films 008, 009, 010. In the Mood for Love trilogy.

Days of Being Wild, 1990.
In the Mood for Love, 2000.
2046, 2004. 
dir. Wong Kar Wai.
Viewed at the Prince Charles Cinema.

Three romance-centric slices of life, somewhat different in tone. Days of Being Wild felt the least stylised, inhabiting a ‘pedestrian’ version of Hong Kong reminiscent of the TVB dramas I watched in childhood. The characters weren’t the most interesting — it felt like the story dragged up until the climactic Philippines sequence. In the Mood for Love, magnum opus, felt like something I’d seen before, testament to the extent of its influence. Obviously visually breathtaking, heavily atmospheric, romantic in every sense of the word. The world of clandestinity, tension and missed opportunities is maladaptive and sacred. 

2046 (of course) was my favourite of the three. A familiar thrill shot through me when the opening sequence played: train through the futurama, moody monologue, Saint-Saëns’ Swan. Here it comes: my beloved melancholy. The rest of the movie was a little less flavourful but still hit. How could it not — cosmic railways, future-hotels, writing, ennui? Engines, speed, eternal return. Epiphanies and pacing-breaks are composed against beautiful anachronistic sunsets. The protagonist’s nihilistic conclusions made more sense to me than those of In the Mood for Love, but still didn’t seem to do more than start a thought; trying to replicate a lost love can be futile as the feeling may never come again, but then what? “Maybe one day you’ll escape your past” — what does moving on look like in that context? Everyone here moves in a never-ending circle, which hurts to watch — but then I guess that’s the point.