‘Before Sunset’ With Bill Simmons, Chris Ryan, Sean Fennessey, and Mallory Rubin

Summary

The Rewatchables: Episode Summary – 'Before Sunset' Hosted by Bill Simmons, Chris Ryan, Sean Fennessey, and Mallory Rubin

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Introduction

In this episode of The Rewatchables, Bill Simmons, Chris Ryan, Sean Fennessey, and Mallory Rubin delve deep into the nuances of the acclaimed film 'Before Sunset', the sequel to 'Before Sunrise'. Released in 2004 and set nine years after the original meeting of Jesse (Ethan Hawke) and Celine (Julie Delpy), the film explores themes of love, time, and personal growth as the two estranged lovers reconnect in Paris.

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Discussion on Themes and Character Development

Sean Fennessey [04:43] highlights the layered complexity of the film:

"This movie taps into the theme...[it] did it the best. And it's one of the many great reasons why this is an all-time classic."

The panel discusses how 'Before Sunset' effectively captures the evolution of Jesse and Celine over nearly a decade, reflecting on their past interactions and current lives. Chris Ryan emphasizes the relatability of their introspection:

"It's something that people think about forever... What would it be like to feel that specific spark?"

Bill Simmons adds personal resonance to the discussion, relating the characters' fears and dreams to his own life experiences:

"It's deeply romantic and so intoxicating and so convincing. I really feel like I'm watching something unfold just like I was when I was watching 'Sunrise'."

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Favorite Scenes and Cinematic Techniques

The hosts unanimously praise specific scenes for their rewatchability and emotional impact. Chris Ryan names the Listening Booth scene as his favorite:

"That scene is, like, genuinely maybe my favorite movie scene ever."

Sean Fennessey commends Richard Linklater's minimalist approach, likening parts of the film to an eloquent documentary:

"And because it's sort of a document of real time, I wanted it to be a, quote, eloquent documentary."

Bill Simmons appreciates the film’s real-time narrative structure and how it immerses the audience in Jesse and Celine's conversation:

"It's a one-act talking... You really feel like you're inside of their heads."

Mallory Rubin points out the seamless integration of flashbacks and present moments, enhancing the storytelling:

"The way they're using the flashback, I just think that scene is so well directed."

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Acting Performances and Character Portrayal

Julie Delpy's portrayal of Celine receives considerable acclaim. Chris Ryan remarks on her ability to convey deep emotion subtly:

"She is so good at performing it. It's the way that she rolls her eyes at herself."

Bill Simmons praises Ethan Hawke's nuanced performance, especially his ability to depict inner turmoil:

"I admire the craft of acting that Ethan Hawke brings to that character."

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Oscar Discussion

The panel reflects on the film's reception during the 2005 Oscars, expressing confusion over its exclusion from major categories despite critical acclaim. Mallory Rubin laments the oversight:

"Best Actor and Best Actress not nominated... I feel like Julie could have snuck in there."

Bill Simmons attributes this to the film's smaller studio backing compared to other nominees like 'Million Dollar Baby' and 'The Aviator':

"This was a much, much smaller movie by comparison."

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Technical Aspects and Filmmaking Choices

The hosts delve into the technical brilliance of 'Before Sunset', noting its constrained setting and dialogue-driven narrative. Chris Ryan appreciates the film's exploration of time:

"Linklater's interest in time... how the movie engages with time."

Sean Fennessey highlights the movie's authentic dialogue and minimalistic visual style:

"The tone is very real world... It's such a beautiful summary of what he accomplished."

Bill Simmons discusses the challenges and successes of filming in Paris, praising the authenticity despite a limited shooting schedule:

"They only shot at the same time of day every day, which is crazy."

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Humorous Segments and Speculations

The conversation takes a lighter turn as the hosts engage in playful speculation about recasting and alternative scenarios. A notable moment includes humorous nominations for awards like the "Sean Penn I brought my Own Pack award for excellence in on-screen smoking," awarded to Julie Delpy.

Mallory Rubin introduces a "flex category," creatively acknowledging standout moments like Delpy's smoking scenes:

"Julie Delpy smokes and smokes. She smokes so much. She should consider wearing ashtrays as trinkets."

The panel also jokes about the improbability of certain scenes and casting choices, adding levity to the in-depth analysis.

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Unanswerable Questions and Final Thoughts

As the episode progresses, the hosts pose intriguing but unanswerable questions about the characters' motivations and possible plot developments in a potential third installment, 'Before Midnight'. They ponder the implications of Jesse's actions and Celine's life changes over the years.

Sean Fennessey raises a poignant question:

"What do you think, Mal? That says a lot about me."

Bill Simmons reflects on the personal impact of the film's themes on his own life:

"It's to make sure this is what you want. Because you could turn out like these people who are at the edge of their own sanity because of the choices they made."

In their concluding remarks, the hosts emphasize the film's enduring relevance and emotional depth, celebrating 'Before Sunset' as a timeless piece that continues to resonate with audiences.

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Notable Quotes

• Mallory Rubin [09:11]: "I have zero regrets about seeing it."
• Chris Ryan [12:02]: "There's a very meta quality to that."
• Sean Fennessey [12:58]: "Escape the day, embrace the night."
• Julie Delpy [35:54]: "You thought I was a fatty? You thought I was a fatty!"
• Bill Simmons [44:22]: "This is one of the most incredibly well-written scenes in movie history."

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Conclusion

This episode of The Rewatchables offers a comprehensive and heartfelt exploration of 'Before Sunset', celebrating its artistic achievements and emotional depth. The hosts' passionate discussions, combined with their insightful critiques and humorous interludes, provide listeners with a rich understanding of why this film remains a beloved classic in the realm of romantic cinema.

Transcript

[Bill Simmons]

If you're a fan of the inner workings of Hollywood, then check out my.

[Mallory Rubin]

Podcast, the Town on the Ringer Podcast Network.

[Bill Simmons]

My name is Matt Bellany. I'm founding partner at Puck and the writer of the what I'm Hearing newsletter. And with my show the Town, I bring you the inside conversation about money and power in Hollywood. Every week we've got three short episodes featuring real Hollywood insiders to tell you what people in town are actually talking about. We'll cover everything from why your favorite show was canceled overnight, which streamer is on the brink of collapse, and which executive is on the hot seat. Disney, Netflix, who's up, down, and who'll eat lunch in this town again. Follow the Town on Spotify or wherever you get your podcasts.

[Mallory Rubin]

Oh, such a clutch off season pickup, Dave. I was worried we'd bring back the same team. I meant those blackout motorized shades. Lines.com made it crazy affordable to replace our old blinds.

[Bill Simmons]

Hard to install.

[Mallory Rubin]

No, it's easy. I installed these and then got some for my mom. She talked to a design consultant for free and scheduled a professional measure and install hall of Fame 6. They're the number one online retailer of custom window coverings in the world. Blinds.com is the goat shop.

[Chris Ryan]

Blinds.com right now. And get up to 45% off select styles, rules and restrictions may apply.

[Mallory Rubin]

The rewatchables is brought to you by the Ringer Podcast Network, where we can find the big picture with Sean Fennesee.

[Bill Simmons]

That's right.

[Mallory Rubin]

House of R with Mallory Rubin. What are you up to again?

[Sean Fennessey]

Any pod that'll have me, man.

[Bill Simmons]

Yeah, the lady of the night of the Ringer Podcast Network.

[Mallory Rubin]

The new CR pod. You'll hear him on off the pike with Brian Barrett a little bit later. My name is Bill Simmons.

[Sean Fennessey]

You guys see what Amin Thompson did to the seas the other night?

[Mallory Rubin]

My name is Bill Simmons. This is Before Sunset. We did Before Sunrise last week. And now the sequel, the classic Before Sunset. Nine years ago, two strangers met by chance and spent a night in Vienna that ended Before Sunrise. They're about to meet for the first time since.

[Bill Simmons]

Hi.

[Julie Delpy]

Hello.

[Mallory Rubin]

I can't believe you're here.

[Julie Delpy]

Well, I live here in Paris.

[Mallory Rubin]

I wanted to talk to you for so long.

[Bill Simmons]

You know that now.

[Julie Delpy]

Me too. How long do we have? 20 minutes and 30 seconds.

[Mallory Rubin]

Let's go. No, we got more than that. Now they have one afternoon to find out if they belong together. I remember that night better than I do entire years.

[Julie Delpy]

Do I look any different?

[Mallory Rubin]

You had a second chance with the one that Got away before Sunset. All right, everybody, first four person pod we've done in a while in studio. Really exciting. Mallory, you heard the Before Sunrise pod?

[Chris Ryan]

Oh, yeah, I booted it up. I thought it was a fantastic pod about a beautiful movie. And I have been meaning to reach out to Sean to discuss with him how much of his commentary about Jesse was clearly about himself.

[Bill Simmons]

What do you mean?

[Sean Fennessey]

Oh, I did not think that you.

[Chris Ryan]

Thought that a lot of like, boy, this is just a really cool, smart, interesting person who's tall and thin with brown hair. And only when you get to know him do you realize how deeply insecure he is and desperate for your love.

[Bill Simmons]

Well, I don't know what you mean at all. I think it's really great writing, really a great performance. I don't. I just. I admire the craft of acting that Ethan Hawke brings to that character.

[Mallory Rubin]

So Before Sunrise, 1995, but it was really set in 1994. Before Sunset comes out in 2004. It's set nine years later. I'll start here. The six great questions of life. How did we get here? What happens after you die? Who killed jfk? Why does fantasy log rewatchables movies on a letterbox and spoil what movie is coming just to impress a couple of dweebs? That's number four.

[Chris Ryan]

Really tough start to the pod for you.

[Bill Simmons]

I believe it was Chris Ryan who spoiled Before Sunrise, not me.

[Mallory Rubin]

Number five, he said we were doing it. I'm not done with my six questions. Number five, did Stern suspend mj? And then the sixth great question of life. What if you had a second chance with the one who got away?

[Bill Simmons]

Now, would you say that those are in order of importance?

[Sean Fennessey]

Can we start with jfk?

[Mallory Rubin]

We already did that part, but this movie taps into that theme. There's been other ones. This did it the best. And it's one of the many great reasons why this is an all time classic. Mal, go ahead.

[Chris Ryan]

Oh, my God. Just from the jump, what do I think of this movie?

[Mallory Rubin]

No, the Second Chance with the One who Got Away.

[Chris Ryan]

Well, it's something that people think about forever. That's one of the reasons that Before Sunset and the entire before trilogy is, I think, so indelible and so important to so many people. It's like simultaneously an experience that you probably feel you've never really gotten to have. Right. Will I ever feel that way about somebody, ever? What would it be like to feel that specific spark? And then that's just like the most deeply human and relatable thing, second guessing your decisions. Did you do the right thing. Do you wish you could have done something differently?

[Mallory Rubin]

Should Lamar have been. Should Lamar have lofted that pass to Andrews a little bit higher?

[Chris Ryan]

It's always great to be with you. And you were going to wait until after the podcast.

[Sean Fennessey]

Yeah. You do remember that, right?

[Chris Ryan]

Unbelievable. Literally said, you're going to wait. The wound is still so raw.

[Mallory Rubin]

See Our Second Chances.

[Sean Fennessey]

Yeah, I mean, it's a pretty. It's a pretty profound movie in that way where you are having this very unique experience with this film because of the time elapse, the time lapse between the first two. Right. And you're once attached to Jesse and Selene as characters, attached to Ethan Hawke and Julie Delpy as people, and then also attached to who you are both in 94 and in 2004. 95 and 2004.

[Chris Ryan]

Yeah.

[Sean Fennessey]

And so there's like this triple layer of things happening that all culminates with, I think, maybe one of the greatest acts of wish fulfillment in the history of movies at the end of this film.

[Mallory Rubin]

Sean.

[Bill Simmons]

I think that when I watched this movie, it became clear to me that I'm nine years behind the characters and that they're making the movie every nine years. And so this movie felt a little bit more predictive about the future, which is also true for the film that comes after this in ways that are like really impactful on your life. Because when you're a teenager, you don't really have to worry too much about what's coming in your early 20s. But when you're in your early 20s, your early 30s are kind of a scary time. And Selene literally has a nightmare about this feeling. And so just being able to capture that specific feeling would have been enough to make it a really indelible movie. But on top of that, it's so deeply romantic and so intoxicating and so convincing. Like, I really feel like I'm watching something unfold just like I was when I was watching Sunrise, where I'm like, these are not characters. This is not a movie. This is something that I am. I got lucky enough to observe. And it is an all time movie for me, this one especially. And it works just as well on me right now as it did the first time I saw it.

[Mallory Rubin]

I saw it in 2004, summer at the. What's the place? The lamellay. Whatever.

[Bill Simmons]

Lamley.

[Mallory Rubin]

Yeah, Lamley in Crescent Heights, in Sunset. We had lived in LA for I think, 18 months. My wife didn't really like it in 03, and then eventually was starting to like it. And by summer 04. Liked it. And I was at a completely different place in my life than the first time I saw it where I was dating somebody, but I had no idea where my life was going. I was living in Boston. Nine years passed. Now we're out here thinking about maybe we had a dog, thinking about maybe having a kid. And it was just a great experience. Was so excited that this movie was coming out. So it was like, man, it would be cool if they made a sequel to that. And I was like, hey, you hear they may. They're working. And then it was like, no, they're making it. And then it's like, oh, I hope they don't fuck it up.

[Chris Ryan]

Oh, yeah.

[Mallory Rubin]

And then a couple people I knew saw it and they were like, it's great. I'm like, really? It's great. And then you go. And it's like, oh, my God. Like, I remember leaving the theater being like, I don't know what to do. Let's go get coffee. It was one of those. And it still is 21 years later. Like, it still fires me up, especially the last 50 minutes. I think it's one of the great movies of that decade.

[Sean Fennessey]

Oh, absolutely. It's also just like the three of the movies, each in their unique way, you walk out and you're just like, I need. I need to talk about this movie for a really long time. I need to talk about how, you know, how my life is like that and how my life is different. And, you know, you're usually watching these with a. With a partner, you know, and you're like, it's a little. It can be a little bit tender at times, and it can be a little bit tough. But it's like.

[Mallory Rubin]

Third one.

[Chris Ryan]

Yeah. Should we all bring our spouses to the Before Midnight? Bob, what do you think?

[Mallory Rubin]

I don't know if there's going to be a third. I think people are going to be expecting the trilogy pod, and I don't think it's happening.

[Chris Ryan]

I'm there when you need me.

[Mallory Rubin]

We might be saving that for some sort of theme month. Like, we're getting divorced. Pull my intestines out of my body through my rectum month.

[Bill Simmons]

Yeah. I mean, I am at the age that those characters were at in that movie. And so I'm kind of eager to revisit it because I haven't seen it in a really long time. But it's the exact opposite feeling that this movie gives you. Also, this movie is, like, so much less ambitious structurally even, than the first one.

[Mallory Rubin]

Right. They have like, really no side characters at all.

[Bill Simmons]

No set pieces, no plot, one conversation over. It's like a one act talking. Yeah. And so you really feel like you're inside of their heads and they're giving you their inner monologues to each other.

[Chris Ryan]

Right.

[Bill Simmons]

Which is. I mean, there are very, very few movies that are able to accomplish this. Like, people don't usually try it because it's not usually cinematic.

[Mallory Rubin]

Well, the other thing. So they're also playing off the first movie, which was so ambitious and works. And then they're like, well, how do we top that? And they basically just run it through. It's almost like the Goodfellas nightclub walking in the Copacabana scene. And they're just trying to do that as the movie.

