"An era-defining aesthetic" - says The New Yorker when commenting about the movie. This struck me more than I could ever imagine. Daggling my feet in the maze of curiosity and unpleasant thoughts - it is still clear that the 2000 film "In the Mood for Love" by Hong Kong director Wong Kar-wai is an absolute masterpiece that has entranced audiences with its breathtaking visuals, haunting score, and poignant storyline.
This movie is a cinematic tour-de-force that demands meticulous analysis and interpretation. The place in the past has always been a muse to creative people - with charming lights shining like a thousand suns that do not give heat, with elegant ladies charming with pleasant smiles, and with shades of red; they are everywhere, on the top of an expensive vehicle, on the Mandarin Dress that hangs on the curved body. You can call it a vibe, an atmosphere, an aesthetics, or just the essence of style.
That island that appears in this movie is no less than what has been described. At the time, I wasn't there to enjoy the purest form of art on the old TV box, gazing passionately at every movement of the moving pictures. Still, enjoying the movie years later doesn't make it any less of a treasure; a work of art.
There is a particular aesthetic floating abroad in the world. It's made up of a collection of ingredients: humid alleyways in dense cities, neon lights cutting through darkness, quietly flashy fashion, nostalgic music, tragic romanticism, and the smoke of many, many cigarettes. It evokes glamour with a streak of grittiness and the feeling of being adrift. It partakes of Golden Age Hollywood but is more international, modern, and self-aware.
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Released in 2000, "In the Mood for Love" is a Hong Kong romantic drama film directed by Wong Kar-wai. The film is set in Hong Kong in 1962 and follows the story of two neighbors, Chow Mo-wan (played by Tony Leung) and Su Li-Zhen (played by Maggie Cheung), who form a bond after they discover that their respective spouses are having an affair with each other. The film explores their relationship, which is marked by repressed emotions and a sense of longing that is never fully satisfied.
One of the most striking aspects of the film is its visual style. The cinematography by Christopher Doyle and Mark Lee Ping-bin is breathtaking, with the use of vivid colors, slow-motion shots, and close-ups creating a dreamlike atmosphere. The film's setting, which is characterized by narrow alleyways, cramped apartments, and crowded streets, is also a crucial element of its aesthetic. The film's use of Hong Kong's urban landscape as a backdrop for the story contributes to its sense of intimacy and claustrophobia.
The film's music, composed by Michael Galasso and Shigeru Umebayashi, is another key element of its emotional impact. The haunting score, which features a mix of Western and Chinese instruments, adds to the film's sense of longing and melancholy. At its core, "In the Mood for Love" is a film about missed opportunities and unfulfilled desires. The relationship between Chow and Su is marked by a deep connection that is never fully realized, as they are both constrained by the societal norms of the time. The film's exploration of the complexities of human relationships, and the pain of unrequited love, is both poignant and universal.
The camera movement in "In the Mood for Love" is a crucial element of the film's visual style. The cinematography by Christopher Doyle and Mark Lee Ping-bin is known for its use of slow-motion shots, close-ups, and intricate camera movements that create a dreamlike atmosphere. The camera is often used to emphasize the emotions of the characters, capturing their longing and unspoken desires through subtle movements and gestures.
Another key element of the film's camera movement is the use of close-ups. These shots focus on the characters' faces, capturing their expressions and emotions in a way that is both intimate and revealing. The close-ups serve to emphasize the film's themes of missed connections and unspoken desires, as the characters' true feelings are often hidden behind a facade of politeness and restraint.
Overall, "In the Mood for Love" is a cinematic masterpiece that has entranced audiences with its breathtaking visuals, haunting score, and poignant storyline. Its exploration of themes such as love, loss, and missed opportunities has made it one of the most beloved films of the 21st century.
Not in the opening, but appears in the 20th Anniversary Restoration is Mubi. Mubi is a global curated film streaming platform, production company, and film distributor. Mubi produces and theatrically distributes films by emerging and established filmmakers, which are exclusively available on its platform. Additionally, it publishes Notebook, a film criticism and news publication, and provides weekly cinema tickets to selected new-release films through Mubi Go.
