Many critics study Wong Kar-wai’s masterpiece ‘In the Mood for Love’ through its cinematography, noting its use of ‘frames within frames’. Here, I want to consider a different framing altogether, and view this extraordinary film through the lens of English and British resonances.
Let’s start with the title:
According to the director, he was going to call the film ‘Secrets’, until he heard Bryan Ferry’s cover of the classic song ‘I’m in the Mood for Love’. This English title completely captures the longing and languor at the heart of the film, a film in which music voices many of the characters’ unspoken feelings.
Set in British Hong Kong in 1962, the constraints of British colonial society run implicitly through the heart of the film, shaping the characters’ lives, events unfolding against a backdrop of conservatism and displacement.
Also, this great work of Asian cinema takes inspiration from an English classic ‘Brief Encounter’, as Wong Kar-wai states his admiration:
“I admire Brief Encounter [1945] – the longing and restraint. But most adultery films are about guilt or passion. I wanted to explore something different – the complicity, the shared secret.”
Emotions running deep under the picture’s beautiful surface – how I love this film!
