“Write an essay that discusses Chungking Express in relation to In the Mood for Love, or In the Mood for Love in relation to
Wong Kar Wei’s films invoke a sense of déjà vu; an evocation of romantic longings and fleeting chances. Juxtaposing the two films, one finds Chungking Express (CKE) idiosyncratic, whilst In the Mood for Love (ITMFL) nostalgic to the point of being larger than life.
The Concept of Time
Love vanquishes time. To lovers, a moment can be eternity, eternity can be the tick of a clock. -Mary Parrish
In CKE, the sense that time is moving forward is strong. The monologue of 223 reveals an obsession with time and remembrance; each centimeter of contact is recounted, each minute a significant marker of time. There is a positive anxiety to capture memories and time; a “canning of time” in order to capture the meaning of what has transpired in his life. The story of 633 is less relentless in its pursuit of time, but the blasting music “California Dreaming” constantly reminds us that Faye’s utopia has not yet come and behind the fast food counter, she is in a state of waiting. Even when Faye breaks into 633’s house, “Dreams” replay each time, giving us a premonition that something is waiting to happen.
ITMFL on the other hand, slowly ushers one down the memory lane nostalgically and leaves one unable to leave it. Time is almost static in ITMFL, with a looming clock that has no second hand to signify the passing of seconds. Time moves in blocks of moods rather than units of minutes, with Lizhen’s dazzling array of cheongsams as the only significant marker of time in the story. There is the stylistics to reinforce the languid pace; the tracking camera that follows Li Zhen up and down the steps with her thermoflask gives a nostalgic significance to the moment. Shot in slow motion, the whirling, tendril-like cigarette smoke from Chow dances against the light hauntingly and bids the audience to remember the smoke, to remember the wistfulness of that moment. The timelessness of memory pervades.
Emotions.
Events in our lives happen in a sequence in time, but in their significance to ourselves they find their own order the continuous thread of revelation.
-Eudora Welty
The use of slow motion in both films highlights the emotional state of the characters relative to the world around them. If 633 was lost in melancholic thoughts after being jilted, Li Zhen was trapped in loneliness with her husband’s absence. In CKE however, the presentation is more literal; 633 drinks black coffee at a snail’s crawl in melancholy as the world around him rushes forward. The same cinematic technique is used more subtly in ITMFL as Li Zhen’s slowed-down, stretch-printed ascent and descent along the stairway with thermoflask in hand, as well as her languid graceful movements near the mahjong table as she mingles with others; exemplifies her loneliness despite the activity and people around her.
Another dimension to the slowness of events portrayed is Kundera’s secret bond between slowness and memory, where slowness is directly proportional to the intensity of memory.[i] The inter-title at the start of ITMFL sums up the mesh of unspoken emotions, raw longings and misty sight of the past in Chow’s memory.[ii] Chow’s memories of meeting Li Zhen at the noodle stalls, enjoyable times in 2046, and pensive moments in his newspaper office are all slowed down and savored. The intensity of 633’s memory of his failed relationship is likewise represented in the extreme slow motion of his coffee drinking. For 223, time is stopped altogether to mark the significance of the moment where he bumps into the blonde and Faye.
In both ITMFL and CKE, close proximity does not mean emotional closeness. The characters get close enough to the point of touching, but not quite. 223 recounts his “0.01cm” distance from the blonde and Faye respectively with a matter-of-factness; Li Zhen and Chow similarly brush past each other along the narrow corridors and stairways, with an air of quiet reticence between them. In CKE, the emotional distance was that of alienation as people are lost in their internal thoughts, whilst the repressed behaviour and emotions of Lizhen and Chow are as much a result as social decorum and respectability as Lizhen's unwillingness to be like their spouses, who have gotten into an extramarital affair. The irony is that Lizhen and Chow were slowly falling in love too, albeit in a waltzing pattern of “Perhaps, Perhaps, Perhaps”, but their love is unconsummated and therein the beauty of a mood for love, forever embalmed in memory.