[Chris Ryan]

Yeah.

[Mallory Rubin]

But watching how nervous they are around each other and how the barriers start coming down and by the time they get into the limo now, it's just like, fuck it, I'm just gonna.

[Chris Ryan]

Incredible.

[Mallory Rubin]

I have no more secrets. I'm just gonna tell you what I think now. And by the time we get to the apartment, you just watch these. I've never had an experience like that with a movie.

[Chris Ryan]

Well, it's like the sensation that you were describing of the anxiety you brought to the encounter of seeing the film. Like, there's a very meta quality to that. You know, you watch Before Sunrise and it is for us as viewers what they are for each other. It's this like, magical moment in time. And then you think about it and you long for it and you wonder if anything else can live up to it or match it. And then, of course, you would be nervous in the first moments of, like, that return. I mean, structurally the way that the entire movie is just basically when you remove the opening and end credits. It's a 75 minute conversation that takes place over a handful of locations. And it's. All three of the movies are very talky, but this one is particularly talky. And that feels so perfect because they're all really true to life. But that aspect just feels like if you spent nine years thinking about whether you would see this person again, and then you did. I love when they start debating the state of the world and it's like, guys, you don't have time for this. You need to figure out if you're supposed to be together. But of course, that's what you would do, both because you're. You're sort of trying to, like, delay and evade the. Where the fuck were you? That Jesse finally builds up the courage to. To say out loud well, he says.

[Sean Fennessey]

It, like, in a couple of different ways.

[Chris Ryan]

Inching toward the thing they've been waiting to say to each other for nine years.

[Sean Fennessey]

And.

[Chris Ryan]

And that just feels very true to what the experience would be.

[Sean Fennessey]

Can I just read something that Linklater said? That's basically exactly what Mal was just talking about. He was talking to Filmmaker magazine when this came out. And he said to me, the tone is different. The visual style is even more minimal. And in the first one, there is a much greater time span. And they were actively seeking out Vienna. They had all that possibility and a lot of time to kill. That was night, too. Very romantic and full of mystery and possibility. This one was just the opposite. This one's daytime. They've both got earthly obligations. We're in a town that she lives in. We're in a town that he's basically working in. He's got real life appointments. He's gotta leave for the airport in 80 minutes. So the tone is very real world. And because it's sort of a document of real time, I wanted it to be a, quote, eloquent documentary. And I thought that was such a beautiful summary of what he accomplished in that.

[Bill Simmons]

That is how it plays, but with incredible oners moving through Paris, which is really hard to pull off, but also seems effortless when you're watching it.

[Mallory Rubin]

There's three different themes going on, I think. And one is that what happens if you have a second chance with somebody. The second one is, how do people change over the course of a decade, from their 20s to their 30s, which I think they nail with this. And then the third one, which I think she does a really good job talking about, is like. She's talking about all these relationships she's had and how each one took something out of her. Right. So when you're idealistic, when you're 23 and then nine years later and she'd been in some things, and these people that she was with took little things from her that she can't get back, and what do they do with them? And even that whole road she went down, I was like. So I was like, I don't. This is never in a movie. What happens? Like, you have these little pieces of yourself that you give to people. I mean, everyone who's ever dated a bunch of people thinks about that.

[Chris Ryan]

Sure.

[Mallory Rubin]

It's like these. They're not gifts, whatever. These things that somebody else is just storing, you're never gonna get them back.

[Chris Ryan]

She's talking about them in this point in her life, less as gifts than as like robberies.

[Sean Fennessey]

Yeah.

[Mallory Rubin]

Right, right.

[Chris Ryan]

She feels like she's violated by something that she has given another person and then no longer has. Obviously specifically with Jesse, like, one of the really heart wrenching moments of the movie is when she says, basically, I had this, like, life altering night with you, and then you took everything with you and I didn't have it anymore. Right. And the. The way that she speaks in general. I mean, obviously you guys, I thought, did a beautiful job in the first pod of talking about this idea of, like, are you a romantic or are you a cynic? Really? They're both. Both. And part of what makes the trilogy this great treatise on love and like, evolution inside of a relationship is they move across the movies, but they move inside of the movies as well. And so when she's talking about how she would prefer to be alone because, like, that's actually better than being lonely with somebody you've chosen to share your.

[Sean Fennessey]

Love life with, which is what's happening to Jesse.

[Chris Ryan]

Yeah. And Right. So of course he understands that keenly, but he's also like, whoa, whoa, whoa, hold on. You just said you can love and you want to be loved. She's like, right. And that's actually why I'm pissed, because you made me remember that I used to feel that way.

[Mallory Rubin]

Yeah, yeah.

[Chris Ryan]

Like the beauty and the devastation of that are inextricable from each other.

[Mallory Rubin]

But is it dead inside or is it dormant? And that's the other thing. And obviously it's just dormant because it comes back to life. Can we talk about Julie Delpy, though? Because we were three guys who all had a crush on her. Talk. You're better in the first podcast, but we didn't have the female perspective on that character in the first movie. Now the second one, did you notice? So let's hear it.

[Bill Simmons]

I don't know what you mean. I felt like I adequately represented the female perspective in my discussion of her.

[Mallory Rubin]

Let's hear the female perspective on Julie Delvey.

[Sean Fennessey]

Did Khalil Shakir get mentioned more than Julie Delvey on the McMorris sunrise?

[Mallory Rubin]

Now, we talked about her a lot.

[Bill Simmons]

We did.

[Mallory Rubin]

But your take on that, I mean.

[Chris Ryan]

She'S an all timer. She is an absolute all timer. Just a queen and an icon. Everything that she does in all three of the films is perfect. I know I'm not really supposed to talk about the third movie, but I think I'll find that challenging.

[Mallory Rubin]

We're trying to confine it to this. Don't we have to save it for Pull my intestines through my rectum.

[Sean Fennessey]

You can only talk about the sponsored by Madness, not about Return of the King.

[Bill Simmons]

It'll be human. Centipede saw Five Before Midnight.

[Chris Ryan]

I mean, she's the best. And, like, part of the reason that they are so well matched is because they are, like, both utterly distinct, but also share this unique blend of, like, humor and charm and doubt and yearning. Like, the yearning that they're both. It's just emanating off of them in waves and ripples. It's, like, almost unbearable. I was so glad that you two both picked the listening booth as the most rewatchable scene. Cause that is, like, genuinely maybe my favorite movie scene ever.

[Mallory Rubin]

Wow.

[Chris Ryan]

Like, period. And the way that they're looking at each other and looking away from each other and how you can feel this, like, crackling desire when you pour ahead nine years to this movie and they're in the car together and you have the evolution of that. He turns and he turns to try to touch her hair, but then can't. And then he's looking out the window, talking, and she reaches for the. To cup the back of his head, but then can't. It's like they are both able to convey something that is, like, so specific to their characters, but feels like just a part of their harmony together. It's perfect. The reason that we have to do Midnight, though, is not only because. Hot take. That's the best movie in the trilogy. But, oh, my God.

[Sean Fennessey]

Way to go, Luke Wilson. Hell, yeah.

[Bill Simmons]

Because, I mean, they're all in that category.

[Chris Ryan]

They're all perfect. They're all perfect. My favorite one, genuinely, is the one I happen to be watching at that moment. But I think I admire that one the most. And we need to do the pause so that we can talk about the moment when they go into the little Byzantine church and she is like, sorry, am I not supposed to talk about blowjobs in a church? And he's like, yeah, you probably shouldn't. And then she does this. Gotta do the movie just for that.

[Sean Fennessey]

I'm so glad you're sitting on the couch.

[Bill Simmons]

The thing that seemed more clear to me as I watch the movies again is that it's very purposely like a seesaw experience for how they see the world. That in the first film, Selene is much more openly romantic and idealistic. And that he is relying on his cynicism as a shield. But also, you can tell that he believes some things. You mentioned how he talks about his parents in the first film, and that that is a defining mode for him. And then in this film, to your point about what's been taken from me by these men who are no longer with me or that line that she has about, you know, I'm the girl that guys date before they get married. And there's like a wounded quality to her in this movie. And then in the third film she's extremely severe and blunt and hurt. And in the third film you can feel him trying to hold on to the hope of the future. And in this movie they feel like the seesaw is even. They're both know that they need change, that there's still the possibility for something, that they probably need each other in a very specific way. And I don't know if that equilibrium is part of what makes it so exciting for me, but it's. It's a perfect middle point for this story and kind of relates to maybe why they didn't do a 4 4th one.

[Mallory Rubin]

Well, the big picture is the first one is about the idealism of everything.

[Sean Fennessey]

Yeah.

[Mallory Rubin]

And this one is. Is kind of like when you've had. You've had some experiences, good and bad, is it actually better because you appreciate a little bit more. Kind of like how Mal didn't win the Super bowl for 10 years and now she'll appreciate it more.

[Bill Simmons]

Yeah. The next time it happens on Joe Flacco's name.

[Mallory Rubin]

There's been some losses, some pieces taken from you. But it is, it is interesting. Like what's, what's better?

[Chris Ryan]

Terrible.

[Mallory Rubin]

I would argue that it's still being in that first before sunrise phase of like the world is wide open. I don't really know. I haven't really been hurt yet. I still believe in all these things as a better place to be. But this is also a really interesting place too.

[Sean Fennessey]

Yeah. You know, I was thinking about the line in the first one in Sunrise where Jesse is talking about how he still feels like he's the 13 year old boy and she feels like. I feel like I have the soul of an old woman. And how much they change between the first and the second one. The way you guys are talking about where she becomes obviously so much more cynical and then something about what happened to him in Vienna makes him so much more of a dreamer and idealistic. But the thing that's so amazing about these movies is the way that they experience this transference from those nights together and those days together and so that they obviously change another so much.

[Mallory Rubin]

This is my second favorite movie sequel ever. I actually went through everything to make sure that was true. Porky's 2, Godfather 2 is pretty cool.

[Sean Fennessey]

Den of Thieves, Pantera. Yeah, Okay.

[Mallory Rubin]

I can't put anything over Godfather 2.

[Chris Ryan]

Fair.

[Mallory Rubin]

But it's on that short list. I had Terminator 2, Aliens, Maverick, Dark Knight, which I think counts as a sequel. I'm talking about official sequels, not like the fourth movie in a thing. We were following up this movie with this one, which I think goes wrong most of the time. And it's either we didn't get, you know, one person that we thought from the previous movie we couldn't get them, or it's just like, ah, we're just. This is a money grab. This is like a true sequel in every respect, which. It's weird. It just. Why is it so hard to pull off?

[Bill Simmons]

It's. Well, I think part of what we talked about with Sunrise that is so powerful is that the stars are the co collaborators, the co conspirators of the story. And this movie, more than any, which I'm sure we'll get into, it just feels like they have suffused so much of the story with their personal lives. So this doesn't feel like a Lord of the Rings movie where you're like, oh, there's all this mythology to acknowledge and this world building and how are we gonna do it? Or, hey, we've got this precious IP that we need to make another movie for. It's just artists trying to find a new way to communicate about how they feel about the world. For whatever reason. Richard Linklater is the only filmmaker who thinks this way. Cause this isn't even the first time that they are reunited since Sunrise because they had that vignette in Waking Life. So he sees all of his characters and his stories on this continuum in a way that very few filmmakers do.

[Mallory Rubin]

Tarantino has a whiff of it, but he's never really fully committed to.

[Bill Simmons]

He does. People pointed out to me what I was trying to think of, which is who's the character who ports over in a film? And it's Ray Nicolette who's in out of Sight, and he's also in Jackie Brown. But that's just a very uncommon thing and it's very hard to pull that off. And, you know, it would be interesting to watch more filmmakers and actors try to pull this off of like, more.

[Sean Fennessey]

Small scale movies are like Michael Apted's and up series than it is the Godfather.

[Bill Simmons]

I mean, the trip movies with Coogan and Bryden are kind of like this, but they were TV series in Europe.

[Mallory Rubin]

Usually it goes the way of another 48 hours.

[Sean Fennessey]

Yeah, we've all packed some pounds on Eddie.

[Mallory Rubin]

Put on some weight.

[Sean Fennessey]

Yeah, we got you out of jail again.

[Mallory Rubin]

Smoking racist anymore.

[Sean Fennessey]

Where are we?

[Mallory Rubin]

Why did this happen? Can we talk about the Oscar piece of this?

[Chris Ryan]

Sure, yeah.

[Mallory Rubin]

We have to take a break. Let's take a break and then we'll do the Oscar piece of this. All right. So I try not to do this with every movie we do, but I found the 2005 Oscars for the 2004 season confusing when it happened because this movie was critically adored and I think I just don't really understand it. Not that we can make sense of the Oscars ever, but for Best Picture, it ended up being Million Dollar Baby One, the Aviator, Finding Neverland, Ray and Sideways were the other ones. Best director. He didn't. Didn't get that.

[Chris Ryan]

Criminal.

[Mallory Rubin]

Best Actor and best Actress not nominated.

[Chris Ryan]

That actually doesn't make sense.

[Mallory Rubin]

So Best Actor, Jamie Foxx wins for Ray, Don Cheadle, Hotel Rwanda, Johnny Depp, Finding Neverland, Leo in the Aviator and Clint Eastwood and A Million Dollar Baby. I'm positive Ethan Hawke was one of the best. Five performances. Best actress, Hilary Swank, Annette Bening being Julia, Catalina, Sandino Moreno, Maria Full Grace, Imelda Staunton and Vera Drake and Kate Winslet in Eternal Sunshine. I feel like Julie could have snuck in there.

[Bill Simmons]

If there were 10 nominees like there are now, this obviously would have gotten in. It's also more along the lines of the kind of movie that we get in nowadays. This is in the halcyon days of big. These are all studio movies that are nominated for best Picture. Million Dollar Baby, the Aviator, Finding Neverland, Ray Sideways, all from major studios. They all have very powerful campaigns behind them. And this was a much, much smaller movie by comparison.

[Mallory Rubin]

I just don't know how many actors could have been in those parts. And especially what Julie Delpy has to do in this movie.

[Sean Fennessey]

Yeah.

[Mallory Rubin]

Which I think is. I think she has the harder part in this movie because she's all over the place and you have to pull it off without seeming like you're nuts. Cr. Which Julie Delpy. Which Selene were you more attracted to Before Sunrise? Selene or Before Sunset? Celine. Cause I think it says a lot about.

[Sean Fennessey]

It's Sunset says a lot about us.

[Mallory Rubin]

Because I was more attracted to Sunset Celine.

[Sean Fennessey]

Yeah.

[Mallory Rubin]

I think that says a lot about me.

[Bill Simmons]

What does it say?

[Mallory Rubin]

That it was just more interesting. She was crazier.

[Chris Ryan]

No. No smoking cigs.

[Mallory Rubin]

It's like she lit that cigarette.

[Bill Simmons]

I was like.

[Mallory Rubin]

This movie did get nominated for an Oscar for best adapted Screenplay.

[Bill Simmons]

And it's adapted because it's a sequel. And all sequels need to go into the adapted category.

[Mallory Rubin]

I forgot about that rule.

[Bill Simmons]

I read about it when we were researching this. I guess I had known it. I think it would have been very tough to win in either of these categories because it's the year of Eternal Sunshine, which is like a masterpiece screenplay, and Sideways, which was a phenomenon, and people really love that spike in.

