For over a decade, the “Before” trilogy has stood as one of cinema’s most intimate and enduring portraits of time and connection — a conversation that unfolded in real time, across years, and between eras. But while 2013’s “Before Midnight” seemed to close the book on Jesse and Céline, Richard Linklater isn’t convinced the story’s over.
Speaking with Ethan Hawke on The Discourse podcast while promoting their new film “Blue Moon,” Linklater admitted that while a fourth film isn’t in active development, it’s still a lingering possibility. “I thought you should have,” Linklater joked when asked how to approach the trilogy. “If you’re coming to it fresh, you should watch them backward. I think you start at the end and go in reverse.”
Then, reflecting on his attachment to the characters, he added, “Do I think of revisiting? It’d be hard not to. They were a big part of our lives for at least 18 years. Jesse was always in the back of my mind, sometimes in the forefront. Never too far.”
He went on to acknowledge that the group — himself, Hawke, and Julie Delpy — had once hoped to continue the series every nine years, but that rhythm has slipped away. “We missed our nine-year deadline to keep that. Yeah, that sailed past us,” Linklater said of the tradition of making the films every nine years, but with good reason. “We didn’t have a great idea. We always have to have a real idea about Jesse and Céline’s new stage of life, and what it is. And that last one was so hard, getting toward that age. But I don’t know. We’re all still here. I would not count us out. It’s just kind of maybe an older [story].”
For his part, Hawke sees the trilogy as complete — at least for now — but not immune to evolution. “My theory about it is that those three really do function as a trilogy. They really function [that way],” he said. “And if we were to revisit it, it would have a new beginning to it. There would be something very different about it. I don’t know what it would be.”
Both men’s comments capture what’s always made the “Before” series resonate: the acknowledgment that relationships, like art, evolve in unexpected ways. The trilogy — from “Before Sunrise” to “Before Sunset” to “Before Midnight” — has chronicled love not as a static ideal but as an ongoing dialogue between time, experience, and compromise. And though the idea of a fourth entry remains abstract, Linklater’s quiet optimism keeps the door cracked open for Jesse and Céline to reemerge in whatever form they might take decades later. Divorce? Adultery? Death in the family? There are still many late-in-life challenges to provide the subtle conflict that always powers these films, even if conflict is rarely what the films are truly about.
Regardless, after all, as Linklater says, “We’re all still here,” and there’s plenty of time for ideas to gestate. More from this whole Discourse podcast conversation shortly. — Additional reporting by Mike DeAngelo.
- Rodrigo Perez
- Rodrigo Perez
- Rodrigo Perez
- Rodrigo Perez
- Rodrigo Perez
- Rodrigo Perez
- Rodrigo Perez
- Rodrigo Perez
- Rodrigo Perez