It seems like the stationary identification was made by another party named Spin. Spin claimed that they were "inspired by Henri-George Clouzot’s L’Enfer (The Inferno, 1964), a film that was never finished but was presented as a documentary in 2009 by the director Serge Bromberg." Originally, the colors of Mubi were bright, neon blue background with white font - same as Sony Pictures. However, as it makes its way for around the first two seconds in the trailer - the background is the old, bleached walls in harmony with the calm, slow rain while the title, is red.
♡ Description
The scene opens with a title card that's believed to be written in Linotype's Didot Headline Roman that says: "It is a restless moment. She has kept her head lowered to give him a chance to come closer. But he could not, for lack of courage. She turns and walks away." for about 10 seconds. Then another title card appeared: "Hong Kong, 1962."
We then see a bustling apartment hallway, filled with the sounds of everyday life. The camera pans across a bustling hallway, capturing the worn wallpaper, dim overhead lights, and the muffled sounds of laughter and conversation filtering through closed doors. Two women, Mrs. Suen, a slender woman with neatly styled hair and a kind smile, and Su Li-Zhen, a younger woman with delicate features and a hesitant expression, find themselves face-to-face outside their respective apartments. Mrs. Suen is inviting Li-zhen into her apartment for a meal. Li-zhen apologizes for interrupting and inquires about how to address Mrs. Suen. Mrs. Suen suggests simply calling her "Mrs. Suen" and offers the same invitation to Li-zhen once she decides. Then, the owners of the apartment see her out where Li-zhen and Chow Mo-wan first met.
On the same side of the hallway, another individual, Chow Mo-wan, is inquiring about a vacant room. He's dressed in a well-fitting suit and carrying a suitcase, indicating his professional status and recent arrival. His neatly styled hair completes a polished appearance. He's informed by a landlady that the room has just been rented to the woman he just saw entering Mrs. Suen's apartment, Li-Zhen. The old lady suggests he try the next door after addressing him as "gentle, polite." He then thanks her politely, his shoulders slumping slightly, and turns towards another apartment, his silhouette swallowed by the hallway's shadows.
This opening scene establishes the film's setting, and period, and introduces the central characters - Mrs. Suen, Su Li-zhen, and Chow Mo-wan. It also subtly hints at a potential connection between Li-zhen and Chow, despite their never directly interacting in the scene.
♡ Genre & audience
Genre: Romance, Drama.
How the movie itself fits in the MAIN GENRE:
"In The Mood for Love"introduces a new vocabulary: Melodrama. Cambridge told me that this is "a story, play, or film in which the characters show stronger emotions than real people usually do" - modern language would call it over-dramatic. However, to me, it was well enough, it's like burning coal in the seasons of snow. You enjoy the warm while watching over the slow, lazy smoke before release that you can not breathe, that the sky bends to oblivion, that the warm is what kills you.
Further research leads me to an article named Offscreen where they commented, "Wong Kar-wai’s "In the Mood for Love" is a romance melodrama in the Chinese form of the genre. Specifically, it is a Chinese melodrama known as wenyi pian, a genre akin to the American soap opera but culturally produced for Chinese society." For me, this comment sounds like Li-Zhen as she spoke with her usual calm tone. Black hair, red lips, bleeding Cheongsam with decorated flowers. Lips open, lips close, single vowel escapes, then silence takes over.
In my aspect, "In The Mood For Love" is more of a sad romance than a normal romance. When the characters' unconventional romance is based on a shared bond of sadness, the foreshadowing is clear that this will be a tragic love. The Medium says "In The Mood For Love is a soulful observation of romance", and Peter Walker of the Guardian believes "It's a film about, yes, love; but also betrayal, loss, missed opportunities, memory, the brutality of time's passage, loneliness—the list goes on". Not all romance movies are romantic, I came across the sudden awake, and not all sadnesses are ugly.
♡ Mise-en-scene & tone setting
I did mention previously about feeling sad about the movie, then what had persuaded me to have such thoughts in mind?
In every of Wong Kar-wai's masterpieces, visual elements will always meticulously contribute to the film's atmosphere and emotional resonance. By the mastermind of using the mise-en-scène, the director crafts a world that is both alluring and melancholic, mirroring the complex desires and unfulfilled yearning of the central characters.