[Mallory Rubin]

By the way, this was a kickass movie year. Yeah, there's a lot of good stuff from this year. Like, even from the comedy side, like Anchorman was this year, there's a bunch of. Bunch of horror movies. Like, I was surprised going through it because in the moment where, like, movies suck now. What's wrong with movies now? Like, I would take half of 2004.

[Bill Simmons]

I would be hard pressed to think of a movie that came out this year that I like more than the one we're talking about today. This is probably this. Probably if I was doing that list back then in 25 or 24 in 2004.

[Sean Fennessey]

Yeah.

[Mallory Rubin]

$2.7 million budget made 15 million. Our guy Raj, he let us down in the previous three star Raj. Tough, he said, to understand these boring gen X people. 3.5 stars for this one. He said it was a remarkable celebration of the fascination of good dialogue. But Before Sunset is better. That's what he said. Before Sunrise. Before Sunset is better because the characters are older and wiser. They have more to lose or win. And perhaps because Hawke and Delpy wrote the dialogue themselves, the film has the materials for a lifetime project like the 7up series.

[Chris Ryan]

Exactly.

[Mallory Rubin]

This is a conversation that could be returned to every 10 years or so as Celine and Jesse grow older.

[Chris Ryan]

And yet Raj was ready for Before Midnight. He gets it. Well, so far they don't have to stick to the nine year thing forever. Right? That was nice.

[Bill Simmons]

But if you're putting Before Midnight one is Sunset two or so.

[Chris Ryan]

My answer honestly is like, a little complicated. Which is genuinely. Whichever one I'm watching in real time is my favorite because they're all perfect. So, like, whichever one you're with, you're like, of course this is the best one.

[Sean Fennessey]

Yeah.

[Chris Ryan]

Right.

[Sean Fennessey]

I think people probably fire Sunset up the most. Right.

[Mallory Rubin]

I think Sunset's the best.

[Chris Ryan]

I do too. The case for Sunrise, in addition to everything you guys talked about, is just. It's the only one that exists in a vacuum. So that's like a special thing, right.

[Sean Fennessey]

Where they didn't know, like, anything about what was happening.

[Bill Simmons]

Yeah, good point.

[Mallory Rubin]

Yeah. Sunrise gets the Degree of difficulty because they're starting from scratch.

[Chris Ryan]

Yeah.

[Sean Fennessey]

Yeah.

[Mallory Rubin]

It's a premise that probably shouldn't have worked.

[Chris Ryan]

Yeah.

[Mallory Rubin]

We're not gonna get producer Craig's feelings on the trilogy yet.

[Chris Ryan]

Did you watch the whole trilogy?

[Mallory Rubin]

No, I just want your feelings on this.

[Producer Craig]

I won't be watching before midnight.

[Mallory Rubin]

80 minutes. 80 minutes. For the second one, did you, like. Did you pass out? Were you delirious?

[Producer Craig]

Yeah. It was shorter than, like, most TV finales.

[Chris Ryan]

Yeah. Oh, definitely.

[Mallory Rubin]

Could you, like, believe it, that it was 80 minutes?

[Producer Craig]

You rarely see sub 90 these days if you see an 8 in front of the runtime.

[Chris Ryan]

I know. It's astonishing.

[Mallory Rubin]

It's so short. I almost had that. For what stage? The worst. Like, I kind of wanted, like, six more minutes. We got, like, 86.

[Bill Simmons]

As soon as they get in the back of the car, I'm like, oh, my God, is this almost over?

[Mallory Rubin]

No.

[Chris Ryan]

Yeah. Yeah.

[Mallory Rubin]

But it's almost like the movies never do this anymore, but they want you leaving.

[Bill Simmons]

Wanting more.

[Mallory Rubin]

Wanting a little bit more.

[Bill Simmons]

Yeah, absolutely.

[Chris Ryan]

You're racing against the clock just like they are.

[Mallory Rubin]

Yeah. As soon as they get in the limo, it is kind of. They get off the Paris boat, and it's like, oh, my God, this movie's got, like, 18 minutes left.

[Chris Ryan]

Yeah.

[Bill Simmons]

It's amazing.

[Mallory Rubin]

What is the exact perfect age to see this movie? C.R.

[Sean Fennessey]

I have. After you're married, so whatever age that is. Yeah.

[Mallory Rubin]

What do you think, Mal?

[Chris Ryan]

I think I agree. Part of the beauty of the trilogy to me is just that you can age with them and you bring a different perspective to them when you revisit them. But the case for this, for me, the case for this one is the best is building off the line from Sunrise. The answer must be in the attempt. This is about the attempt. Every movie, all three of them, hinge on some sort of choice for them. But this is the one where they make the most active choice. Jesse wrote this book hoping Selene would find him. Selene went to the bookstore hoping that she would get to see him. Like, they really chose to try to rediscover each other.

[Mallory Rubin]

CR Went on off the pike, opened the cross. Bloomberg Comics.

[Chris Ryan]

Exactly.

[Sean Fennessey]

I was like, I'd love to talk Selene, but I got a due press box.

[Mallory Rubin]

Did I hear you on the 25th anniversary of NOMA?

[Chris Ryan]

Like, you can only, I think, really understand that perspective. If you're a little bit older and.

[Mallory Rubin]

Have, I think you have to be at least early 30s and either marry, you have to have, like, a couple.

[Sean Fennessey]

Of relationships under your belt. You need some fantasy. What do you think, though?

[Mallory Rubin]

You need a basketball reference page with some seasons in it.

[Sean Fennessey]

Yeah. Gotta have a couple of nicknames.

[Bill Simmons]

It's so. I mean, you know my personal history, obviously, I'm married to the girl that I was dating in high school. I saw this movie with her in a movie theater. I vividly remembered. It was right after we graduated from college. We both moved to New York together. We saw it at the Angelica. I had misremembered it when I was talking to her about it, but she remembered it cold. She remembered the entire experience. You know, there's that train that runs right next to the Angelica, so if you sit in there, it shakes the seats.

[Mallory Rubin]

Oh, I like that.

[Bill Simmons]

And it was such a memorable movie going experience. We both loved it. We went out, we did the thing you talked about. We went out and had coffee. We talked about it for hours. We'd already loved Sunrise together. But if you look at it in one way, it's a real cautionary tale movie if you see it in your 20s. And I think I internalized that probably, that. That sort of. Because what Jesse says in this movie, which is something that a lot of people think that are married, is chilling. I mean, there is a horror movie quality to a lot of that confession that happens in the final 15 minutes.

[Chris Ryan]

Running a nursery.

[Bill Simmons]

Yes, running a nursery with someone I used to date.

[Chris Ryan]

Yeah.

[Bill Simmons]

And I mean, the writing is brilliant in this movie, but they both get to say things that people think and do not ever verbalize. And it. So it kind of like.

[Mallory Rubin]

It's almost like if somebody hugged me, I'd dissolve into molecules.

[Bill Simmons]

But, like, the movie is almost like a challenge if you're in a relationship too, where it's like, make sure this is what you want. Because you could turn out like these people who are 32 and are at the edge of their own sanity because of the choices that they made.

[Chris Ryan]

This is so interesting. I feel like this is our version of the conversation in the bookshop about, like, it's a test for you whether you thought they showed up six months later. Like, are you the romantic, the cynic, or undecided? Because, like, I definitely think that's true. But I also think you could view it the other way. It's like, it can be affirming that you don't run out of Runway. Like, you can make your way back.

[Sean Fennessey]

It's just that pregnant moment where it's like, I'm your Jesse.

[Producer Craig]

Right?

[Sean Fennessey]

Like, there's a Jesse out there. You were, like, still thinking about.

[Bill Simmons]

Yeah, yeah.

[Mallory Rubin]

I Actually disagree with my friend Sean. I think this is an optimistic movie. Well, I think. I think it ultimately is. Like, a lot of weird shit can happen and you could give up and think that the moment passed, but sometimes it. It doesn't and you still have a chance.

[Bill Simmons]

I. I think you're right. Ultimately in the movie is ultimately on.

[Mallory Rubin]

But I see what you're saying about, like, the. This really lays out the baggage that can happen.

[Chris Ryan]

Yeah.

[Mallory Rubin]

With some bad choices.

[Bill Simmons]

You know, it's. It's child of divorce. You know, probably, like, how can I not be thinking about Henry when I'm watching this movie?

[Sean Fennessey]

Movie. He would probably say, you're both right.

[Chris Ryan]

Yeah.

[Sean Fennessey]

Because there are multiple realities where Jesse. Where Celine just gets the day wrong and doesn't go to the bookstore. And Jesse's. His life goes on, you know, and that's the whole point.

[Mallory Rubin]

The flip side of that is if the grandmother doesn't die, she's in Vienna.

[Sean Fennessey]

Well, the flip side of that is that if the German couple aren't arguing on the train, they never meet in the first place. Right. It's just like the whole thing.

[Mallory Rubin]

That's what's great about this movie. Yeah. There's 40 different points that this could have gone bad.

[Bill Simmons]

That's true.

[Mallory Rubin]

Most rewatchable scene, Jesse in the bookstore. Just gonna start there. I weirdly really like the press conference of this random book because it's so absurd it would never happen in real life.

[Bill Simmons]

Please, please tell me what the Book of Basketball version of this was for you. Please.

[Mallory Rubin]

It didn't exist. Like, be in Paris. Like, just doing. Like that. Get the hands going. Here's the thing about Kareem, that a lot of people didn't realize this would just never happen. But I like watching Ethan Hawke just be full Ethan Hawke, just doing Ethan Hawke stuff. Doing the. It's like my grandfather said to answer that, take the piss out of everything. Slightly overreacting, but I'm sorry.

[Sean Fennessey]

Someone's like MJ or LeBron Bill. It's like Grandma.

[Mallory Rubin]

I like how into it that one reporter is too, where she's a little, like, a little sweet on Jesse. Sure.

[Chris Ryan]

Oh, yeah. I mean, how could you not be?

[Mallory Rubin]

But then watching her, the way they're using the flashback, I just think that scene is so well directed. Cutting back and forth with the new one. And then it's that part when they're memorizing each other's face from the first movie. They're flashing back to that. And then it cuts right to her now, and it's like, oh, My God, so good.

[Sean Fennessey]

It's also like the same cinematic language of the end of the first one, which is the montage of the places they were.

[Mallory Rubin]

Yeah.

[Sean Fennessey]

And now it's like a montage of who they were. And it's just like, ah, shit.

[Chris Ryan]

It's so good.

[Mallory Rubin]

It's really great. And his reaction to seeing her, Everything about it, it's just great.

[Chris Ryan]

Well, also, like, the whole time he's talking to the. He's waving his hand like you see a wedding ring. You don't know.

[Mallory Rubin]

Yeah.

[Chris Ryan]

Is he married to her? Like, we do not know.

[Mallory Rubin]

I didn't even think of that. That's a good point.

[Chris Ryan]

And so there's that second when you see her, and she could just be like the proud wife who's there watching her husband.

[Bill Simmons]

He reacts, though.

[Chris Ryan]

But the second you see his face and he's just, like, melting, there's a.

[Bill Simmons]

1.5 second pause where you're like, he's.

[Chris Ryan]

And you realize.

[Bill Simmons]

Excited and destroyed at the same time.

[Chris Ryan]

And it's like this melding of heartache and euphoria because you realize that they have not been together, but also that they're there together again. Yeah, it's amazing.

[Mallory Rubin]

Good bookstore, too.

[Chris Ryan]

Shakespeare and Company. Incredible.

[Mallory Rubin]

I basically just have the whole movie as rewatchable scenes. But we have the awkward walk.

[Julie Delpy]

Oh, no, no. You were there, weren't you?

[Mallory Rubin]

Oh, no, that's terrible.

[Bill Simmons]

Oh, no.

[Julie Delpy]

I'm laughing, but I don't mean it. Did you hate me? You must have hated me. Have you been hating me all this time? You have?

[Mallory Rubin]

No.

[Julie Delpy]

Yes, you have.

[Mallory Rubin]

No.

[Julie Delpy]

Oh, but you can't hate me now, right?

[Mallory Rubin]

I know.

[Sean Fennessey]

I mean, I don't hate you.

[Mallory Rubin]

All right, come on. It's no big deal, all right? I flew all the way over there, you blew the thing off, and my life's been a big nosedive since then. But, I mean, it's not a problem.

[Julie Delpy]

No, you can't say that. Oh, I can't believe it. You must have been so angry with me. I'm sorry.

[Chris Ryan]

Sorry.

[Julie Delpy]

I really wanted to be there more than anything in the world, I swear.

[Mallory Rubin]

Honestly.

[Julie Delpy]

I mean, you can't be angry. My grandmother.

[Mallory Rubin]

No, I know, I know. I honestly thought that something like that might have happened. Just that whole little mini roller coaster.

[Sean Fennessey]

I also love, love him being like the. The book is actually a composite of.

[Bill Simmons]

You and this other girl.

[Chris Ryan]

Gretchen. Gretchen. That's great stuff.

[Mallory Rubin]

I also like when she says, do you. You think I'm neurotic? Oh, my God, you must think I'm so. And it's like. Yeah, you're being neurotic right now. At the cafe is really good. Do I look any different? Skinnier?

[Chris Ryan]

Oh, my God, I love that part.

[Julie Delpy]

Okay, come on, tell me.

[Mallory Rubin]

Skinnier, I think.

[Producer Craig]

A little thinner.

[Julie Delpy]

Did you think I was fat before?

[Mallory Rubin]

No.

[Julie Delpy]

Yeah, you thought I was a fatty. No. You thought I was a fatty.

[Mallory Rubin]

Yeah.

[Julie Delpy]

You wrote a book about a fat French girl.

[Sean Fennessey]

No, listen, seriously, all right.

[Mallory Rubin]

You look beautiful. Do I look any different?

[Julie Delpy]

No, not at all. Oh, actually, you have this line.

[Mallory Rubin]

I know, it's like a scar. A scar.

[Bill Simmons]

You thought I was a little fat French girl.

[Mallory Rubin]

Wait. But most importantly, the cigarettes come out. Cr.

[Sean Fennessey]

I mean, we'll talk about in a minute.

[Chris Ryan]

Big moment for you.

[Sean Fennessey]

Yeah, yeah.

[Mallory Rubin]

We got. We get quotes like, desires to fuel life. They're really cooking in the cafe.

[Chris Ryan]

So good.

[Mallory Rubin]

Then we get to Celine pretends she doesn't remember having sex with them.

[Chris Ryan]

Yeah.

[Mallory Rubin]

In lines like, I remember that night better than I remember entire years. What'd you think of Jesse's six months later? Lottery winners are the same. No matter what their plight is, whether they're paraplegics or rich, they revert back.

[Sean Fennessey]

To where they were. Felt like when he died sometime. Yeah, sometime like, you know, coming up later.

[Bill Simmons]

Yeah, it's in the zone of, you know, how are there so many souls?

[Sean Fennessey]

Yeah.

[Chris Ryan]

Well, no, it just feels like another version of when he's like, you know, well, life's supposed to be hard. We have to suffer. How would we learn? It's like you just know that this is what he's been telling himself since she didn't show up at the platform.

[Mallory Rubin]

You know, it's amazing. We've become such perverts in the last nine years.

[Chris Ryan]

Oh my God.

[Bill Simmons]

Incredible.

[Mallory Rubin]

The boat ride. I don't know how the boat ride doesn't win. Most rewatchable scene, but it's not going to. Is it possible to have a bad on a boat going slowly down Paris scene? I'm trying to think of any movie that could do that.

