They seem to drift through the world in firm denial of their loneliness, but Wong refuses to let it stay hidden and unaddressed. Set in 1963 Hong Kong, the 2001 film is the story of Su Li-zhen (Maggie Cheung) and Chow Mo-wan (Tony Leung), neighbors in an apartment building that only know each other from the occasional run-in in the hall until a discovery about their spouses binds them together. All that’s left are a few alleyways, a few hallways, and a handful of empty rooms. In watching it, it feels as if the entire world has melted away and everyone else with it. It lingers over things unsaid and empty rooms and places where someone else should be. Instead, it seems to be a movie obsessed with empty spaces. For a movie about love, Wong Kar-wai’s In the Mood for Love has little interest in longing glances or passionate embraces.
