Just imagine, two strangers in a train decide to
spend time together walking the streets in Vienna and getting to know
each other! The very idea sends a tingle down my spine and fills my mind
with a sense of being overwhelmed. And, the same strangers, of course
not strangers any more decide to meet in the Vienna train station after
six months, and in the interim not exchanging any phone calls, letters
or visits. Well, they don't meet but connect after nine years in France.
Well, more than the films, what really interested me was the
conversation that transpired between the strangers during their first
walk around Vienna which lasts until the wee hours of the morning - before sunrise, to be precise. To me the film is an ode to conversation -
A conversation which is genuine, frank, occasionally punctuated by the
gurgle of a stream, song of a street singer and by the different sights
and sounds of the city. A conversation without mobiles, facebook and other usual suspects.
The
strangers, okay the actors, Ethan Hawke and Julie Delpy converse on an
assortment of topics ranging from feminism to climate change to love,
sex, popular culture, media, animals and so on. Their discourse is
peppered with anecdotes and in the process of sharing thoughts and
ideas, they get to know the other quite well and also by the end of the
meeting are attracted to one another. The film consists of only walking
and talking and there aren't any more characters in the film than the
two actors. Reading up on the film, I found that most of the dialogues
are written by the actors themselves and that does not come as a surprise!Image 1: Internet
Image 2: Internet