[Producer Craig]

Right.

[Sean Fennessey]

Worry about the river being full of feces before the Olympics. You'd probably be like, this is harshing or mellow. But any other moment, this end is.

[Chris Ryan]

Just pretty much pretty good.

[Mallory Rubin]

Just don't know a single movie that could fuck that up. It's like unfuckable. Fuck upable.

[Sean Fennessey]

It's also for as much as this movie is so realistic and feels so actually a second by second document in my mind when I close my eyes, if somebody's like, what's the perfect day in Paris? It's the day they're having. And even though I know it was super hot while they were filming, it just looks like the platonic ideal of being in.

[Chris Ryan]

You just gotta throw in like a corner crepe or two.

[Sean Fennessey]

Yeah.

[Mallory Rubin]

Again, not quite enough eating in this one.

[Chris Ryan]

Yeah.

[Bill Simmons]

It's just a great way in many respects to experience the city, which is just to wander, to not be a tourist, but to just be somebody. Wandering into cafes, wandering in gardens, wandering onto a boat. It's an amazing way to experience Paris.

[Mallory Rubin]

How'd you feel about Jesse's Notre Dame story?

[Sean Fennessey]

Prescient. Yeah.

[Mallory Rubin]

Do you think that was a real story or was that another dipping into the routine?

[Sean Fennessey]

I think it might have been something he heard at a bar close in time. He's like, that's a great one.

[Bill Simmons]

He would be an unreal podcaster, though, Jesse. He's got so many takes, so many, like, apocryphal anecdotes.

[Sean Fennessey]

Can I pod with him?

[Bill Simmons]

He should be the. You guys have a good book, Jesse.

[Sean Fennessey]

Already jawing with Jesse featuring Be great.

[Mallory Rubin]

Put him on the Prestige TV pile. Breaking down severance.

[Chris Ryan]

Yeah.

[Mallory Rubin]

Then we get near the end of the boat. You want to know why I wrote that book?

[Chris Ryan]

So good.

[Mallory Rubin]

All right, now I know for sure. You want to know why I wrote that stupid book?

[Julie Delpy]

Why?

[Mallory Rubin]

So that you might come to a.

[Bill Simmons]

Reading in Paris and I could walk.

[Mallory Rubin]

Up to you and ask, where the fuck were you?

[Bill Simmons]

No.

[Julie Delpy]

You think I'd be here today?

[Producer Craig]

I'm serious.

[Mallory Rubin]

I think I. I wrote it in a way to try to find you.

[Julie Delpy]

Okay, that's. Yeah, that's not true, but that's sweet.

[Sean Fennessey]

Of you to say.

[Mallory Rubin]

I think it is true. What do you think the chances were of us ever meeting again?

[Julie Delpy]

After that December, I'd say almost zero. But we're not real anyway, right? We're just characters in that old lady's dream.

[Mallory Rubin]

We also get the line, I guess when you're young, you just believe there'll be many people with whom you'll connect with. Later in life, you realize it only happens a few times.

[Chris Ryan]

Very painful to hear.

[Bill Simmons]

I thought about this a lot. Even set aside the romantic aspect of it because there's a whole other way to think about the movie, which. Just finding people that you make that connection with. And when you get older, you really. Or at least I do, really protect myself against that. You know, like, I don't really like, over invest in long term relationships now because I think I also don't want to get hurt in the same way in Addition to being lazy and so you're like, way less open.

[Chris Ryan]

Yeah, for sure.

[Bill Simmons]

When you're young, you're like, it'd be great to get laid tonight. It'd be great to make a friend forever. It'd be great just to have fun. But as your life comes smaller.

[Chris Ryan]

Yeah.

[Bill Simmons]

These opportunities, like, they're kind of at a pretty significant pivot point here.

[Mallory Rubin]

Yeah.

[Bill Simmons]

Your early 30s is when that starts to go away. You know, when you're like, I've got my people.

[Mallory Rubin]

That's when your capacity in your nightclub starts getting cut down. You go from like a 350 person capacity to like 70.

[Sean Fennessey]

You wrote.

[Bill Simmons]

You wrote about this. I feel like.

[Mallory Rubin]

Yeah, when you hit your 40s, it turns. It's like a 25 person.

[Sean Fennessey]

It's like a invite only social club speakeasy.

[Mallory Rubin]

We also get. I feel like I'm running a small nursery with someone I used to date, man. And if someone would touch me, I would dissolve it in molecules. There's a lot of stuff going on. Plus the 11th and Broadway thing. Revelation. Tough one.

[Sean Fennessey]

That one fucks me. Like that fucks me up.

[Mallory Rubin]

Even on my way to my wedding.

[Sean Fennessey]

Yeah. And she's like, I thought I saw you. Basically as you might have seen me. I forgot when she said she lived there from 90.

[Bill Simmons]

Is this like when you saw Dana Wheeler Nicholson going to a deli in New York? I thought it was you.

[Sean Fennessey]

Edie Falco asked me for a light outside a boat in Brooklyn in 2003.

[Mallory Rubin]

Then we get to the limo, freak out when we find out what actually happened. That she was fine until she read his fucking book.

[Chris Ryan]

Magical Scene.

[Julie Delpy]

You know, it's not even that I was. I was fine until I read your fucking book. It stirred shit up, you know, it reminds. It reminded me how genuinely romantic I was. How I had so much hope in things. And now it's like, I don't believe in anything that relates to love. I don't feel things for people anymore. In a way, I put all my romanticism into that one night and I was never able to feel all this again. Like somehow this night took things away from me and I expressed them to you and you took them with you. It made me feel cold, like if love wasn't for me.

[Mallory Rubin]

I don't believe that. I don't believe that I put all my romanticism into that one night. And then you took it with you. Yeah, it's really, really playing all the hits for Mal.

[Chris Ryan]

That seems incredible.

[Mallory Rubin]

Then he has the good joke. I'm happy to see you Even if you become an angry, manic depressive activist. Little comedy in there.

[Chris Ryan]

Oh, yeah, always.

[Mallory Rubin]

Really some great takes on an unhappy marriage where you really, for the full depths, like, oh, man, this guy. And when he says the thing about it's all worth it because he doesn't want to give up one minute with the kid or whatever that line is, and it's like, yeah, there's a million people like that who are like, you know what? I'll suffer the rest of this because I don't want to miss anything with this child that I created.

[Chris Ryan]

It's so sad because then he goes right into like. But there's no joy or laughter in my home.

[Mallory Rubin]

Yeah.

[Chris Ryan]

It's like, I don't want to get to 52 and finally have to, like, admit that this was all a pretense and I don't love my spouse.

[Bill Simmons]

Yeah.

[Chris Ryan]

Very tough to hear. Very painful.

[Mallory Rubin]

Then she's like, wait, I'll get sadder than this. After she almost touches his head.

[Chris Ryan]

But then he says that he's had sex 10 times in four years. So it's like, he's doing great.

[Mallory Rubin]

Yes. Put that thing away.

[Bill Simmons]

Yeah.

[Chris Ryan]

He's driving. Boy, that's exhausting.

[Mallory Rubin]

Yeah.

[Bill Simmons]

How do you not have 10 kids?

[Sean Fennessey]

The.

[Bill Simmons]

The thing about this scene, to me, which is my favorite scene in the movie by far, and I think is one of the most incredibly well written scenes in, like, in movie history.

[Mallory Rubin]

What did they go for?

[Bill Simmons]

It feels like eight or nine minutes.

[Mallory Rubin]

Yeah, at least nine.

[Bill Simmons]

The thing I really. That really hit for me this time when I was watching it, is we actually do see a lot of scenes like this now in popular culture because everything is so therapized and people are all about finding ways to talk about your feelings, but it's done using the language of therapy. This is a scene where people are really honestly talking about how they feel, their most vulnerable feelings in the world. Like, you can. What they share together is very, very intimate. But it has none of the, like, casing of that language.

[Sean Fennessey]

This is traumatic.

[Bill Simmons]

Exactly.

[Mallory Rubin]

All of those, like, I was triggered when you weren't there.

[Bill Simmons]

All those buzzwords, all that, like, I'm signaling to you my pain. It's none of that. It's like, super fucking real.

[Mallory Rubin]

Yeah.

[Bill Simmons]

And if you think about where these two actors were at in their real lives, you can feel them putting their lives into what they're saying.

[Mallory Rubin]

Well, we should mention that he's getting divorced from Uma Thurman. What was going on with her?

[Bill Simmons]

I think that they were just raising young kids. And that they were both working people and that they were falling out of love in a way.

[Sean Fennessey]

But what was going on with Delpy?

[Bill Simmons]

Well, she's been married a couple of times now. She has. Has had many boyfriends over the years. And I think because she was such an ingenue in Europe and such a kind of like desired woman, because she had such fame in the movie culture that I think she always had a complicated relationship to the way that she was viewed versus how she viewed herself. And so if you look at her career now, she's directed eight movies. She's written a lot of those movies. She's more than what she was presented as basically when she was a teenager and was kind of a lust object. And so I think she is bringing all of those feelings into what she wrote in that sequence too. So it's just. It's very painful and very impactful, but just feels very true.

[Chris Ryan]

Yeah.

[Mallory Rubin]

The good news is she's not a lust object anymore. And nobody was online last night looking for photos of her smoking to send a cr. I didn't do that at all. Respond with and he did not respond. That never happened. She's not a lust.

[Sean Fennessey]

Call from the Google image search Julie Delpy.

[Mallory Rubin]

That never happened. There's no evidence that any of those moments happened.

[Bill Simmons]

Was that on your Air Gap iPad that you use for all Delpy materials?

[Sean Fennessey]

That's the one where all my off the pike research happens there.

[Mallory Rubin]

She also says, I think I might have given up on the whole idea of romantic love. I might have put it to bed that day when you weren't there. Because she's like, how do I trump this guy baring his soul to me? I'm gonna just, just say I'm dead inside. That's where we land as we head to the last 15 minutes of the movie. We get a walk, we get the song Nina Simone and we get. Baby, you're going to miss this plane. Oh, yeah.

[Julie Delpy]

Baby, you are going to miss that plane.

[Mallory Rubin]

I know.

[Chris Ryan]

Yeah, man.

[Mallory Rubin]

So it's either between the limo or the end of the movie for me. I. I would go with the ending just because I think it's one of the best last 15 minutes of movie ever. And the song is just. Especially the first time you see this movie. This song is like just one of the breathtaking.

[Bill Simmons]

When she sings to him, when she.

[Mallory Rubin]

Sings the Walt song. It's one of the great moments of this century in a movie.

[Julie Delpy]

You meant for me much more than anyone I've met before. One single night with you, little Jesse Is worth a thousand with anybody. I have no bitterness, my sweet. I'll never forget this one night thing.

[Mallory Rubin]

Like. And she's so good at performing it. And it's incredible, just the lyrics and everything. The whole movie leads up to that moment and then it, like, crushes it. It's like a sports scene.

[Chris Ryan]

Yeah. And again, it's just something about it that feels so true. If you have never written a love song for somebody you then thought about and yearned for for nine years, you can't relate to that part of it. But the, like. She's so. Embarrass. Embarrassed. Right. She's so embarrassed.

[Mallory Rubin]

She's almost more than good at it. That's the thing.

[Chris Ryan]

Yeah. Like, it's a very natural continuation of the car scene because there's this, like, unburdening.

[Mallory Rubin]

Yeah.

[Chris Ryan]

I'm not just singing this. I'm finally singing this to the person it was about. I would pick the car ride as the most rewatchable scene and the best scene, but the single best moment in the movie, other than, I guess, on the bench when she's like. What do you think of the word pussy? It's like, I love it. Other than that is his face when she says his name.

[Mallory Rubin]

Yeah.

[Chris Ryan]

It is unbelievable.

[Bill Simmons]

He, like, widens his eyes. Yeah. She makes a lot of great facial gestures while she's singing where she's, like, rolling her eyes at herself.

[Chris Ryan]

Yeah.

[Bill Simmons]

She's trying to remember, but then she remembers perfectly her, like, anxiety about saying the word Jesse that is communicated only on her face. I mean, it's like a beautiful. It's mesmerizing. The last 20 minutes of the movie are just.

[Mallory Rubin]

Just.

[Bill Simmons]

It's. They hold you.

[Sean Fennessey]

The limo scene. Like, it. It. The her reaching out to him and not touching him. I was like. This is like when Christian Laitner hit the shot to beat Kentucky. And the crowd is going wild, but Thomas Hill is sobbing. That's me. I'm both in the crowd freaking out, but also, like, walking around crying, being like, this real. Like, to me, the way that they. Because you think about that, that's almost like. Do they do coverage? I think it's mostly an uninterrupted job.

[Mallory Rubin]

No, it's on and there's no cut, I don't think. Yeah.

[Sean Fennessey]

So just even for her to time it so that she goes for his head, I don't even know if that was, like, improv or what was she.

[Mallory Rubin]

Like about 10 seconds before she starts to do it? So she's like.

[Sean Fennessey]

I was like. That, to me, is harder than like the liquid Terminator.

[Mallory Rubin]

To act in a limo is just like, bizarre. They're moving around.

[Bill Simmons]

Yeah. You got Philippe up there. Who knows? I can't get out of my head since the moment I saw it. You go by and you go by and you go by and you go by. And the way that he delivers that story about the dream is that's the.

[Chris Ryan]

Last second he sees her.

[Sean Fennessey]

Is her going by on the train.

[Mallory Rubin]

It's a cop out. But the answer is everything from the boat on. But then if you go everything from the limo on. But if this movie's on, it's like, oh, they're in the limo. I'm gonna watch this.

[Bill Simmons]

And it's so achievable. It's 78 minutes of movie that you can just get through.

[Mallory Rubin]

I would pick the waltz as the single. The single most for me. What's the most 2004 thing about this movie? What do you have?

[Sean Fennessey]

Celine's freedom fries joke.

[Mallory Rubin]

Great one.

[Sean Fennessey]

Really good one. Globalism tapes.

[Mallory Rubin]

That's a good one.

[Chris Ryan]

That's a very top version of globalism.

[Mallory Rubin]

I was gonna say no Facebook. And how easy if it's two years later, they're hunting each other down.

[Bill Simmons]

Yeah, yeah.

[Mallory Rubin]

The fact. And I have some questions about why they couldn't have hunted themselves down in 2004. We had enough technology at that point. Point, we'd email, we'd Google, there's.

[Sean Fennessey]

Does he even know her last name?

[Chris Ryan]

No, but she knows his now. Because of the book.

[Bill Simmons]

Because of the book.

[Chris Ryan]

That's the thing.

[Sean Fennessey]

Well, he also. Didn't he say.

[Bill Simmons]

He must have known her last name. They must have exchanged full names because how would she have stumbled upon the book?

[Mallory Rubin]

You know what her last name was? Smoke show? No, I don't know.

[Bill Simmons]

Celine. Can someone translate that for us into French?

[Mallory Rubin]

What stage is the best?