An interesting to point out is that although lots of people view this movie as unhappy, the color palette of its never directly shown blue or green, the colors that are well known for their interpretation of sadness but red. Red overtook the vibe of the whole movie. In the cultural aspect of China, red means auspicious—associated with life-generating energy (the sun, blood, and fire)—and is the color of celebrations and prosperity. In the 1960s, Hong Kong was one of the Four Asian Tigers in economic, cultural, etc. So maybe, red is a trend, but more than that, does red cover up something that no one wants to see?
I think the answer is yes. Mrs. Suen, dressed in simple yet well-kept floral dresses, embodies a sense of domesticity and warmth. At the same time, Li-zhen's more modern, tailored outfits hint at a younger and perhaps bolder personality. Both women, however, are predominantly adorned in muted shades of blue and green, reflecting a subtle sadness and unspoken yearning that permeates the film. Also, even though both Mrs.Suen and Li-zhen speak with smiles, it still instantly establishes a sense of isolation. Characters move past each other nearby, even if their interactions are brief and polite, highlighting a shared loneliness despite physical closeness.
Not only that, but shadows and lights also play a part in the loneliness race. Wong Kar-wai is renowned for his masterful use of lighting, and "In the Mood for Love" is no exception. The film is awash in warm, amber hues, creating a sense of nostalgia and intimacy. However, key scenes often utilize low-key lighting and deep shadows, shrouding characters in a veil of mystery and highlighting hidden emotions. This interplay of light and shadow mirrors the characters' internal struggles, where unspoken desires remain hidden beneath a façade of social propriety.
The New Yorker states that "In The Mood For Love" looks like Mark Rothko's artwork. While known for his large, monochromatic color fields, Rothko also experimented with different colors and compositions throughout his career. Although often associated with a sense of serenity, his work also encompassed a wider range of emotions, from deep contemplation to profound despair.
One interesting fact to point out here is that in the opening scene, no location is introduced directly. We know is a flat in a building with narrow hallways, and we know a family is having dinner by sounds, we guess they are warm and welcome by the colors: no inferior design was there. We got locked in the hallway, watching Li-zhen and Mrs. Suen talk in the distance, and overheard the owner and Chow Mo-wan talk also in that hallway before watching him depart. We are in fact, the viewers, souls that returned in the past to witness the story. Supported by the ending title card of the film, Liu’s words read: "That era has passed. Everything that belongs to that era no longer exists."
The Architectural Review makes a shocking find: "Chow rents a hotel room in the film, at a time when Tsim Sha Tsui was undergoing major redevelopment into a commercial and retail hub of hotels, malls, and massive mixed-use buildings, rapidly replacing the urbanism of low- and mid-rise tong laus (tenement houses), back alleys, street vendor stalls, and open-air markets". By the time the movie was shot, there were only five of those kinds of hotels left - so they had to hurry. Wong’s Hong Kong of the 1960s is an assemblage of fragments, displaced people, and disrupted places."I always wanted to put someplace in my films, a corridor, a restaurant, or a street, because I knew it would be gone soon", he claimed in 2001. This overall contributed to the loneliness vibe of "In The Mood For Love". Because even if they had existed, no shreds of evidence would be left behind. Nothing, but memories.
♡ Camera movement
The camera movement in "In the Mood for Love" is a crucial element of the film's visual style. The cinematography by Christopher Doyle and Mark Lee Ping-bin is known for its use of slow-motion shots, close-ups, and intricate camera movements that create a dreamlike atmosphere. The camera is often used to emphasize the emotions of the characters, capturing their longing and unspoken desires through subtle movements and gestures.
Another key element of the film's camera movement is the use of close-ups. These shots focus on the characters' faces, capturing their expressions and emotions in a way that is both intimate and revealing. The close-ups serve to emphasize the film's themes of missed connections and unspoken desires, as the characters' true feelings are often hidden behind a facade of politeness and restraint. The use of a handheld camera adds to the intimacy of the film, making the audience feel as if they are right there with the characters. It creates a sense of closeness and immediacy, emphasizing the emotional intensity of the story. The camera movement also mirrors the characters' movements, creating a sense of synchronicity between the characters and the camera.
Overall:The camera movement in "In the Mood for Love" is a masterful example of how cinematography can convey emotions and themes in a subtle yet powerful way. It transforms the film into an immersive experience, taking the audience on a journey through the characters' emotions and desires.
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