I fell in love with this film the way you fall in love with a person—slowly, then all at once, then forever.
The first time I watched In the Mood for Love, I was impatient. It’s so slow. So much of it is just people walking through corridors, buying noodles, sitting in rooms. Where’s the plot? Where’s the drama? I didn’t get it.
The second time, I was recovering from a breakup. And suddenly, every frame hurt.
The story is simple: two neighbors discover that their spouses are having an affair with each other. And in the process of dealing with this betrayal, they develop feelings for each other. But they never act on those feelings. They never kiss. They never sleep together. They never even say “I love you.” Because they don’t want to become like their spouses. They don’t want to be the people who have affairs.
So instead, they just… exist near each other. They meet for dinner. They rehearse conversations they’ll never have with their spouses. They rent a hotel room to write together, but nothing happens. They’re so close, so clearly in love, but they never cross that line.
Wong Kar-wai films this restrained passion in the most beautiful way I’ve ever seen. Every frame is a painting. The colors are saturated and rich. Maggie Cheung wears a different cheongsam in nearly every scene, each one more gorgeous than the last. The camera lingers on hands almost touching, on glances held a moment too long, on the space between two people who want to close the distance but can’t.
And the music—that haunting string theme that plays over and over—it becomes the sound of longing itself. Every time it starts, my chest tightens. Because I know what’s coming: another scene of almost, another moment of restraint, another opportunity lost.
There’s a scene where they’re in the hotel room, and it starts to rain. She’s leaving. He asks her to stay. She hesitates. The camera holds on her face. And then she leaves. And I wanted to scream at the screen: STAY. JUST STAY. CHOOSE HAPPINESS FOR ONCE.
But she doesn’t. Because that’s not who she is. Because some people are too good, too principled, too afraid of becoming the thing they hate.
The film ends years later. He’s in Cambodia, at Angkor Wat. He whispers his secret into a hole in the wall and covers it up. We don’t hear what he says. But we know. We know it’s her name, her memory, the love he never allowed himself to have.
After I watched it the second time, I texted my ex. Just “I miss you.” They didn’t respond. And I sat there, listening to that string theme on repeat, feeling like Wong Kar-wai had reached into my chest and filmed my heartbreak.
In the Mood for Love is about the tragedy of timing, of circumstance, of being the right person at the wrong time. It’s about the loves we don’t pursue because we’re too afraid, too moral, too late. It’s about restraint and regret and the unbearable beauty of what might have been.
I’ve watched it six times now. And every time, I hope they’ll make a different choice. Every time, they don’t. And every time, it breaks my heart in exactly the same way.
Some films you watch. This one you ache through.