[Chris Ryan]

What do you got, Mallory, for what's aged the best? I mean, everything, literally everything, obviously, the two leads and their. Just their chemistry and their involvement in imbuing their own experiences into the story. I think for me, it's time. Both the way that the movie is shot as a real time. We've got this 80 minute block until you're supposed to catch your flight. But also just in general, Linklater's interest in time, his fascination with time. This trilogy, Boyhood, is one of my favorite movies. I absolutely love that movie. He. He's now attempting to do this with Merrily We Roll Along. He's just obsessed with time and the way that they talk about time. And I love Jesse at the Book event at the opening when he's quoting Thomas Wolfe and saying, we're all the sum of the moments of our lives. Each movie being a day, a part of a day set nine years apart. It could have been 10, but it's not. Why is it nine instead of 10? It's just these little touches. It's just. I love that part of it. And then the way that the time travel is in every movie in some way. You know, like when Jesse's pitching his next book, talking about the pop song and porting across time with this link in your life. And obviously the time traveler is a character who he invokes in the first film and you know, won't spoil the return of the time traveler in the third movie, but plays a very crucial role, the idea of time travel in the third movie. So I just love the way they talk about time and the way that the movie engages with time and how, how it's. It's made. I think my other big age the best is just the restraint. Like they don't kiss in this movie. Forget fucking. The only time we see them kiss is in the flashback footage from Sunrise. And the hug because of that, when she says, I want to try something and hugs him goodbye. Like I just want to sob watching.

[Bill Simmons]

But when she's doing her little Nina Simone dance, it's like one of the sexiest scenes in movie history. Despite the fact that they're not. They're 10ft away.

[Chris Ryan]

Exactly. It's all about the longing.

[Bill Simmons]

Yeah.

[Mallory Rubin]

Do you have any.

[Sean Fennessey]

A lot of the callbacks to Sunrise, like walking through the cemetery, she says, I think when she's like, do I look like the way you remember me? He's like, I had a pretty clear picture of you. Cause he took the mental picture of her. Before they leave, Selene talking about having a 13 year old's perspective. That was Jesse's bit in the first movie. And then another. What's aged the best was Celine almost calling Notre Dame burning down. Because she's like, that'll this Notre Dame. Notre Dame will be gone one day. And almost. Almost was very sad.

[Mallory Rubin]

Wow. Yeah, that's a really good one. It's a sad one, but it's a good one. I had how they. They're talking about serious early 30s stuff as small talk. Whereas when they were in their 20s, they wouldn't have done that. They would have just been like, oh, Vienna. And you do like that idealistic stuff.

[Bill Simmons]

But it's a little bit of a crutch because they're afraid to Talk about what they really want to talk about. So it's like. It's work. It's like the state of the world. These platitudes.

[Sean Fennessey]

Like, you have such a great job.

[Bill Simmons]

Yeah, yeah. It seems like a little bit fake, a little bit forced.

[Mallory Rubin]

That's your early 30s.

[Bill Simmons]

Yeah, yeah.

[Mallory Rubin]

This is a really good one. I'm surprised one of you didn't mention it. The living in New York at the same time with somebody else and not realizing they were there.

[Sean Fennessey]

Yeah.

[Bill Simmons]

Yah.

[Mallory Rubin]

Big city thing. Big T. Yeah.

[Bill Simmons]

Yossi, who we work with, we lived in New York.

[Sean Fennessey]

We are no Mal.

[Bill Simmons]

We're going to the same bars and the same shows across the street.

[Chris Ryan]

Literally across a apartment building across the street from Ben Lake Lindbergh before I knew him. True.

[Mallory Rubin]

Even being alone, it's better than sitting next to your lover and feeling lonely. Call Back to Neil McCauley. I'm not lonely. I'm alone. Definitely.

[Sean Fennessey]

What was going through everybody's mind at that time?

[Bill Simmons]

You were channeling Neil.

[Sean Fennessey]

Can I just shout out one thing that's aged the best? It's probably the hottest anyone's ever looked. Is when Delpy's on the boat on the Seine. The wind blows her blouse up for a second.

[Mallory Rubin]

Side waist.

[Sean Fennessey]

Yeah.

[Chris Ryan]

And then that comes back. Thank you for bringing.

[Sean Fennessey]

Yeah.

[Chris Ryan]

Thank you.

[Sean Fennessey]

Bill Simmons, Celtics drafted James Young fist.

[Chris Ryan]

It's perfect because they're always talking about little body parts. Like, when he mentions the dream, he's like, I touched your ankle.

[Sean Fennessey]

Yeah.

[Chris Ryan]

And you're stooped, you know, she's like, you're. You've got this, like, this line right here. It's like a scar. The red in your beard. It's these little pieces of each other.

[Mallory Rubin]

I would suffer all the torture to be there for all the minutes of his life. Was the divorce quote. That's just a good quote. Well, middle finger tricks.

[Chris Ryan]

I wonder if that will have a bearing on the third film in the trilogy.

[Mallory Rubin]

Middle finger tricks. Always been a sucker for those.

[Chris Ryan]

It's good.

[Mallory Rubin]

And I don't really like cats, but good performance by the cat. I'm not good camera.

[Chris Ryan]

I've got some flaws.

[Sean Fennessey]

No, you're not a cat guy. Or. I thought it was just more of like, you didn't mind him, but it's just. You have to.

[Mallory Rubin]

I'm a dog guy. I feel like you have to choose. I don't think you'd be choosing. Okay.

[Chris Ryan]

You don't have to choose. There's enough room in your heart to love all animals.

[Bill Simmons]

I think also the primacy of Bookstores and of the international book tour. Yeah, these are not as common, these.

[Mallory Rubin]

Things, I'm gonna say they weren't common in 2004.

[Chris Ryan]

Got some questions.

[Bill Simmons]

Oh, okay. Interesting. Yeah. So this book, not enough of a success.

[Mallory Rubin]

I think this book had to been a monster book.

[Sean Fennessey]

We can talk about that.

[Chris Ryan]

That's like literally my.

[Bill Simmons]

This book is not about the NBA, mind you. This is a story that can be translated.

[Mallory Rubin]

It said it's a bestseller.

[Sean Fennessey]

A minor bestseller.

[Chris Ryan]

Minor, minor.

[Mallory Rubin]

So that means like New York Times extended list. It's like number 22. Just don't think he's getting a European book tour.

[Chris Ryan]

Yeah, but what if like the only picking it on the entire movie.

[Bill Simmons]

What if he's big in France? Like we do have American artists, but there's a lot of trans.

[Sean Fennessey]

There's more journalists there there than there are fans.

[Chris Ryan]

And he says, he says it's 10 cities in 12 days.

[Mallory Rubin]

What's the big newspaper in Paris?

[Sean Fennessey]

Le Mond.

[Mallory Rubin]

The Lamond editor is like, hey, who do we have going down to the bookstore for Jesse Wallace?

[Sean Fennessey]

No, no, that's not enough.

[Mallory Rubin]

He's number 24 on the extended bestseller.

[Sean Fennessey]

I need one person who believes in cynicism, one person who's on fire downtown.

[Mallory Rubin]

Do we want someone cover that? No, no, we need to be at the bookstore. Great shot. Gorder Award most cinematic shot. What do you got, Sierra?

[Sean Fennessey]

There is a moment on the. On the boat ride on the Seine where he's got his face, he's facing the camera, but he's looking at her. She's looking out off the boat and the sun is like illuminating her hair. It's like a halo. And you're just. I don't know how they did that, how they caught it, how that happened. Happened.

[Bill Simmons]

He said that they only shot at the same time of day every day, which is crazy.

[Chris Ryan]

Then when you consider it was only a 15 day shoot.

[Bill Simmons]

Yeah.

[Chris Ryan]

They had to nail everything.

[Bill Simmons]

You get the impression this was a very difficult movie to make, despite how modest it is.

[Mallory Rubin]

I, I actually like the very, very ending for most cinematic shot that she's dancing and turning and it just. The way it fades out is really.

[Bill Simmons]

Yeah, yeah.

[Mallory Rubin]

You don't know if the movie's done yet. And then it's like, no, no, not only we're done, we're.

[Bill Simmons]

One scene that I love is when they're showing up to her apartment for the first time and they're walking in and the woman comes out the doorway, which is her real life mother. And the camera turns and for one of the only times in the whole movie the camera is not on one of them and it's on the courtyard. And you see that there's this meal, this sort of barbecue that's happening and her real life father is there cooking. And it is a 5 second snapshot of what it would be like to live here. And you just understand everything immediately. And it's like incredible.

[Mallory Rubin]

You can see Tony storytelling.

[Bill Simmons]

But that's like he never takes us away from them except for that one moment.

[Mallory Rubin]

Yeah, that's interesting. You're right.

[Bill Simmons]

It's a weird but a cool choice that they make.

[Mallory Rubin]

Kid Cudi, Pursuit of Happiness. Aware. Best needle drop's gotta be the Nina Simone song because it's the only needle drop.

[Sean Fennessey]

But it inspired by your speculation in the last pod about 94 songs or 95 songs that they could have picked. It is really funny to imagine Jesse putting Drop it like It's Hot by snoopon. You heard this? Neptune's produced this. These guys are great. They're doing amazing stuff with hip hop production. Now Tim Bland.

[Chris Ryan]

Oh, my God.

[Bill Simmons]

Then I really would've devoted it to Jesse.

[Sean Fennessey]

Yeah, but don't you think then Celine's like, cool, get in your fucking limo.

[Mallory Rubin]

Right. Dennis Benny Horde scene, stealing location. We don't always give this one out, but I really liked her apartment complex, that whole building. Everything was neat.

[Chris Ryan]

It was great.

[Bill Simmons]

When they're driving in, he's like, you live here. He's so blown away by how beautiful it is.

[Mallory Rubin]

We don't get to give this one out either. That much. The Mallory Rubin Award. Did this movie need a better sex scene?

[Chris Ryan]

No, it's the rare possibly only maybe I've said once before. No, I think. No, it's perfect. The fact that you are experiencing the same.

[Bill Simmons]

Does the sandlot need a better sex scene?

[Chris Ryan]

I don't know if that category made it into the sandlot pod.

[Mallory Rubin]

Yeah, I don't think I stuck.

[Chris Ryan]

Oh, man. Yeah. You have to be in the same place as viewers that they are. You're just like consumed by your need. And then you leave and you wonder.

[Mallory Rubin]

We'll take a break and then CR is going to do his flex category.

[Chris Ryan]

Oh, my God.

[Mallory Rubin]

All right, CR Flex category. What do you got for us?

[Sean Fennessey]

The Sean Penn I brought my Own Pack award for excellence in on screen smoking goes to. Julie Delpy.

[Chris Ryan]

Hell yeah.

[Sean Fennessey]

Oh, at the lepure Cafe.

[Mallory Rubin]

I feel like she didn't smoke enough.

[Sean Fennessey]

Well, nobody smokes enough in these movies. But knowing that Julie Delpy, there's a not so long ago Guardian profile Of her that opens with Julie Delpy is smoking. She is constantly smoking.

[Mallory Rubin]

Yeah, I have it here. Julie Delpy smokes and smokes. She smokes so much. She should consider weari ashtrays as trinkets. It's the first two.

[Chris Ryan]

Your dream woman.

[Sean Fennessey]

Honestly. Pornography. Yeah. No, she. I love also that he gets so excited that she's smoking, has a drag, gets his own lights it off of hers. True smoker behavior. Respect.

[Chris Ryan]

Wonderful.

[Mallory Rubin]

I'm still upset that they didn't smoke in the first movie. That's fine. The Butch's girlfriend award. Wink link in the film. I mentioned this earlier. I just felt like they could have done a slightly better job of trying to find each other if this was the true love of your life and you've never been the same since it didn't work out that day. I just feel like. And by 2004, you could maybe hunt the person down.

[Bill Simmons]

You get the impression that she didn't go the extra mile.

[Mallory Rubin]

Yeah, exactly.

[Sean Fennessey]

She's pretty busy. She was in New Delhi. You know, it's not like all consuming.

[Mallory Rubin]

Pretty busy having relationships. New York.

[Bill Simmons]

She was in the United States of America for four years. Years.

[Chris Ryan]

Yeah. But didn't know his last name at that point.

[Bill Simmons]

We had. We had AOL at that time.

[Sean Fennessey]

Yeah.

[Chris Ryan]

You know how many Jesses are in Texas?

[Mallory Rubin]

I just feel like she would have known his last name by the end of spending 20 hours together in Vienna.

[Sean Fennessey]

What is his last name?

[Chris Ryan]

Wallace.

[Mallory Rubin]

Wallace. What's age? The worst? I really have nothing other than I wanted Delpy to take a couple more puffs from the cigarette. I might say it. She takes one and then really doesn't smoke it at anymore.

[Sean Fennessey]

I'm not sure to be a dick, but could we just talk this out? Could we have the meeting? Jesse's second novel idea is not good.

[Chris Ryan]

The pop song one.

[Mallory Rubin]

Oh, yeah. That idea was.

[Chris Ryan]

Hmm.

[Mallory Rubin]

That was like a bad podcast pitch.

[Chris Ryan]

I liked it.

[Bill Simmons]

And yet what he says zag for me. Fits very well into my flex category.

[Sean Fennessey]

Okay.

[Mallory Rubin]

Oh, we can do that right now.

[Bill Simmons]

So my flex category is a three way tie. It's the Dracula the Musical award for best imitation of real art. The three things that are tied are Celine's song A Waltz for a Night. The COVID of Jesse's book, which is called this Time, which looks like a real novel that you would have seen at Barnes and Noble in 2004. And the third is the answers that he gives during his impromptu press conference after his and including his quote unquote reluctance to share what he's going to say for his next novel and then immediately reveals it in full to French journalists at the end of his book tour. And the idea is super flawed and kind of stupid. And yet the way that Ethan Hawke has an amazing ability to do in being interviewed imbues it with so much quote unquote. Meaning that you're like, I might read that book.

[Chris Ryan]

It's a pre order for me. Yes, no doubt. Isn't it also absolutely no doubt that.

[Sean Fennessey]

His like in the. In like if I remember correctly, he's like his daughter who is talking to him reminds him of the girl he loses his virginity to.

[Chris Ryan]

That part is a little weird. In the proud tradition of I'm an old woman and you're a 13 year old boy. There is a little bit of oddness to it, but this is again like a through line for Jesse. You guys talked about like, did Jesse invent YouTube and live streaming like the 24 hour program idea. Then he has this pitch for the. The whole book takes place in the span of a pop song across time. You know, without getting into any of the particulars about where we find them in before midnight when he. He's. There's like a seven minute scene where he's ripping off. Here's what my next book is going to be about. And everybody has their own. And the other guy's just like, this idea doesn't make sense. And even the way you are describing it is clearly not accurate. And Jesse's like, here's why it's great. And I'm like, I side with Jesse. This is just his thing.

[Sean Fennessey]

I'm just. It's sophomore slump. That's what I'm saying.

[Bill Simmons]

Is Jesse a great artist or is he the future inventor of meta. Like he. A lot of his ideas are like kind of where we are with technology. A lot of the time they're much less having to do with bitcoin.

[Mallory Rubin]

What if I could just pay somebody. I didn't like the second novel idea. I had it in picking nits that he would just volunteer to these strangers.

[Sean Fennessey]

Yeah.

[Chris Ryan]

Workshopping it.

[Mallory Rubin]

It was probably my biggest nitpick in the movie. Because if you have an idea, the last thing you want to do is be like, what do you guys think? Because then somebody else could just write it and take it.

[Sean Fennessey]

Yeah, you never do it. That one French journalist who was being kind of a hard. Who was like, there's no way they got back together. He's just like, I will write the pop song novel. Well, this lazy American, he was kind.

[Bill Simmons]

Of the Woj on LeBron circa 2012.

[Chris Ryan]

Anyone could just like tweet about it. So that's helpful.

