I just finished watching In the Mood for Love for the second time. It truly is a work of art. The shots, the costumes, the music. Absolutely stunning. Unfortunately I don’t think I know how to entirely appreciate the art.

As I watched I kept thinking about what I saw on screen. Time is a blur so Wong had at least three shots of a clock ticking. Time allows love to bloom between Su Li-zhen and Chow Mo-wan. In the beginning, the clocks seem to tick slower and Su’s husband seems like he will never return. The two are young, and as Ms. Suen remarks later, “Have fun while you’re young.” Towards the end of the film though, the lovers realize their time is drawing to an end. “I wish he would stay away,” smiles Chow. Indeed, time flies. The story concludes three years after the events of the film. Su uses time to bury away her “flowery days”, raising a son with her still-absent husband. Chow clings onto the past. The closing lines on the screen are

那些消逝了的歲月，彷彿隔著一塊積著灰塵的玻璃，看得到，抓不著。他一直在懷念過去的一切。如果他能衝破那塊積著灰塵的玻璃，他會走回早已消逝的歲月。

Which brings me to another aspect of the film: glass. Glass is a recurring motif in Wong’s films. I distinctly remember in Chungking Express the glass Faye was cleaning when she first met Cop 663. You can see everything through glass, but it separates you from whatever is on the other side. Something you want but you can never have. Here, Mr. Chow peers longingly into the glass, wanting to break it and walk back into the days of his youth.

In some types of glass, you can see your reflection. Mirrors, specifically. There are mirrors everywhere in In the Mood for Love: bedrooms, offices, hotels. Mirrors are an outward expression of another theme of the film: reflection. The characters reflect each other. Su Li-zhen and Chow Mo-wan are neighbors. Their spouses are having an affair. They both notice that each other owns an item of clothing that their spouses also own. In the beginning of the relationship, they repeat the same lines to each other: “This is what my husband/wife would eat”.

The final theme I noticed was appearances. This means two things: the struggle to uphold appearances and the clash between the inner and outer. Su, because she is a woman, recognizes the need to maintain her image as a loyal wife. Once Ms. Suen confronts her once about her frequent outings, she begins to draw away from Chow. Other than that though, no one close to the two can tell that the two are falling in love. This leads to the dissonance between the outer (apperance) versus the inner (reality). Mirrors in rooms the two share also perhaps hint at the theme of inner reflection.

Watching In the Mood for Love again, I realize that the film is less about what is shown and said and more about what is not shown. Unlike Western romances, which are loudly dramatic, In the Mood for Love is silent. This is not to say there is no dialogue or music but rather the characters do not profess their feelings. In fact, the only mention of the word “love” was at the end of the film before Chow left to Singapore: “I never imagined falling in love with you.” The protagonists do not fawn over each other. They dance in a hesitant courtship. They never touch each other intimately but it is abundantly clear there is something between them. Wong shows us glimpses of their relationship objectively but that is enough for us to understand what the characters feel.

Other thoughts:

  1. Flowers. The film’s title in Chinese is 花樣年華, literally “The Flowery Years”. Half of Su’s qi-paos are decorated in colorful flowers. I also noticed when Su is not in scenes with Chow, her qipao are more colorful and floral whereas when she is with Chow, her qipao are more muted. I don’t know if I’m reading too much into this.
  2. The music. Very on point. At the end of the movie Chow asks Su if she would come with him if he had an extra ticket. The song played at that point is “Quizás, quizás, quizás”, which is Spanish for “maybe”. In the song, a man sings about how the woman he loves only says “maybe” whenever he asks her a question about the future. Also the irony of the namesake song 花樣年華. The singer sings about happy times. What is shown on the screen however is Su and Chow, on opposite sides of a wall, each sitting alone and looking very despondent.

Despite all that I’ve wrote, I don’t understand the film. I feel like I’m not appreciating the true beauty of it. I’m writing this because I actively analyzed it. I feel like to appreciate something as art, one needs not try so hard. It’s beautiful. It speaks to you. It moves you. I can’t lie, I wasn’t moved by this film. I can see why it’s moving but I didn’t feel it.

I don’t know if it’s possible for me to see movies the way some people do. As just art.