the Pretentious, the Presumptuous and the Preposterous

"The difference between a caprice and a lifelong passion is that a caprice lasts longer." When the great Oscar Wilde wrote this sentence, he probably didn't expect that three people (Richard Linklater, Ethan Hawke and Julie Delpy) would make a movie to vividly and thoroughly interpret this famous sentence of his. 'Before Sunrise' was all about caprice. An American guy spent a night with a French girl in Vienna. They flirted, drank, laughed, had sex and parted before the Sun rose again. The night passed by pleasantly with all the pretentious conversations between two typical twenty-some pseudo-intellectuals. He felt like a different person with her; she wanted to be lost in this beautiful dream. Although it's a corny one-night stand with an even cheesier poem inserted weirdly into the middle of the film, 'Before Sunrise' demonstrates how every love story starts. As two people connect and fall in love, they present to each other the best versions of themselves, the no-liability view on life and the impractical ideals about relationship.

        Nine years later, when 'Before Sunset' caught up, the honeymoon stage was long gone and the bitterness just kicked in. Instead of talking about '911' or any major events that had happened (since both of them were in 紐約 for some time), the two people assumed that the other was better off in his or her life. He wondered why she never showed up; she found it unfair that he became successful while she was aging and trapped in failed relationships. The presumptuous thing about knowing a person by just a little bit is that one forgets that a story, by default, has to be interesting. Both the storytellers and listeners tend to omit the intermittent uneventfulness, hence the illusion and insecurity of other people's lives being more exciting than their own.

        Eventually through all the things that didn't work, the man and the woman realized what was most important for them and got together. Another nine years later, they took the offer to spend a romantic night away from the kids and the mid-life crisis but the fighting couldn't stop, not even by sex. 'Before Midnight' darkened and deepened the two characters' relationship, it was brutally honest about life's toll on couple, its impatience on love and its immunity to communication. When passion becomes commitment and sacrifice; man becomes a rationalist without emotion, woman a philosopher without reasoning.

 Recently I had a conversation with a friend about how long it would take to know your partner in a relationship. While I argued that it takes as long as it gets, my friend confidently claimed that one month, at most, should be more than enough to know all the things needed to know about the other person. His Charlotte Lucas "Don't ask, don't tell" style made me wonder: how can a person be sure of the love of his life just by meeting her twice over 9 years? At the end of 'Before Midnight', Jesse himself answered my question: he threw away everything because of Celine's little waltz; he put up with all the craziness because he decided to "miss that plane". The ultimate answer to the Before trilogy is that love is about the good, the bad and the ugly. There is no such ending as happily ever-after. After going through the pretentious, the presumptuous and the preposterous, the finale of love is a conscious choice, a decision to take a chance with someone, to give to him or her without asking why. So I guess there is no fairy tale here, just great sex in the Southern Peloponnese of Greece.