[Mallory Rubin]

Does anyone have a CR Thinks Luke Wilson could have been Harrison Ford. Had a stake award.

[Bill Simmons]

I do.

[Mallory Rubin]

Okay, let's hear it.

[Sean Fennessey]

CR Jesse kind of fucks over his wife and Celine fucks over her war photojournalist boyfriend who's probably in a war zone when she decides to get back together with this guy.

[Chris Ryan]

I don't know. Last night was rewatching this and I asked Adam, what do you think the lesson of the movie is? And my husband said to me, we had a very like sensible measure conversation. He's like, it's probably like try to find your first love again. And I was like, yeah. Is it like it's like okay to cheat on your spouse?

[Sean Fennessey]

I mean I just to say if you shot.

[Bill Simmons]

If you could make I'm married to.

[Sean Fennessey]

My first love before sunset. From the perspective of Jesse's wife who's home with a five year old boy waiting for him to get back from this lark of a book tour for his like kind of bestseller novel, when she knows this second novel is not going to take off because it's a stupid idea and she's like, okay, when you get back you have to take the kid for like a week. And then it's like, yeah, hey, like when, when does he make the phone call to be like, crazy thing happened, missed the flight. But like I'll jump on one in a couple of days.

[Mallory Rubin]

I think when your sex per is under 3, all bets are off.

[Bill Simmons]

There should. That should be part of the Prime Videos Amazon X ray feature is that you can see the sex per for every character on screen at any given time. A lot of depth. Yeah.

[Sean Fennessey]

I was also thinking like she in Midnight. He wants to move to Chicago to be closer to the sun. So I don't know if they're living in Chicago at the time.

[Chris Ryan]

He thinks he wants that.

[Sean Fennessey]

Okay.

[Mallory Rubin]

But he's supposed to talk about the third movie.

[Sean Fennessey]

I'm just saying there is a possibility that while Jesse's on his European tour, his wife's banging Kirk Heinrich.

[Chris Ryan]

Yeah. They're not in a good place. They're not in a good place, but they're in New York at that time. They're not in Chicago yet.

[Mallory Rubin]

Is there a deleted scene where Jesse's wife is just angrily stalking around in the airport? Because he's not, he has his plane. He wasn't on the plane.

[Sean Fennessey]

Or hysterical, like where is he?

[Chris Ryan]

I mean, I think this is a completely valid point that is One of the things about the movie that, like, it makes you complicit and kind of rooting for them to commit adultery, but, like, you were very swept up in.

[Bill Simmons]

Yeah, both things are true, right? You want to see them together. And also, he's clearly destroying Henry's life and his psyche for the rest of the.

[Chris Ryan]

This is why, like, all of that will be dealt with in the third film, right? In a way, that is.

[Mallory Rubin]

What's your hottest take?

[Chris Ryan]

All right, here's my hottest take. We haven't talked enough, obviously, about Che the cat, but it's time. And my take, I honestly don't know. This is very hot. This is a tepid take. Selene, who I love and is a very important character to me. Terrible cat mom. Terrible cat mom. She is so boastful about the fact that she just deposits every morning this beautiful creature in the mean streets of Paris just to fend for himself in the hundred degree weather. No, terrible.

[Mallory Rubin]

No. That's a hot take. But, I mean, cats are animals who would just kill rodents and different things. Bring a dead rat back into your living room and be like, look, mom.

[Chris Ryan]

My cat sleeps in my arms in bed. Dead.

[Mallory Rubin]

Your cat's like 15.

[Chris Ryan]

He's doing great.

[Mallory Rubin]

He's thriving.

[Sean Fennessey]

Watch it. That cat's gonna live forever.

[Chris Ryan]

Careful. There is a line.

[Sean Fennessey]

You can make fun of Mark Andrews. Don't talk about my cat.

[Bill Simmons]

It's a lot.

[Sean Fennessey]

Phil gets an hr.

[Bill Simmons]

I don't know if I can follow that one up. I texted this, and I think I. I think I believe it. I think the car ride scene is. I don't know if it's the best scene scene of the 2000s, but it's the scene that makes me feel the most kind of electrified when I'm watching it. And it's on a list with two other scenes that I can think of right off the top of my head, which is one, the truck flipping over in the Dark Knight, where I was like, oh, my God, like, this is so exciting and crazy when that happened for the first time. Then the other one is, yo, homie, is that my briefcase from Collateral? When Tom Cruise shoots those two guys in the street. And I was like, what the fuck? Like, holy cow. And I was so, like, just pumped up and excited. And this movie is. That scene does the same thing in a different way, obviously, but where you just can feel everything inside your body when it's happening. You're thinking really hard and you're feeling really deeply at the same time.

[Mallory Rubin]

So you're saying that should get the okay the word for when the movie goes up.

[Bill Simmons]

I think so. Yeah. Yeah, I think so.

[Mallory Rubin]

Casting what ifs. There are none. Best that guy. Word. There are none.

[Sean Fennessey]

Victor Dobchief. That his name? The guy who's Jesse's like French handler.

[Chris Ryan]

I had Dion Waiters stealth.

[Mallory Rubin]

Stealth, stealth. That guy.

[Sean Fennessey]

I'm just stealthing it up.

[Bill Simmons]

I had him in Waiters as well.

[Chris Ryan]

Yeah. Here's my waiters.

[Mallory Rubin]

7:30 at the very latest Dan Waiters award. The press tour questionnaire. The limo driver who looks like Larry Zabisco. What do you got?

[Chris Ryan]

My Dan Waiters is the guy Chris just talked about.

[Bill Simmons]

Philippe doesn't really do anything thing. No, no, he just kind of nods.

[Chris Ryan]

Yeah.

[Mallory Rubin]

Probably could have been drawn out a little more.

[Chris Ryan]

Yeah.

[Mallory Rubin]

Post script editing it's unclear.

[Bill Simmons]

What if he understands anything Jesse says?

[Sean Fennessey]

Well it's also, it's like does Fe.

[Chris Ryan]

That's an unanswerable question.

[Sean Fennessey]

Get paid either way or is his job to get Jesse to the airport?

[Bill Simmons]

Like do you otherwise he's assassinated at the end of the day or they.

[Sean Fennessey]

Right after the fade out they're about to do the deed and Philippe's like Mr. Jesse, come on, you're going to be late.

[Mallory Rubin]

Recasting couch director city. I mean we can run this back in Boston. Jesse's book tour in Boston.

[Sean Fennessey]

I'll just say that the. The idea of Jesse and Celine being in New York at the same time is. Is very intoxicating and like that idea of like what if like he's on. I mean even if you want to get crazy on his way to his wedding and he sees her and they have like a hour long that's like.

[Mallory Rubin]

A prequel post quel.

[Chris Ryan]

I think even though it's like very appropriate that this takes place in her home city, it makes sense that that would be where they discovered each other again. I really do like the idea of it being in New York because it lends then even more heft to the which continent should we build our lives in question that will loom large later? If we had actually seen them, however briefly in the States to get together, we would have had that measuring stick.

[Bill Simmons]

And we still have not seen them in the States together.

[Chris Ryan]

Right.

[Mallory Rubin]

You didn't give Celine the Edie Falco and Copland award as well for the character that became three times hotter as soon as they had a cigarette.

[Sean Fennessey]

It's not even three times hotter. He's already like non smoking heavyweight champion of the world, you know, half ass.

[Mallory Rubin]

Internet research originally link later considered a larger budget with four locations could not get the funding so they scaled it back.

[Chris Ryan]

What would that have been like? I don't really even understand that.

[Mallory Rubin]

It just feels like it completely betrays the whole point of the first two movies to be like a bigger budget. I just didn't get it either. They filmed it in Paris, obviously. Shakespeare and company is the bookstore.

[Bill Simmons]

Yeah.

[Mallory Rubin]

I've been the Puree Cafe, the Promenade, Plantier Park.

[Sean Fennessey]

Can I just tell you one thing about Le Puree cafe? It is 45 minutes walk from Shakespeare.

[Chris Ryan]

Yeah.

[Mallory Rubin]

Yeah.

[Sean Fennessey]

So it's a little bit of a movie magic going on.

[Mallory Rubin]

There's some other French stuff that I'm not going to try to say. The names including her apartment which was filmed in Cour d'etre deserve.

[Chris Ryan]

You guys have your social clip you.

[Bill Simmons]

Said you weren't going to say was.

[Mallory Rubin]

One of the hottest summers on record. 100 degree weather during the filming. And then the man and woman that Celine speaks to in the courtyard were her actual parents.

[Chris Ryan]

Yep.

[Mallory Rubin]

You can see a review of Jesse's book.

[Chris Ryan]

Yes.

[Mallory Rubin]

Next to the picture where she looks like a cross eyed baby.

[Chris Ryan]

That would have been my like this time capsule, you know best like 2003 thing about it still clipping out like things from a newspaper or magazine and taping them to your wall.

[Mallory Rubin]

The CD is Tomato Collection by Nina Simone moan. Which weirdly was recorded on June 16, 1968.

[Sean Fennessey]

Oh yeah.

[Mallory Rubin]

Apex Mountain. Hawk.

[Sean Fennessey]

Just. Can I just say one more Internet research thing? Yeah, I'm sorry. The guy who jogs past them when they're sitting in the park. There's a guy who runs past him. He's wearing a Horace Pinker T shirt. Which is a early 90s pop punk band from Arizona. Just just very link later to do that I think.

[Chris Ryan]

And very CR also.

[Sean Fennessey]

And they. They apparently were writing the final scene, the Selene's apartment scene at 3am the night before. They were still working on it.

[Mallory Rubin]

Wow.

[Sean Fennessey]

Yeah.

[Mallory Rubin]

Apex Mountain. We already did Hawk and Delpy. I think this is it for Delpy.

[Bill Simmons]

Probably.

[Chris Ryan]

Yeah.

[Bill Simmons]

Gets Academy Award nominated. This movie is a beloved classic.

[Mallory Rubin]

Paris.

[Bill Simmons]

Nope.

[Sean Fennessey]

Nope.

[Mallory Rubin]

No Paris in movies.

[Chris Ryan]

No.

[Sean Fennessey]

What's. What is it?

[Chris Ryan]

Ratatouille? Amelie?

[Bill Simmons]

Not for me. Not an Amelie.

[Chris Ryan]

Midnight?

[Sean Fennessey]

Breathless. Like yeah.

[Bill Simmons]

Any number of movies.

[Chris Ryan]

Pretty long list. Yeah.

[Mallory Rubin]

Sequels? No romantic sequels.

[Bill Simmons]

Might be maybe romantic sequels. It's a short list.

[Mallory Rubin]

Yeah.

[Bill Simmons]

Mamma Mia 2. What else is on that list?

[Mallory Rubin]

Penitentiary 10 too.

[Chris Ryan]

I'll get back to you when they make a sequel to Past Lives.

[Sean Fennessey]

Do you guys think it's Apex Mountain for film endings?

[Bill Simmons]

Oh, holy it's a huge question.

[Sean Fennessey]

I have Casablanca.

[Mallory Rubin]

Not ready to answer that.

[Bill Simmons]

It's an inverted Casablanca.

[Sean Fennessey]

There Will Be blood. Godfather, Rocky 2. Shawshank. Did you say Rocky 2?

[Bill Simmons]

Yeah, yeah. Shawshank.

[Mallory Rubin]

I think for me, it's probably Shawshank or the Shining.

[Bill Simmons]

Movies.

[Chris Ryan]

Movies set in one day. There are a lot. Draft day.

[Mallory Rubin]

Yeah, Draft Day.

[Sean Fennessey]

Bueller.

[Mallory Rubin]

This is a good movie. Set in one day. Yeah, it's definitely on the list.

[Bill Simmons]

Sony. It's like, is it. Is it supposed to be real time? I forget, is it supposed to be 78 minutes?

[Chris Ryan]

Is that about.

[Sean Fennessey]

Yeah, he's saying it's like an 80 minutes between.

[Bill Simmons]

There is some cutting where we don't actually watch them do every single move out of the cafe into the cafe.

[Mallory Rubin]

I don't know if this is Nina Simone's Apex Mountain. It's not, but you could make a case because this movie will live on for like 100 years.

[Bill Simmons]

In a weird way, she was a world famous star.

[Mallory Rubin]

No, I can't. I'm just saying, what is her Apex Mountain? Maybe it's her feeling good. Probably her posthumous Apex mountain.

[Bill Simmons]

Yeah, could be her posthumous apex mountain.

[Mallory Rubin]

I think that's a good answer.

[Bill Simmons]

There's a great documentary about her. There's a very bad biopic about her. Starring as always, Eldon.

[Mallory Rubin]

Paris. Bookstores. Paris. Boat rides in love. Those are my last three.

[Sean Fennessey]

I was gonna say, is this the best. Is this the best movie couple? Is this Apex Mountain?

[Bill Simmons]

Apex Mountain for love?

[Mallory Rubin]

Well, for love. Apex Mountain for movie couples?

[Chris Ryan]

I think so. Yes.

[Sean Fennessey]

Wow.

[Chris Ryan]

You live their lives with them.

[Sean Fennessey]

Alvy and Annie. Yo. Come on.

[Bill Simmons]

Yeah. What other Woodman characters you got on the list?

[Chris Ryan]

I think if you apply it to.

[Sean Fennessey]

The whole trilogy, the two of you are full of, you know, you were.

[Bill Simmons]

Where would you put Manhattan?

[Sean Fennessey]

Oh, cr. You're really off the reservation there.

[Mallory Rubin]

I guess this is the last rewatchables. I was trying to think like Billy Crystal, Meg Ryan.

[Sean Fennessey]

These two are way better to me.

[Mallory Rubin]

Yeah, that's what I'm just trying to think of famous couples in a movie. Movie.

[Bill Simmons]

Yeah. I think there's obviously a lot of.

[Mallory Rubin]

Oh, I know it. It's De Niro and Fonda. Jackie brown. So number two, there's a lot of.

[Bill Simmons]

Movies from the 40s that are obviously in the conversation.

[Sean Fennessey]

Ingrid Bergman. Yeah, yeah, I know.

[Bill Simmons]

I'm just.

[Sean Fennessey]

I'm just from my.

[Bill Simmons]

Was referenced, I would probably say in their first film, you know, at any hall and fair to remember, that's the one that jumps to mind, you know, Know, Casablanca is a huge One Cruiser Hanks.

[Mallory Rubin]

Can you weigh in on Cruiser Hanks?

[Chris Ryan]

So I. I don't think there's a. I enjoyed your discussion. I don't think there's a place for. For either of them in this film unless we got. That's not the point of Cruiser Hanks 4 City version. You need other characters. There aren't other characters in the movie.

[Bill Simmons]

What if they just recast Jesse with Cruz?

[Chris Ryan]

It's not something that we can.

[Mallory Rubin]

Doesn't matter. Cruise or Hanks in the Jesse part. Pick.

[Bill Simmons]

Yo, homie, is that my Celine?

[Chris Ryan]

I would go with Cruz.

[Mallory Rubin]

All right, so Cruise.

[Sean Fennessey]

Cruise story describing idea.

[Chris Ryan]

Yeah, it all takes place.

[Bill Simmons]

You go by. You go by. You go by.

[Mallory Rubin]

I would dissolve into molecules.

[Sean Fennessey]

I've had sex 10 times.

[Mallory Rubin]

Scorsese or Spielberg? What do you have, Mal?

