The Waking Life of Richard Linklater.

Richard Linklater, San Francisco, CA 10/13/17

There are many things that I adore about the intellectually eclectic films of Richard Linklater.  If he had done nothing except the incisive, heartbreaking, and romantically dizzying BEFORE SUNRISE, BEFORE SUNSET, and BEFORE MIDNIGHT, trilogy, his place in cinema would have been assured. But, as he once told me, repetition is not in his playbook. There’s the compassionate absurdism of BERNIE (with some of the best career performances of Shirley MacLaine, Jack Black, and Matthew McConaughey, not to mention Mr. McConaughey’s mother). The consideration of the confusions strewn by a genius operating in the regular world in ME & ORSON WELLES. The stunning simplicity of his profound (and profoundly moving) BOYHOOD.  What I love best about him, though, is the way he joined me in the WAKING LIFE test after my interview with him for his perceptive take on grief and friendship, LAST FLAG FLYING,

To celebrate his birthday, click on the links above for some of the interviews that I’ve done with him over the years, and my full review of WAKING LIFE.