Film: In the Mood for Love

Director: Wong Kar Wai
Genre: Comedy
Source: Hong Kong (2000)
Rating: PG
Location/Format: Netflix Instant Watch
Grade: A

Well this was not at all what I expected. I think it was better on pretty much every level (though I do want to buy it on blu-ray to get a better look at the visuals, which were already rich). More complex, evanescent, and emotionally demanding than I thought it would be, while also richer in theme and scope. This may be moving up into my top ten films (after a second or third watch) but it's already on my list.

It's hard to put my finger on one thing that makes this so good, because all the individual elements themselves are so well constructed. The mise-en-scene is perhaps what stands out the most. From the gorgeous costumes (I'm not sure what the dress is called that Su Li-zhen wears throughout the film, but they are elegant, beautiful, and restrictive, just as she is) to the longing looks actors Tony Leung and Maggie Cheung shoot at each other, to the beautiful cinematography, everything we're looking at seems to be both beautiful (that's the third time in this sentence I've used that word, which ought to be telling) and richly evocative. I was particularly struck by the careful composition. So often what we see is restricted--by walls, belongings, or whatever--so that part of the action (participants in a conversation, whatever our subject is looking at, etc.) are invisible, hidden behind walls. The characters have no space to move around in, and so visually we have exactly what is happening emotionally, as Leung and Cheung's characters are locked by propriety into formality and doing nothing. It's such an effective technique that I didn't understand it at first, and was frustrated with how cramped and tight the cinematography seemed to be. But things fell into place as the film progressed, because much of this film seems to be about what is hidden, what is unexpressed, what can't be seen (or shown), what is secret. So director Wong Kar Wai matches that visually, let's us feel the theme even before we consciously acknowledge it. It's brilliant.

I also love how much of the film is never told to us, only implied (and here I'm entering spoiler territory), just like the secret that Chow Mow-wan whispers into the wall. The film feels almost dreamlike at times, as fragments here and there force us to construct the greater meaning. Did he know she was at his apartment? Does he recognize her name on the door? Is the child his, and does he know of its existence? I think I know the answer to all of these questions (and I think they are all the same answer), but the film allows the questions to exist in the netherworld between doubt and certainty, just as the relationship between these two characters does, and just as the affair between their spouses does. We're left with very little that we know--a fragment here or there, an overheard comment, a look in the rain under the awning--but so much that we feel. It's impossible not to create meaning from those jagged pieces that we have, which is exactly what our two leads do, both for their spouses and for themselves. It's full of pathos, and it's full of tragedy, and it's full of allure and need.

On top of all of this, we have the beautiful soundtrack. Everytime that song (Shigeru Umebayashi's "Yumeji's Theme") starts up, and we move into the slow motion world of desire and longing, the film just seems to turn up the beautiful. All these elements--the music, the cinematography, the mise-en-scene, the acting--just blend together perfectly, creating the ache, the yearing that Su Li-zhen and Chow Mow-wan feel. It's cinematic alchemy, and it's awesome.

I can't get this movie out of my mind.