In the Mood for Love (2000)

With a little more foresight, I would have followed my previous viewing with a movie that promised to be exciting, as with action. Instead, I chose something more popular but similarly simple in plot...and thus similarly slow.

My only prior experience with Wong Kar-wai was the singular Chungking Express, which, like so many accomplished foreign films, defies American genre standards. By contrast, ItMfL is a rather straightforward love story that could easily have been set in the modern U.S. instead of various parts of the Far East in 1962. Mrs. Chan (Maggie Cheung) and Mr. Chow (Tony Chiu Wai Leung) live in neighboring apartments and come to keep each other company while their spouses are on vacation. After they develop strong suspicions of their spouses' prolonged adultery, they are tempted to do likewise with each other in spite of their resolve to be better than that.

The first thing that stood out to me was the cinematography. We get a lot of seemingly inconvenient shots, sometimes leaving one audible member of a conversation off screen for the entire scene. I imagine that the point is to create a sense of semi-detachment, not just for ourselves but for the characters, who no doubt have their thoughts wandering frequently.

The second thing was the soundtrack. Indeed, the main DVD menu includes an item labeled "About the Music." It varies quite a bit, but certain numbers and styles recur thematically. Thanks to Filipino covers of Nat King Cole songs, we hear far more Spanish than English (limited to the adoption of "Bye-bye") or even French, spoken in a Cambodian news segment.

You might say it's a feast for the eyes as well as the ears, given the looks of the stars. Cheung actually spent five hours in makeup each day and wore dozens of dresses. Some viewers marvel that her character, or even Mr. Chow, has any reason to fear infidelity, though I believe that nobody in the world is too desirable for a sufficient jerk to cheat on.

Honestly, those are the only aspects that you might find a little difficult to believe. Things play out in entirely credible ways. IMDb lists only one goof, and so far it has only negative feedback. Maybe there are no genuine goofs.

Unfortunately, I don't have much taste for stories of forbidden love. They are all too typically disinclined to go anywhere, and when they finally do, it's no surprise. They also don't seem to offer much in the way of interesting dialog, though it's hard to judge with subtitles. At least this story doesn't downright champion adultery, even in the form of "Turnabout is fair play." My favorite scenes (not saying much) involve broke drunkard Ping, who serves largely as a messenger where the plot is concerned.

If you rent it via Netflix, be warned: My DVD froze and/or skipped about once a minute on average. Most skips were just a second, but that may matter if you lose a subtitle. I didn't rewind unless it skipped minutes. Even then, I felt like I hadn't missed anything very important. Maybe I shouldn't have bothered. I could have cut 90+ minutes down to about 70 and still gotten the gist. But if this is your kind of movie -- and it certainly appeals to most viewers -- you may have to keep the remote handy at all times.