[Chris Ryan]

It's gotta be Spielberg. I don't think you can consider Scorsese for the trilogy until before midnight.

[Sean Fennessey]

I consider considered it Scorsese.

[Chris Ryan]

Cameron Scorsese for Performing Night is very.

[Sean Fennessey]

That was the only second novel idea I had.

[Mallory Rubin]

What role would Phil Philip Seymour Hoffman have played? I read Cadbury's. Really growing. Amazing. Gotta be the limo driver.

[Chris Ryan]

How's the cheating Jesse? How's the cheat?

[Mallory Rubin]

So I have a little special mailbag interlude from Courtney C. Who writes the rewatchables Mailbag episode was fantastic. Thank you, Courtney. I was thinking about that email that suggested a female counterpart category to the Cruz versus Hanks category.

[Chris Ryan]

Yeah.

[Mallory Rubin]

How about this? Pick a Jennifer. Would the lead female role be better with Jennifer Aniston, Lawrence Lopez, Connelly Garner or Coolidge?

[Chris Ryan]

Connelly. Jennifer Kyle.

[Mallory Rubin]

Jennifer Roulette.

[Chris Ryan]

Oh, my God.

[Bill Simmons]

I didn't hear Love Hewitt in there.

[Mallory Rubin]

Then she writes. P.S. i love the podcast. Whenever you get together with CR, it always feels like I'm hanging out with the guys I grew up with. Keep up the great work.

[Sean Fennessey]

Wow, thanks.

[Mallory Rubin]

Just thanks for. Thanks for making us feel great.

[Bill Simmons]

Must have some cool friends.

[Mallory Rubin]

So Jennifer Lev Hewitt could be in there too. Could Jenna Ortega be squeezed in?

[Bill Simmons]

What's the Jenna versus Jennifer?

[Sean Fennessey]

Jenna Ortega?

[Mallory Rubin]

No, Jenna.

[Producer Craig]

She hasn't earned it. Not yet. She's not there.

[Mallory Rubin]

But Jennifer Love Hewitt I think could be in there.

[Chris Ryan]

Yeah.

[Bill Simmons]

What about Jennifer Jason Leigh?

[Mallory Rubin]

Jennifer Jason Lee could be in there.

[Bill Simmons]

What about screen icon Jennifer Jones? Think of all the great Jennifers. What about Jennifer Flowers? ER's favorite? You know.

[Mallory Rubin]

So all Jennifers are open. Do you like this category?

[Sean Fennessey]

All Jennifers.

[Mallory Rubin]

Oh, to any Jennifer.

[Sean Fennessey]

All Jennifers are open Sounds like the porn title for this movie.

[Mallory Rubin]

I like this one. So who would be The Jennifer for this.

[Sean Fennessey]

I can't conceive of this character not being French. So until you give me an alternative French.

[Mallory Rubin]

How about Jennifer Connelly with a French accent?

[Sean Fennessey]

Yeah, sure.

[Chris Ryan]

I mean, who says no? Honestly? Yeah.

[Mallory Rubin]

The Dan Campbell skill for. Holy shit. Are they really going for this right now? The waltz.

[Chris Ryan]

Yeah, yeah.

[Mallory Rubin]

Oh, she's going to play it.

[Chris Ryan]

Oh, yeah.

[Mallory Rubin]

All right, Mallory, it's time. Your flex category.

[Chris Ryan]

Okay. I'm going to do. Did this movie have a porn parody? Oh, and are you surprised?

[Mallory Rubin]

No, I, I, I didn't know where you were going.

[Sean Fennessey]

We're shot on these a little earlier. Go ahead.

[Chris Ryan]

I, so I, I, I don't actually know the answer to the question. I assume it's no, I didn't want to Google that on my work computer. But I think we should discuss like if it, if it could have been you just started doing this a few, a few moments ago or very organically. Chris, I, I would like to nominate as the title before C. Yeah, yeah, yeah.

[Mallory Rubin]

See our, yeah, yeah.

[Sean Fennessey]

I was like we forgot to say before come rise.

[Chris Ryan]

Yeah. And this is before come set. Days and days of fucking.

[Bill Simmons]

It's before cum Shot.

[Sean Fennessey]

That's you're being a little bit direct.

[Mallory Rubin]

Before Comerise and before come Set is pretty good.

[Chris Ryan]

What is Cumset crusty befouled surfaces of the apartment. After collection of this for 10 days. And sweet little Che as to like just why he waits through secretions to get to his food bowl.

[Producer Craig]

Yeah, I'm just gonna look it up.

[Mallory Rubin]

Craig's gonna take the safari cachet hit. I like when Mal, when we do movies with pets, Mal always remembers the pet's name.

[Chris Ryan]

Che. Yeah, sure.

[Bill Simmons]

I mean, what does it mean?

[Chris Ryan]

Well, in Argentinian it means hope, I believe. Is that what she said? Said? Yeah. Because Jesse's like, you're a commie. Yep.

[Bill Simmons]

Bit of a, bit of a hardline kind of right wing Jesse or is he just. He's very undermining of a lot of her left leaning ideas.

[Mallory Rubin]

911 had a big impact on him.

[Sean Fennessey]

Yeah.

[Bill Simmons]

You know, it radicalized him.

[Mallory Rubin]

I don't know.

[Sean Fennessey]

Jesse dedicated this time to Donald Rumsfeld.

[Chris Ryan]

Jesus.

[Mallory Rubin]

Did Jesse start in the Capitol on January 6th?

[Bill Simmons]

Huge Wolfowitz guy, Jesse. Yeah. Department of Defense have to protect the Green Zone.

[Mallory Rubin]

We did, we did all my picking nits actually. And then the 47 minute walk, there's one where the extra in the red shirt is about to walk by them and then doesn't walk by them when they flip camera angles for like 10 seconds. That's just Like a up do better. We hit everything else. You don't have any other nitpicks, right?

[Sean Fennessey]

Mine was the 45 minute walk is actually the. The like it's like eight minutes in the movie.

[Mallory Rubin]

It's actually 45 sequel prequel prestige TV all black cast or Untouchable? This became a trilogy. Is this movie better with Wayne Jenkins, Danny Trejo, Doris Burke, Sam Jackson, Nell Byron Mayo, Barney Cousins, Tony Romo, Harling Mays, Chris Collinsworth, Daniel Plainview, Long Legs or Wilford Brimley and the firm CR.

[Sean Fennessey]

I was thinking about how funny it would be as Jesse sees Salute Lean. It's the culmination of this nine year wait and then Wayne Jenkins walks up to him and he goes God damn Jesse. Hey man, that's some great auto fiction dog. I didn't know I was here. With supernovilists and a bestseller spot. You better get back to your wife and kid or your royalties are gonna come alimony for a long time. Big dog.

[Mallory Rubin]

I was hoping you'd do Wayne.

[Chris Ryan]

Incredible. You think Wayne spends a lot of time in Paris?

[Mallory Rubin]

Paris?

[Chris Ryan]

Yeah. Yeah. Really cultured guy. Loves to travel. You're not doing Romo gm He's gonna miss that plane.

[Sean Fennessey]

Yeah.

[Mallory Rubin]

Miss that flight gym. It's a 1010 flight gym.

[Chris Ryan]

The Leaf's gonna lose that Commission gym after 9 11.

[Sean Fennessey]

It takes a ton of time to get through security gym.

[Mallory Rubin]

I actually was thinking Collinsworth would be pretty good for this.

[Chris Ryan]

Yeah.

[Mallory Rubin]

Like. Oh Mike. She just nailed the waltz. Mike. I mean you can't. She didn't even remember the lyrics that she was nailing it. Mike. Just want to ask her. Just want to ask her. Who gets it.

[Sean Fennessey]

Delpy.

[Chris Ryan]

I think so.

[Bill Simmons]

I like that.

[Chris Ryan]

Here's the. Here's the argument. It's Linkleader for sunrise, Delpy for sunset, Hawk for midnight. And they each get one.

[Bill Simmons]

If the world were just.

[Chris Ryan]

Hawk's performance in mid night is unrivaled.

[Mallory Rubin]

Probably unanswerable questions. When did he actually get on the plane? How many days passed?

[Sean Fennessey]

So do you kind of learn that in the next calls her and is like I'm not coming back because I'm going to have 10 days of sex with Seline?

[Chris Ryan]

No, I think he waits.

[Mallory Rubin]

I think we're in the lying stage.

[Sean Fennessey]

Of he goes back a day to later.

[Chris Ryan]

No, he's there for days and days.

[Mallory Rubin]

A meeting with the book company here about.

[Chris Ryan]

About the second they extended the tour. It's some lie. Then he goes home and he's like I have had an incredible amount of sex with the love of my life. We're done.

[Mallory Rubin]

They're running a nursery.

[Bill Simmons]

Yeah, we're done.

[Chris Ryan]

We're done.

[Bill Simmons]

You can say that to her.

[Sean Fennessey]

What do you think?

[Bill Simmons]

I think they probably have a sort of illicit affair over time, and he doesn't go back right away and break it off immediately. And they try to figure. He tries.

[Mallory Rubin]

Oh, I disagree. I think. I think he stays three extra days and then tells his wife when he gets home. He's like, I'm. I'm packing.

[Sean Fennessey]

Guess what? Hank's going to camp in France.

[Mallory Rubin]

Yeah.

[Chris Ryan]

Yeah. They get into all that.

[Bill Simmons]

I think maybe just my. My. My affection for Hank, you know, I.

[Mallory Rubin]

Want to believe Hank's collateral damage in the love affair of a lifetime.

[Sean Fennessey]

Hank will be fine. Hank's got a cool new stepmom.

[Chris Ryan]

Yeah, yeah.

[Mallory Rubin]

Hank.

[Bill Simmons]

Hank got before midnight is telling us.

[Mallory Rubin]

Hank got pardoned from January 6th. He's fine. He's doing good.

[Chris Ryan]

Oh, man.

[Bill Simmons]

Internalized all of his father's ideas.

[Mallory Rubin]

Is any other unanswerable questions for you all?

[Sean Fennessey]

I have a couple.

[Chris Ryan]

A couple as well.

[Mallory Rubin]

All right, let's hear it.

[Sean Fennessey]

You think Hawk wrote in all the stuff about Jesse being a stickman, like, in terms of, like, his lasting sexual impact on Seline's life?

[Mallory Rubin]

Oh, that. He added that.

[Sean Fennessey]

He's like, why don't you say this?

[Chris Ryan]

Yeah, yeah. Those were his contributions to the script. Yeah.

[Sean Fennessey]

And, I mean, what do you think Philippe's thinking this whole time?

[Chris Ryan]

This is one of my huge ones.

[Mallory Rubin]

I think he's just stoned.

[Chris Ryan]

Do you think he understands English at all?

[Bill Simmons]

I wonder that many times because there is actually.

[Chris Ryan]

It's sort of like, a little disturbing when, like, this woman is in. In the back of his car begging.

[Mallory Rubin]

Yeah.

[Sean Fennessey]

To get out.

[Chris Ryan]

She's speaking French, obviously, but, like. Yeah. How long does he wait? Like you said before, he goes and pursues Jesse and tries to figure out if he's going to be able to fulfill his mission. A lot of Philippe questions here, I.

[Sean Fennessey]

Will say, in the grand scheme of things, like, the fuck you let me out of the car Is, like, one of the hardest things to navigate when you're driving, whether you're being driven or driving. If somebody's just like, I'm getting out. And you're like, we're on fucking La Brea. Where are you going?

[Chris Ryan]

But he didn't say that. He was just like. The man said, no, I'm gonna keep going.

[Sean Fennessey]

Yeah.

[Mallory Rubin]

They're only stopping if you're like, I'm gonna throw up, then they'll fucking stop. Then Fleep stops Fleep stops for that one.

[Chris Ryan]

How do you guys think the song about Che the cat went? We know that that's one of the three English songs. One is about an ex. Many ex.

[Mallory Rubin]

I had a question. I had an unanswerable for that. Whether she was singing the waltz regardless of which one he picked because the choices she gave were like pretty lame choices.

[Bill Simmons]

I think that that's on purpose. I think that she gave him those choices so that he would pick the waltz.

[Mallory Rubin]

That's what I'm saying.

[Bill Simmons]

And she offers it up last because who.

[Mallory Rubin]

Oh, let me hear the song about your cat. That sounds fucking awesome.

[Bill Simmons]

And we certainly wouldn't want to hear the song about the ex.

[Chris Ryan]

No, of course not. But the song about the cat would have been great.

[Mallory Rubin]

The only thing for the ex, she's like, the ex ex would be like, is that about me? Maybe I'll pick that one.

[Bill Simmons]

Possibly, possibly. But we know she's had many men.

[Chris Ryan]

Many men.

[Mallory Rubin]

Many pieces of herself were handed out all over Paris in New York.

[Chris Ryan]

Nope. She takes her health very seriously. Remember that was part of her lie about. I mean that part was probably true. But when she's lying about remembering having sex like I did take my health very seriously. Unanswerable question. Jesse, you think he's a Booktok star today? You think he'd just be crushing it on Booktok writing romance novels?

[Bill Simmons]

I mean He's a 60 year old man so probably not.

[Chris Ryan]

I think Jesse would be huge on Booktok today and I wish he had gotten to live in this time.

[Mallory Rubin]

I have probably an answerable question. What's Booktok?

[Chris Ryan]

Book talk. Oh boy.

[Bill Simmons]

It's answerable. I assure you.

[Chris Ryan]

Booktok is a subset of TikTok that is about books. I figured I could tell you I'm not on TikTok big for Romantasy in particular. And as you know, Jesse writes romance novels and likes to incorporate some fantasy elements into his stories.

[Mallory Rubin]

So you know why I'm not on TikTok? Because I'm going to be like Will Smith and I am legend. I'll be the only one left after the Chinese take everything from TikTok. It'll just be me. They'll not have my info.

[Sean Fennessey]

It was out of bounds for me to like Andy hall though.

[Chris Ryan]

Oh man.

[Bill Simmons]

The floor is yours for the wood, man.

[Chris Ryan]

Do you guys think that Jesse insisted on Paris being the last stop on the book tour? We all agreed that it's a picking that he would have a European tour.

[Bill Simmons]

I like that.

[Chris Ryan]

But was he like paris has to be last just do you think Jesse's.

[Sean Fennessey]

In to make such a difference?

[Mallory Rubin]

I need some press.

[Chris Ryan]

With the press, he somehow got a 10 city European tour. So maybe.

[Bill Simmons]

Wouldn't you argue that the opposite would be the way to go though? That he should start in Paris so that she could join him if they.

[Chris Ryan]

She's definitely wounded. When he's like, yeah, I was here last night.

[Bill Simmons]

Yeah, yeah.

[Sean Fennessey]

He's like, oh, I just love it.

[Bill Simmons]

So maybe he wasn't fully strategizing for this. Cause he'd already had his heart broken so badly. And the book was published and was reviewed and she never tracked him down. So.

[Chris Ryan]

Okay, let's build on this. And it gets to the questions you were asking earlier. Another unanswerable if he had not had a stop in Paris. Cause she says, I saw the event. This is my favorite bookstore. I come here. I saw your face. I saw. Easy enough to go. But she also says, I read about your book.

[Sean Fennessey]

Yes.

[Chris Ryan]

Seemed vague. This is strangely familiar. She read the book. She read it twice.

[Sean Fennessey]

The French covering this time breathlessly.

[Chris Ryan]

Enraptured. If he had not come to Paris, would she then have gone to find him? Because she knows for sure who he is, where he is. She's been reading about him. Reading about the book.

