stroll through Vienna of young Celine and Jesse is marked by both the filmmaker’s and the characters’ constant awareness that their time, both here and on earth, is limited.”

Before Sunrise espouses the perks of living life spontaneously and seizing the moment. Ponder how the couple adapts to their limited environment and acts uninhibitedly despite these limitations. Both Celine and Jesse decide on the spur of the moment to depart the train and forget their rules and restrictions. They also randomly encounter three artists along their travels—a palm reader, a street poet, and a belly dancer. Jesse and Celine spontaneously engage with each of them and their art.

Additionally, the film questions the unpredictable nature of fate versus happenchance. Were Celine and Jesse destined to meet like star-crossed lovers, or was this just a random event that won’t mean much in the scope of their lives? (You’ll need to conveniently forget about the sequels for this query to be fully explored.)

Discovering yourself through the eyes of another person is a further takeaway. Remember Jesse’s telling rumination: “(So many people) are sick to death of being around themselves…So of course I'm sick of myself. But being with you, uh, it's made me feel like I'm somebody else.”

Celine and Jesse explore another fundamental problem: relationship rigor mortis. The pair discuss how, as couples age together, they can lose the ability to hear each other. But Celine and Jesse attempt to avoid this inevitable problem by spending only one night together.

Rewatching Before Sunrise, one particular message becomes all the more evident: the power of playacting. Per Dennis Lim in his Criterion Collection essay: “Jesse and Celine move past initial awkwardness by implicitly acknowledging the role-playing aspect of their impromptu date. He initiates a question-and-answer game, in which they take turns quizzing each other about sex and love. The verbal seduction drifts into strategic thought experiments—What would happen on an island with ninety-nine men and one woman? With ninety-nine women and one man?—that allow the opinionated twosome to get a fix on their respective worldviews. Late into the night, with time running out, they again use the indirection of play as disinhibitor and armor.”

Lim is referencing the famous role-playing scene toward the end of the movie involving imaginary phone calls. It’s enthralling how Jesse has to stay in character as Celine’s pretend friend while Celine speaks positive and negative words about him. It’s a clever way for both to reveal things about each other without discussing them directly, and it could be the best scene in the entire film.

In another scene, Jesse says: “I always think that I’m still this 13-year-old boy that doesn’t really know how to be an adult, pretending to live my life, taking notes for when I’ll really have to do it.” And revealing how engrossed with finality and death our female protagonist is, Celine remarks: “I always have this strange feeling that I am this very old woman laying down about to die. You know, that my life is just her memories, or something.”

Above all, this work examines the transformative power of genuine human intimacy, as evidenced by the film’s most memorable monologue, courtesy of Celine: “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. If there's any kind of magic in this world it must be in the attempt of understanding someone sharing something. I know, it's almost impossible to succeed but who cares really? The answer must be in the attempt.” This suggests that divinity and meaning lie not within individuals but in the shared connections between them, emphasizing the intangible beauty of trying to understand and relate to others. It celebrates the effort to connect as inherently valuable, even if perfect understanding is unattainable.

Before Sunrise’s best bestowal to fans on its 30th birthday is its incredibly credible conversation and intellectually stimulating dialogue. The discourse between Celine and Jesse plays as realistic and authentic, as evidenced by its occasional stream-of-consciousness circuitousness, its focus on the mundane as well as the momentous, its mining of deeply philosophical matters, its lack of florid, overscripted language, and the absence of audience-friendly one-liners and groan-worthy catchphrases. Here’s a rare film romance that touches the head as well as the heart, a fresh-scented falling-in-love drama that avoids cheap mawkishness and predictable tropes.

But it’s often what’s not spoken aloud that further cement this as a masterwork. It boasts possibly the best “falling-in-love” moment in cinema history via the wordless sequence in the record shop, when, fascinatingly, as they listen to a Kath Bloom folk song, each character keeps stealing quick glances at the other with their eyes never meeting. And it later features one of the best kissing scenes ever in the movies: their first lip lock on the Ferris wheel. (A later osculation, when Jesse asks “Can I tell you a secret,” then quickly leans in and steals a smooch, is equally memorable.)

Before Sunrise is all the more amorously imbued because it’s set before the ubiquity of smartphones, which makes the uncertainty of their future rendezvous at the conclusion more gripping and heartfelt. What can be more romantic than, at the conclusion, not sharing their last names or contact information and simply promising to rendezvous in six months at the place they first met?