The closest theater that is playing this film is about an hour away, so I won’t have time to see it and I can’t wait for it to come out on DVD, so will someone please tell me how it ends? Do Jesse and Celine ditch their married lives for each other? Do they just agree to never see each other again? Please tell me! Thanks!
I saw it few weeks ago, so I’ll remember the best I can:
Jesse has written a book about his experience in Before Sunrise, and is now at a bookstore in Paris at a book signing.
Celine shows up to see him, and they go off on a walk before he has to leave to catch his plane back home.
They had never exchanged numbers or contact info before, so they had no way to contact each other before his booksigning publicity made it possible. Apparently at the end of Before Sunrise they had agreed to meet at a certain time, and while he showed up, she had a death in the family and could not make it even though she wanted too.
It’s amazing how interesting the movie actually is when nothing significant happens the entire movie — it’s all about their conversation.
Gradually it is revealed that Jesse is not happy in his marriage. Celine is not married (don’t remember what her current relationship status is, probably has none).
At the last minute he puts off his limo ride a bit longer after dropping her off at her place, and goes up instead of leaving.
After another 10 minutes of more conversation, he decides to blow off his ride to the airport and just stay there with Celine. We don’t know how long he will stay, what they will do (although our imagination certainly kicks into overdrive) or if there will be any committments or long term anything. Just that at this moment, he blows off his ride to the airport and stays at her place.
The end.
She is in a long term relationship with someone who is required for his job to be out of the country for extremely long periods of time (I think he works for Medicins Sans Frontiers or something like that). It’s a significant comment on Celine’s character that the perfect man for her is one who she never has to see or talk to or deal with. Jesse’s the only man she ever really connected with.
Prove it! richardb, you did an excellent job recapping the film but you messed up one of the things I absolutely loved about it. Yes, they’re in Celine’s apartment at the end, and yes, Jesse’s driver is waiting to take him to the airport. I believe, as you seem to, that Jesse stayed with Celine and didn’t end up going to the airport. But the beauty of the end is that Linklater refuses to tell us that in any certain terms.
All Linklater gives us is:
Celine: You’re going to miss your plane.
Jesse: <smiles>
Cut to Black- Roll Credits
And the packed theater I saw it in collectively went, “Aaaargh!”
Just like in the first movie we are not told what happens and we’re left to bicker and argue over who killed who. I loved it! It was highly effective!
Linklater is at his best with movies where nothing happens. When he has to direct things happening (SubUrbi@, Newton Boys) he never really pulls it off. But when nothing happens (Slacker, Dazed and Confused) this is when he shows his true skills. In Slacker he even has a line of dialog to pay tribute to Antonioni, another director who was a master at directing films where nothing happens!
bienville writes:
> She is in a long term relationship with someone who is required for his job to
> be out of the country for extremely long periods of time (I think he works for
> Medicins Sans Frontiers or something like that).
I think that she says that her boyfriend is a photojournalist. She works for a charitable organization that occasionally sends her abroad to work. In discussing their lives over the past nine years, one thing they discover is that they both lived in New York simultaneously during one period of a year. Jesse says that on the ride to his wedding he saw a woman who looked like her standing on a streetcorner. Celine says that she lived near that location at that time, so it could have been her.
Slight nitpick. The last two lines of the movie:
Celine: Baby, you are going to miss your plane.
Jesse: (smiles) I know.
Fade to black.