In the Mood for Love
An elegant crossover of social formality (near-boarding house conditions and interaction) and the formal filming of platonic nuance. Absent partners, a mutual love that never actually crosses the formal boundaries (its biggest threat is implication), mutual pain and absence in turn. Brilliant consistency of tropes (handbags and ties, supporting cast affaires and lust), brilliant set and mood, brilliant and rapid intercutting of timeframes: a temporal shift indicated by dress alone. A loving portrait of the diction and punctuation of affaires, of a couple who use the idea of an affaire as rehearsal or paralleling or read-thru for their actual partners. But for whom the film is that reality of that affaire, the love. Seen as a formal exercise (genre: affaire drama), this is filmmaking on the highest plane. Maybe a bit too stylised for some, Tony Leung could nonetheless convince anyone. It well warrants a second viewing, especially to appreciate the abrupt subtleties. Ready now for Wong Kar Wai’s
2046.
