We Indians love straightforward love stories with happy endings. Anything that is a twisty, messy,rocky romantic tale frightens us.
The spontaneous, impulsive characters Jesse and Celine of 'Before sunrise' who meet on a train, get off the train together and later fall in love, come together in 'Before Sunset' nine years later as long lost lovers. The movie ends with the unanswered spine-tingler question, 'Will they or will they not get together?'
In the third sequel 'Before Midnight' we see them as two lovers who didn't take the conventional route to get married but they are now together share a pair of beautiful twins.
This goofy couple makes you love their movies instantly. The anything-but-ordinary way they fall in love makes you believe in romance. They meet, spend a mesmerizing day together, and part making a promise that they would meet on a fixed date. Such is the faith, they do not exchange numbers or their address. In the second part however, we find that due to an unexpected turn of events they couldn't meet. Their love doesn't fail them. They meet 9 years later and have the courage to admit their love to one another. The movie ends there.
Then comes Before Midnight.
The bourgeois couple in their forties. It is anything but a happily ever after. It is melancholic if anything. The flawless love story of them both is now terribly flawed. You witness them bickering all the time. That's when the reality hits you in the face. It can't be rosy all the time. It is about the turbulence and how these prickly couples get past them.
This film definitely cannot match up to the standards of the prequels since they portrayed love the way we imagine it to be, while the third part shows the bitter reality of people in a relationship. it covers the uncomfortable yet inevitable aspects of long term love, and does so with frightening realism. However ,the best part in the movie is that despite all the arguments, they do not give up on the their efforts of rekindling their flame.
There are several moments of levity, but this is by and large the most dramatic and dark film of this series. The film ends on not a very bright note I would say, but yes, a satisfactory ending with both of them sitting by the waters engaging in playful banter.
The movie can be summed up in this dialogue Jesse gives at the ending trying to make things fine with Celine: "If you think there is some other kind of true love out there, I hate to tell you, but that is a fairy tale. This is true love."