Attire in both films hence becomes a vehicle for emotions and passions to be expressed; consequently, restraint of attire is a reflection of restrained emotions. The more carefree attire of 223 and Faye is a contrast to the prime and proper 633, where in public space, his hair is always immaculately combed and shirt tucked in. The blonde is always decked in her wig, sunglasses and raincoat. The duo finds emancipation from their restraint by the end of the movie segments. Symbolically, 633’s shirt is un-tucked when Faye comes back from
Hence, the voluptuousness of emotions in ITMFL that reside within the characters bursts unto the colours around them. “Unbearable nostalgia”[iv], that of knowing the inevitable death of one’s love, is hence imparted to the vivid colours of Lizhen’s cheongsams, the bedsheets of Chow’s room, even the colours of the aged walls. Those colours are reminiscent of a time charged with pent up emotions, a time that was more colourful in Chow’s memory than what actually was. They lure the modern audience into believing that the 1960s had more vibrant colours, more life. Rather than an accurate portrayal of the real 1960s, it is perhaps more fittingly, Chow’s subjective memory of a wistful past. Emotions in CKE are similarly displaced onto inanimate objects and rituals. 633’s melancholy from being dumped by his air stewardess girlfriend is displaced onto his bar of soap, rag, soft toy. 223 creates a ritual for himself (buying cans of pineapples with an expiration dated 1 May), imparting much emotional tenacity to a senseless activity. Faye’s adoration for 633 is similarly displaced onto her routine of cleaning up 633’s apartment. Both Faye’s break-in into 633’s house and Li Zhen’s break-in into Chow’s apartment in
Space
Love is space and time measured by the heart. –Marcel Proust
In CKE, the high density of the whirling mass of faceless people who surround the characters and crammed spaces[v] creates a deep sense of alienation. ITMFL however, is reminiscent of a time where people were crammed together in a claustrophobic space and forming a community where they borrow newspapers from each other and have meals together. Characters are always negotiating crammed, narrow spaces and corridors. The spying camera places the audience as a voyeur and neighbour, always behind something, peeking in and eavesdropping in a living space with high human density. The only time that Li Zhen and Chow could be free from prying eyes and chatter is during their dinners together and thereafter, along the lonely night streets that were stripped of other people or street furniture. Even on the broad streets however, they are frequently shot behind the barred windows and in a cab, maintaining them in a claustrophobic space, signifying their trapped existence in a close knit community where tongues wag at the slightest misstep one makes.
At the same time, space is presented as a repository of memories. The occasional empty shots of the street lamp, the common corridor between the two families and the empty street void of people long after the characters leave. The space takes on a life of its own, inviting the audience to fill in the elliptical gaps in the story. Lizhen walks past under the street lamp and after a short delay, Chow walks past in the opposite direction. Will they meet the next time they pass through? The street lamp seems to ponder as the original score carries the characters through the space. True enough, they do, as the rain patters down against the light from the street lamp.
Juxtaposition
CKE as as forward-looking and hopeful as ITMFL is nostalgic and wistful. The stories might be different, but underlying them, Wong's distinctive themes of memories, chance and regret remain the same. The concept of time, display of emotions and use of space echo these themes in the two films.
[i] “There is a secret bond between slowness and memory, between speed and forgetting. Consider this utterly commonplace situation: a man is walking down the street. At a certain moment, he tries to recall something, but the recollection escapes him. Automatically, he slows down. Meanwhile, a person who wants to forget a disagreeable incident he has just lived through starts unconsciously to speed up his pace, as if he were trying to distance himself from a thing still to close to him in time… the degree of slowness is directly proportional to the intensity of memory; the degree of speed is directly proportional to the intensity of forgetting” (Kundera, Milan. Slowness. Trans. Linda Asher.
[ii] 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.
That era has passed.
Nothing that belonged to it exists any more.
He remembers those vanished years.
As though looking through a dusty window pane,
the past is something he could see, but not touch.
And everything he sees is blurred and indistinct.
[iii] The landlord lady criticizes Lizhen for wearing beautiful cheongsams “just to get noodles” and the boss finds the new tie by his young mistress too flamboyant.
[iv] The “unbearable nostalgia” describes a situation in which, even though one’s beloved is present, one sees no future, or “your beloved’s death is, invisibly, already present”. (Kundera,