[Bill Simmons]

I think no too. I think she's too scooped out at this point. She's pretty beaten down in this movie.

[Mallory Rubin]

She's Neil McCauley Range. Why are you so interested in what I do?

[Bill Simmons]

Lady, you really got Neil on the brain.

[Mallory Rubin]

I feel like I've been studying.

[Sean Fennessey]

The scouts are out.

[Mallory Rubin]

Scouting department.

[Sean Fennessey]

It's senior bull time at 40.

[Mallory Rubin]

It's coming up, boy.

[Sean Fennessey]

You see Sizemore's running the 40. Like what I'm seeing from him.

[Mallory Rubin]

I have some real questions about whether she would ever know. The book came out in 2004.

[Chris Ryan]

She's got a little clipping that means.

[Mallory Rubin]

She'S reading the newspaper from COVID to cover. Does she seem like an I read.

[Sean Fennessey]

The newspaper that in 2004?

[Bill Simmons]

Okay, let me. Let me ask you a question.

[Mallory Rubin]

I'm just. I. There's a world where she just never knows the book came out.

[Bill Simmons]

You had a crush on a girl in high school.

[Sean Fennessey]

Okay.

[Bill Simmons]

You hadn't thought about her in 10 years. We had Facebook in 2008. Did you ever just pop that name into the search bar?

[Mallory Rubin]

Sure, of course.

[Bill Simmons]

But then this is the equivalent of. But this is the equivalent of that.

[Mallory Rubin]

But it hinges on that she had to see that this book was coming out with this guy, Jesse Wallace.

[Sean Fennessey]

But was.

[Mallory Rubin]

She had to know that's the Jesse Wallace. So why didn't she look him up?

[Bill Simmons]

Is it possible that she hasn't fully revealed how closely she's been tracking him?

[Mallory Rubin]

Because she's stealth, like, been monitoring it.

[Bill Simmons]

And maybe some time had passed and she hadn't thought about him as much, but she got lonely. Or she got. She turned third 30 and was like, oh, my God, am I not.

[Mallory Rubin]

Once Google got better, she googled him, found out he was married, and decided to. Maybe she knew he was married the whole time.

[Chris Ryan]

What did she Google? Jesse Texas.

[Sean Fennessey]

She could have just written his publisher and been like, she didn't know anything about just looking for Jesse. Incidentally, I'm the woman in this book.

[Chris Ryan]

This is the thing. Like, they didn't. They didn't exchange phone numbers. They don't actually know that much.

[Bill Simmons]

The last name is important. We don't know if they exchanged last names. That would be crucial.

[Chris Ryan]

I don't think they.

[Bill Simmons]

Did you say no. Okay.

[Mallory Rubin]

I think that's crazy that they wouldn't have exchanged last names when they're 20 hours together. I have another question. Because we couldn't answer this in the first one because we didn't know if they had sex or not, but they did.

[Chris Ryan]

Yeah. Twice.

[Mallory Rubin]

Twice.

[Sean Fennessey]

Way to go, Jesse.

[Mallory Rubin]

Jesse put all his stuff in a locker. Did they have condoms? 1994.

[Chris Ryan]

They talk about it in this.

[Bill Simmons]

Yeah.

[Chris Ryan]

He says he remembers the brand of the condom. Yeah.

[Mallory Rubin]

Oh, you're right.

[Chris Ryan]

Has him in his wallet. Has him in his pocket. Stop to pick him up as soon as they leave the bar.

[Mallory Rubin]

He's like, you already gave me a.

[Chris Ryan]

Free bottle of wine. Give me some condoms.

[Sean Fennessey]

He got him in the wallet.

[Producer Craig]

What do you mean?

[Mallory Rubin]

It's a dark era.

[Bill Simmons]

You don't know about this. What's age the best lamb skin. Just in case you had an exciting night with a big opportunity, you always kept one in the wallet. But that was not a good idea.

[Mallory Rubin]

I'm saying the condoms in the Air Force. When you're single and that's part of your diagnosis, the question is really, what.

[Chris Ryan]

Condom was Jesse carrying?

[Bill Simmons]

But they told us not to do that.

[Producer Craig]

Why?

[Bill Simmons]

Because it would erode the usability.

[Sean Fennessey]

Also, the guy who had the condom that was, like, in there so long that it would make a ring on the wallet.

[Chris Ryan]

Very deeply sad. Deeply sad.

[Bill Simmons]

You had the bad motherfucker. But for unused condoms, wallet.

[Chris Ryan]

What kind of, like, was Jesse carrying? Like a Magnum so that people were impressed. Was he carrying, like, a ribbed for her pleasure?

[Bill Simmons]

Yeah.

[Chris Ryan]

What kind of condom do you think Jesse was carrying? Sharing Good question.

[Mallory Rubin]

A cheap one.

[Sean Fennessey]

He runs out of Money at like 7pm yeah.

[Mallory Rubin]

He probably got a condom from like the. One of those things that drops him out of the bar in the bathroom. Yeah, the thing he put in, like 10 cents.

[Sean Fennessey]

So for what piece of memorabilia?

[Mallory Rubin]

For the first film, I'd want Jesse's signed book of this Time. Me too, I think is the. The easy obvious answer. Which raises the question, was this time a good title?

[Chris Ryan]

Yeah.

[Sean Fennessey]

Can I ask a secondary question? What would you have done if the book had been called Before Sunrise?

[Chris Ryan]

I don't think I would have liked it, actually. That's one degree too, like through the looking.

[Bill Simmons]

It shows a restraint to not do that.

[Chris Ryan]

Yeah.

[Mallory Rubin]

I think this time is a terrible title.

[Sean Fennessey]

Yeah.

[Chris Ryan]

Right. But Before Sunrise is a beautiful title. And so it feels appropriate that I.

[Mallory Rubin]

Actually think it should have been called Before Sunrise. Even though it's corny, it makes more sense to me than this time. What does this time even mean?

[Bill Simmons]

It sounds like the name of a Kenny Loggins song.

[Mallory Rubin]

Yeah. He should have done. He should have done Heart to Heart.

[Chris Ryan]

But then he writes that time.

[Bill Simmons]

That's right.

[Mallory Rubin]

Actually. What a fool believes. If we're going Yacht rock.

[Bill Simmons]

Oh, that would be good.

[Mallory Rubin]

That would have been good title. Coach Finstock Aware. Best life lesson. Memories are a wonderful thing if you don't have to deal with the past.

[Bill Simmons]

That was what I was from her.

[Chris Ryan]

Really good.

[Sean Fennessey]

I have. Sometimes you got to miss that plane.

[Chris Ryan]

Yeah, that's might as well.

[Mallory Rubin]

Best double feature choice has to be Before Sunrise. Unless you would say Before Midnight.

[Chris Ryan]

No, I would pick Before Sunrise. Yeah.

[Mallory Rubin]

Who won the movie?

[Chris Ryan]

The only thing I pair before I have Delpy.

[Sean Fennessey]

I feel like the first one is kind of Hawks and this one's kind of hers. Maybe that's too simple way of looking at it. There's something about.

[Bill Simmons]

I feel the opposite.

[Sean Fennessey]

I feel like I'm watching him through her eyes in this film somewhat. But you feel the opposite.

[Bill Simmons]

I feel the opposite, yeah, but not by much. Like I said on the last one we did, I felt like it's really close, but the last one is more up. And this one, even though it has this amazing romantic ending, there's way more pain in this movie.

[Mallory Rubin]

I think Delpy wins.

[Sean Fennessey]

That's why you're my guy.

[Chris Ryan]

If I had to pick, I would.

[Mallory Rubin]

Pick because the movie hinges on if the waltz isn't really good. The movie kind of.

[Bill Simmons]

That's true.

[Mallory Rubin]

Gets a little scraggy, but it hinges.

[Chris Ryan]

Just as much on, like, his face as he's listening to it. It's tough. You almost can't pick. Yeah. It has to be both of them.

[Bill Simmons]

It's almost like it's a madeup category on a podcast.

[Mallory Rubin]

Well, buckle up. Producer Craig, who had not seen any of these movies, and then watch both of them on a plane.

[Producer Craig]

Is that. Does that bother you that I saw he's on a Plane?

[Mallory Rubin]

No, I think that's actually perfect.

[Chris Ryan]

Appropriate. Yeah.

[Sean Fennessey]

You were traveling.

[Bill Simmons]

You didn't miss.

[Mallory Rubin]

Give us your thoughts on one and then two.

[Producer Craig]

Okay. Truly mesmerized by the first one. Beautiful movie. Sean mentioned in the first part about the dialogue kind of being that early twenties, dorm room philosophizing. I completely identified with that. I fell in love with Selene, who didn't. She's very funny. I think the only thing so watching. So I love that entire movie. I love that they. My favorite quality about the movie is that about both movies, really, is that they don't fully get along always. They are a perfect fit, but that's not a literal term. And I think a lot of times when they try to build relationships in movies, the perfect fit are like, you all like the same things and you have the same views about everything, and they don't have that. And it's messy sometimes, but you still know that they should be together. But that doesn't always mean you agree. And so I thought that was really smart writing. I really enjoyed the ending. I was like you, Bill, a hopeful. I thought they were going to get back together, or at least I wanted to believe that. And you don't want to think about it too much, the possibility that they wouldn't get back together. I also was a little bit annoyed that she liked Ethan Hawke so much at the beginning of the movie because I think he's not the best hang. He's a little bit smarmy and smug. And I was almost jealous of Jesse. I was just like, this fucking guy. I'm like, he's really getting Selene right now. But then I think it's part of it. They kind of soften each other and their differences come together. The movie doesn't work if she's not French. Also, she has to have an accent. Honestly, she has to be French. I firmly believe that if she was Jennifer Connell, it wouldn't work. And then before sunset, I was terrified, didn't want to watch it, was upset that it even got made. Maybe I'm just burned out from sequels nowadays where I'm. Especially the delayed sequel, where it's not immediately planned, where it's like when they Put them together and they come out two years apart and it was a part of a whole thing. It's fine. But I don't know, it's like dumb and dumber too. 20 years later, you're like, God, this is gonna suck. I knew obviously these movies were beloved, so whatever. But once again, I was beautifully surprised. I like that their perspectives switched in many ways. And again, it was clunky and they took time to warm up to one another. Once again. Cause at first or like, I don't know, they're not really meshing. Once again, the only thing I think what's aged the worst in this movie?

[Mallory Rubin]

Oh, boy.

[Producer Craig]

No, no. I think both these movies are honestly perfect. But the only thing that aged the worst is I think that young people are aging slower now because how old are they before sunset?

[Sean Fennessey]

32, 23. Sunset. They're 33.

[Producer Craig]

33.

[Bill Simmons]

32.

[Mallory Rubin]

33.

[Producer Craig]

32, 33. I think that's too young now to.

[Sean Fennessey]

Have like a kid and stuff.

[Producer Craig]

Yeah. I think the idea of, like, you're 32 and your life is over is no longer identifiable for people my age. As a 30 year old myself now I'm just like. They seem like a weathered 32 to me. He's got two kids and a wife. She's had a whole life. It just feels like nowadays people are getting started so much later that they. In my head, they should be like 37 having this issue, not 32.

[Mallory Rubin]

It's a really good point.

[Bill Simmons]

I think that's accurate.

[Sean Fennessey]

If it's later in their life and they haven't seen each other, it's almost like it breaks through some wall of like. Yeah, but that was like 15 years ago. Do you know what I mean? There's something about.

[Mallory Rubin]

That's why this movie works so well with the years it was made, because you'd also. If it was made now, there would be phones. She would have hunted him down in five seconds. There's all these reasons why this movie could never happen in the way it happens.

[Producer Craig]

Yeah, yeah. I.

[Sean Fennessey]

It.

[Producer Craig]

It really feels. I can't believe it worked that this sequel came out and I ended it before midnight Worked. But it really does feel like you're getting like a. It's kind of suspenseful. It's like you can't believe that you get these 80 extra minutes with this couple that you have no idea what happened to. And it's the most captivated I've ever been watching two people talk. It's like you genuinely are like, I can't miss a word.

[Chris Ryan]

They're gonna say, but you did not watch the.

[Mallory Rubin]

A good review from Craig.

[Producer Craig]

I don't. I know where it's headed and I don't want to go there.

[Chris Ryan]

You don't know where it's headed.

[Producer Craig]

I'm happy now.

[Chris Ryan]

You don't know where it's headed.

[Producer Craig]

I'm happy where I am now. Now with this. With this franchise.

[Chris Ryan]

You have to watch it.

[Producer Craig]

No.

[Chris Ryan]

What?

[Mallory Rubin]

Craig.

[Producer Craig]

At least I'm gonna. Can I live with this for nine years like everybody else got to?

[Mallory Rubin]

Craig, don't watch it.

[Bill Simmons]

I think that's not a bad idea. Yeah, but you run a very serious risk, which is you will be very close to the age of the characters in the movie when you watch the next movie, which I was. Which is a little risky.

[Producer Craig]

But isn't it worse If I watch 30 now and going that's where I'm headed?

[Bill Simmons]

No, I don't think so. I don't think so. I think if you find yourself associating with the feelings in the third film, you will have a full blown midlife crisis. Well, do you agree?

[Chris Ryan]

I actually. Can I answer that or is it getting into too. Too many spoilery territory?

[Bill Simmons]

You got sbs.

[Chris Ryan]

I think there is a take.

[Mallory Rubin]

Are you going to ruin pull my intestines through my rectum month?

[Producer Craig]

You've nailed that every time, by the way. Like the phrasing of that, which is very impressive.

[Chris Ryan]

I kind of think you. You. I think there's something comforting about it.

[Bill Simmons]

Actually, that is so, so defining about you.

[Sean Fennessey]

I know, but it's like other people also have problems.

[Chris Ryan]

Even the dream, it's like it is actually totally normal.

[Bill Simmons]

I'm not saying it's not, but is a lot. It is a lot.

[Chris Ryan]

It's a very painful movie to watch.

[Producer Craig]

I'm still closer to the sunrise phase in my life than I am to sunset. And so I don't even want to think about making Midnight.

[Mallory Rubin]

Right.

[Bill Simmons]

You're thinking about Wife Number Two or. What do you mean?

[Chris Ryan]

How dare you?

[Producer Craig]

These movies are so good. Unbelievably good.

[Chris Ryan]

You have to watch the third one. It's a masterpiece.

[Producer Craig]

The Listening Booth is the fact when I heard you guys say it was the first take that you can tell.

[Bill Simmons]

You can't.

[Chris Ryan]

It's my favorite.

[Bill Simmons]

I didn't know that this movie was 80 minutes when I saw it. And I just remember freaking out when it ended.

[Chris Ryan]

Yeah.

[Bill Simmons]

Like, I don't know if I've ever had that experience of, like, what do you mean it's over? Like, desperately wanting it to continue.

[Producer Craig]

It's good that if this movie were two and a half hours, it would feel like overindulgent and sequelized. I actually love.

[Sean Fennessey]

Well, there would also be more opportunities to be like maybe they shouldn't.

[Mallory Rubin]

Weirdly, 80 minutes is also kind of the perfect podcast interview length. When anyone I've done, I've always felt like around 70 minutes. It starts to get a little gamey.

[Bill Simmons]

So once again, Jesse a pioneer.

[Mallory Rubin]

Yeah, we'll see you next week. Not with before Midnight, by the way.

[Chris Ryan]

Damn.