Before Sunrise

As you’re watching the movie, Before Sunrise, you don’t even notice that the majority of the film is purely all conversation.  I don’t think that it’s completely fair to say that this film doesn’t incorporate some element of “love at first sight” because Celine does make a reference later in the film that she had seen Jesse and it was not accident that she sat next to him when the couple on the train was fighting.  However, I think “love though conversation” is different from the typical story of “love at first sight” because it’s more genuine.  Most people don’t experience “love at first sight” and it’s much more realistic to become more connected to someone through talking.

              One of the scenes that struck me the most throughout the whole film was when Jesse and Celine come across the young poet, and he reads the milkshake poem to them.  I found this poem peculiar because it makes me wonder if this young poet is used to seeing young adults who have just met each other fall in love?  On another note, this poem speaks a lot about new love.  In the last two lines, it says, “Don't you know me? Don't you know me by now?”  This relates to Jesse and Celine perfectly because they feel like they know everything about each other, but they truly don’t.  The same goes for love in general when it’s new.  Even though people think they are meant for each other and they know each other, the truth is nobody can know another person that they haven’t know for a while.

            I don’t think that Jesse and Celine will meet again in six months, or if they do, I don’t think that they will have the same connection that they had initially.  Jesse and Celine are complete polar opposites.  In the scene with the gypsy, Celine believes what she is told, while Jesse makes fun of the whole thing.  We don’t just see them disagree in this scene, but throughout the whole film.  Jesse even describes himself as a “thirteen year old boy” and Celine describes herself as an “old woman”.  As much as the two are entranced by each other, I just don’t think that they are compatible enough to sustain a long-term relationship.  Their time together is not pointless, though.  People care more about the future than the moment.  Whether they spent twenty-four years or twenty-four hours, the love they feel for each other is still important and real.  

Annie Hall

     In many ways the film criticizes the idea of the "romantic comedy".  When we think of what a romantic comedy is in our society, we usually picture a stereotypical set up: a young good looking, successful, strong guy meets a young attractive girl.  The two begin dating, but in the end, they both resolve any problem they have between them, and they live happily ever after together.  The entire movie in itself rejects the idea of the stereotypical romantic comedy simply because Alvey and Annie don't end up together in the end (even though we secretly wish they would because that's what we expect).  One of the major aspects that Woody Allen uses to criticize the romantic comedy in the film is sex.  At the very beginning of the film we see Alvey reject Allison’s sexual advances towards him.  This stems away from what would normally be a romantic comedy because usually the male and female character are supposed to love each other and engage in sex all the time, so especially to have the man turn down sex goes against the norm.  Another important scene is when Alvey wants to have sex with Annie, but she leaves her body because she does not want to have sex with him.  This criticizes the romantic comedy by showing how men are so stereotypical and don’t care about the emotions of a woman.  Annie even says in this scene to Alvey that “at least [he has her] body”. 

            Gender roles in this film are not black and white, as people typically perceive them in the romantic comedy where the man is strong, and the female is a damsel in distress type.  One the one hand, Allen supports gender roles and the notorious wine-drinking scene between Annie and Alvey when they first meet.  As we hear what each character is saying and we see what each character is really thinking, it plays into the stereotype.  The man is merely thinking about the girl naked and the girl is nervous and overthinks too much to try to impress the guy.  For the most part, though, Allen completely goes against gender roles.  One thing that is noticeable is that even the way Annie dresses from the beginning is extremely androgynous.  She often wears business shirts with their collars popped, and she usually ties a scarf around her neck, which looks very similar to a male tie.  The major scene we see this gender switch, however, is when Annie has to catch the lobsters because Alvey is too afraid to.  Ultimately in the movie, Woody Allen never clearly defines gender, as we would typically see it in a romantic comedy because in real life there are no specific gender roles among people.

            There can be many theories of love from the movie, but one thing that I concluded is that there will always be a complete disconnect between people.  There will always be dueling wants, desires, thoughts, and opinions between people, which is what makes love nearly impossible especially for Annie and Alvey.  We even see this with Alvey’s parents when they argue over the maid who stole from them.  They both have different opinions on how to deal with it, which just over dramatizes the disconnection between people.  Alvey closes the movie with the chicken and egg quote.  This relates back to the disconnection: one person will be one way, and the other person will think that they’re crazy for being that way.  We see this simply when Annie wants to move to Los Angeles and Alvey hates it.  I think ultimately, Allen’s theory is that two people can never truly come together simply because they will always be two separate people.