THE VIRGINIAN-PILOT
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: Monday, January 30, 1995 TAG: 9501280022
SECTION: DAILY BREAK PAGE: E1 EDITION: FINAL
SOURCE: BY MAL VINCENT, ENTERTAINMENT WRITER
LENGTH: Medium: 97 lines
IF RICHARD LINKLATER and his cast of two have their way, there will be a whole generation of new babies conceived on the night couples see ``Before Sunrise.''
The film, currently in local theaters, is unabashedly romantic - it has ``sensitive'' written all over it.
Just ask the filmmaker himself. He'll tell you how much he cares.
``It's the kind of talk that makes the difference,'' Linklater said when he and his movie couple gathered in New York for a screening of the movie. ``You don't hear talk like this often in movies.''
Linklater, who has already achieved a reputation for reaching young moviegoers with the films ``Slacker'' and ``Dazed and Confused,'' is betting his reputation that the targeted audience will identify. ``With `Dazed and Confused' and `Slacker,' I had a large group of people. You didn't get to know any of them,'' Linklater said. ``With this one, you get to know them really well - maybe better than some people you know in real life.''
Ethan Hawke, 24, an aging teen idol who started with ``Dead Poet's Society'' and most recently flopped with ``Reality Bites,'' plays Jesse, a young American on a train from Budapest to Vienna. He meets Celine, a young French girl played by Julie Delpy, 23, who appeared in ``White'' and ``The Three Musketeers.'' They spend a long night walking about Vienna and talking about life, about commitment, about love, and what it means.
Linklater is a native of Austin, Texas, the setting for ``Dazed and Confused.'' For ``Before Sunrise,'' he wanted a European city.
``I wanted that cultural clash - two strangers in a different world.'' His first choice was Berlin, but it turned out to be difficult. He settled for Vienna, complete with its giant Ferris wheel.
The director says he cast Hawke because, ``I like the way his mind works. He was afraid, really afraid, of the project. I liked that. I was afraid too. Here is a movie in which he and Julie had to talk all the time. I didn't want him to be macho. These two actors had to come with me and jump off a cliff.''
In real life, Hawke is single and lives in a Manhattan apartment. When not filming, he works with his theater company, Malaparte, which he says is dedicated to ``doing new plays no one else will do.''
Hawke's defensive and careful about everything he says. He initially tells an interviewer that he's still asleep and then, finally, admits that ``I'm being pretty boring, I guess.''
He does reveal that he's acted since his early teens ``because it's the only thing I'm good at'' and that, after working with River Phoenix in ``Explorers,'' when he was 13, he felt ``really jealous of him because he was a really good actor. The way he went was really stupid.''
Hawke feels that ``Before Sunrise'' is ``dangerous because there's no plot to fall back on. I looked on it as an experiment.''
If Hawke is reticent, Julie Delpy is just the opposite - a firebrand of nonstop conversation. ``The movie never would have worked if it had been totally scripted,'' she said. ``We added some things, some lines, and many ideas, mostly mine.''
She was upset about the movie's proposed end - the director and Ethan thought that the couple should part.
``A woman is different from a man,'' Delpy said. ``A woman doesn't just forget about an affair and walk off. It doesn't work like that. I fought to change this ending, and they had no choice but to listen to me. They were stuck with me. They kept saying `but when they part it is so romantic.' I said, `Yes, and he could have gotten a prostitute for the night. It would have been the same thing.' ''
We aren't telling if she won her battle, but you can bet that she was heard.
``When I was a little girl, my father made me read one book a week,'' Delpy said. ``Now, everyone says I'm so intelligent. That has nothing to do with intelligence. The kind of commitment the couple talk about in this film takes real intelligence.''
Delpy, born in Paris, lived in New York for a few years and now resides in Los Angeles. She feels thoroughly Americanized but admits that her French accent has limited her American film career. ``I'm not just a French babe,'' she laughed. ``Don't try to perceive me as just that way.''
She was up for the Audrey Hepburn role in the upcoming remake of ``Sabrina,'' co-starring Harrison Ford. She doesn't regret that the part went to Julia Ormond from ``Legends of the Fall.''
``Actually, `Sabrina' is one of the lesser of the films directed by Billy Wilder. I had real doubts about whether a remake should be made. It's from another period. Two rich guys fall in love with her. It's kind of weird in modern times. On the other hand, I'd love to do the Marilyn Monroe role in `Some Like it Hot.' That's more remarkable.''
As for ``Before Sunrise,'' she feels it was doubly dangerous ``because the part is a girl a lot like me. It's difficult to play a character who is like yourself. It's like playing on the piano. If you play loud, the mistakes won't be as noticeable. Here, we play soft. Every little touch, or mistake, will be right out there for everyone to see.'' ILLUSTRATION: Color photo Castle Rock Entertainment
Julie Delpy and Ethan Hawke...
Color photo
Richard Linklater...
by CNB