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Review by Harvey Karten
No Rating Supplied
When married couples go out together, double-dating if you
will excuse the adolescent term, it it not altogether
uncommon to find each of the men attracted to the other's
wife and vice versa. Usually the men and women do not act
on their fantasies since, after all, what are friends for?
Arguably the most romantic American film more or less on
the theme, David Lean's "Brief Encounter," makes excellent
use of Rachmaninoff's ardent Second Piano Concerto
to pump up the desire felt between two strangers, both
married, who meet at a train station and find themselves
drawn into a poignant romance. In Wong Kar-Wai's current
version of the motif, a pair of next-door neighbors, Chow Mo-
Wan (Tony Leung), and Su Li-zhen (Maggie Cheung),
imperceptibly discover that their spouses are having an affair.
They find they are drawn to each other What do they do
about it? If this were an American film, particularly one shot
against the background of the sexually free 1970s, we know
what would result, whether out of revenge for the marital
partners' indiscretions or in the heat of the moment. But
Wong's film takes place in the Far East during the early
sixties, particularly in and around the damp streets of Hong
Kong, with Mark Li Ping-bin's camera showing groups of
Chinese residents possessing a fair amount of prosperity
moving to and fro, while in the buildomg inhabited by the two
principals, the neighbors often play mah-jongg throughout the
day.
Su is the secretary in a shipping company and works side
by side with her boss, who is subtly shown to be having an
affair with a younger woman. Lonely for the absent man
while her neighbor, Chow, is missing his own bed partner,
they would expect to get together for more than a string of
dinners in informal coffee houses and chats in Chow's
apartment. But even during a period in which Su, tired from
having to hide out for hours in Chow's flat rather than risk
being caught exiting the room by her neighbors, is able to
recline stiffly on his bed without messing a strand of her
mummified coiffure.
Wong Kar-Wei, whose faster-paced "Chungking Express"
featured Tony Leung in a pair of related stoires of
lovesickness, obsession and the peccadilloes of relationships,
beats a different drum this time around. Where "Chungking"
is light, frothy and delightfully offbeat, "In the Mood" is
more straightward, meditative, and concerned to show its
audience a palette of colors in scenes of Hong Kong,
Singapore, and Cambodia. While the conversation between
the two shy neighbors is relatively free of Pinteresque
pauses, Wong allows us to form impressions of the
relationship through the gaps in the story, forcing us to
imagine the connection between Su's and Chow's spouses,
to absorb the bonds that take place within the housing
complex, to take an armchair journey in portions of the world
which are distant from the West and yet share in the
Occident's cultural values.
Wong is almost obsessed with showing consumption of
food, usually noodles which the two people share at Chow's
place and even, surprisingly, a steak that the two indulge in
with forks and knives in a barebones but pleasant little
restaurant. Food and love are closely connected, of course,
and in one scene that's far from a sybaritic representation of
the randy gluttony in Tony Richardson's "Tom Jones," Chow
places a dollop of spicy mustard next to his partner's steak,
asking her whether she likes her sustenance hot.
As the very title suggests, this is a picture to be enjoyed for
mood rather than literal essence, using a soundtrack of Nat
King Cole favorites in place of Rachmaninoff's Second in the
sound track. Notwithstanding an overlong coda that take us to
Kampuchean sites to represent the increasing distance of the
two, "In the Mood for Love" is a fine, but muted showcase for the
talents of its two prolific stars.
Copyright © 2000 Harvey Karten
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out of 4
