‘Before Sunrise’ at 25 — A Look Back at Richard Linklater’s Modern Masterpiece
Twenty-five years ago this month, a modest film was released in theaters across the United States, to little fanfare. Late January is traditionally a dumping ground for misbegotten movies and, though the film debuted to respectful reviews, it ended up grossing an unspectacular $5.5 million. Yet those few who saw Before Sunrise fell in love with it, and it eventually developed a passionate cult following.
More importantly, the three unparalleled talents behind it — writer/director Richard Linklater and stars/cowriters Ethan Hawke and Julie Delpy — felt they had created something special and eventually came to believe they had more to say with these characters. This led it to become, in Linklater’s words, “the lowest grossing film to spawn a sequel,” and eventually “the lowest grossing films to ever be a trilogy.”
Today, The Before Trilogy films are acclaimed as classics. They’ve been released as part of The Criterion Collection. The very name Before Sunrise is used as shorthand for a kind of authentic love story all too rare in cinema.
