Wong Kar-Wai’s hit movie In The Mood Of Love has always been a film that hits home about oppressed love and universally praised for its bold storytelling, cinematography and lighting design. I will be taking a dive into the aspect of Spaces and how Wong was able to manipulate the busy streets of Hong Kong to produce the marvel known as In The Mood for Love.
Perceptual Space
Without looking too much into the cultural aspect, Hong Kong has always been known for it’s tight spaces and with the film being set in the 1960s where Hong Kong was in political destress, Wong’s bold cinematography choices of using more than usual Close Up shots in already tight fitting spaces not only emphasis storytelling but also the unease and small nuances that a space can bring to the characters.
Frame within frame is a common technique used by many film makers but Wong’s over usage of this technique is intentionally done for multitude of reasons. Hong Kong of the 1960s would deem platonic man woman relationship dubious and doubtful and this contributes to the surveillance around their landlords and spouses but also makes it so the audience, us, feels like we are surveilling them as well, like observers. The frame within frames makes us feel we are but observers, observing from a far. A film maker created a space for their audience to safely observe, for us to naturally pay attention as is required from the time jumps and abrupt cuts. I have not seen any other film that frames us audiences in such a space before. The frame within frame also gives context to our location and the characters’ relative positions within the given space.
Because of the intricate use of frame within frame, the Bantum shots are usually focused within a certain area instead of congregating upon a line. This technique also creates natural framing which is inline with how our eyes move around within a space. Hierarchically speaking, it is an effective method to command where the users would navigate a space.
The panning shots that establishes many new scenes also give a perspective of physical space our characters are in and tune us into an expectation of the scale. Used meticulously for storytelling and establishing shots, but also gives us a good gauge of the spatial design and curated art direction it is supposed to show.
Perceptually, most shots follow the horizon line of our characters, almost always making the effort to let us delve deeper into the mental and physical space of our characters and their motivations.
Architecture
Directed and shot in 2000 but being a periodic piece set in 1962, a sensitive time of transition for Hong Kong because of western influence, independence issues and the political pressures from China and Vietnam, means an interesting mix of the golden age of traditional oriental Chinese architectures, famous for the street side stalls and tiny apartment buildings juxtaposed with the evolving streets of western influence with classy 60s cars.
The slow build up of the unique style of Chinese, more specifically, Hong Kong, architecture and neon light architecture is properly portrayed in the movies with multiple scenes emulating and sense of evolving spaces.
More over, the time skip at the end of the film to 4 years after the current affairs, which gave Hong Kong it’s independence, also showed architectures becoming more matured in Hong Kong. Even though it was not shown prominently, the tenants moving out of Hong Kong to join their children in the states was a clear sign of evolving architecture and culture which I will talk more about later.
Cultural
The relationship between culture and space is very important in this movie. In Hong Kong during that period, it was considered extremely sinful to cheat on your spouse as per traditional Chinese culture, so as the two main characters grew fonder of each other, when any of them decide to almost cross the line, there would usually be frame within frames, usually with window grills, to capture the moment.
This shows that the main characters are being watched, something I will talk about within Immersion as well. This type of framing is influenced by culture of that era and translated gracefully into the film.
Beyond the obvious architectural influence of Hong Kong pre-independence, there were many cultural nods that could symbolise different architectural and spatial influences that pushed the narrative forward. During the mahjong scenes, which was a cultural staple as a past time for Chinese, would foreshadow and symbolise male dominance, inability to escape and the impending doom of the female lead’s relationship through framing and perception of space being smaller than it should. This narrow space is also part of the culture of Hong Kong but is empathised within this scene with the long lens used.
Immersion
The immersion is in the space. In particular, I want to talk about the boxed up alley way scenes which is prominent throughout the entire film.
The alley way shots were particularly immersive because of not only it’s repetitiveness but the ability of Wong to choregraph around a tightly knit, structurally prominent urban architecture of the city. Details of the wall and the posters left behind, the cracks and stains, the soundscape design all contribute to the inevitable immersive landscape within these oriental streets.
The smaller details like the buildings naturally framing the streets and alleys through light from window grills of homes around them create an immersive spatial environment not only for the scene within the film but also brings the audiences in.
The ambient shots are coupled with usually wider framed long shots that emulate like the couple is constantly being watched. This feeling and framing makes the story of forbidden love even more prominent as we as viewers watch the movie, but also seem like an outsider, constantly watching them as well. Instead of breaking the fourth wall, we enter it.
The Room, Tommy Wiseau, 2003
On the opposite end of the spectrum, I would like to talk to you about the “critically acclaimed” film by self funded Director, Writer, Producer and Actor Tommy Wiseau, The Room.
Perceptual Space
Because of the nature of Wiseau, the movie’s behind the scenes were almost non-existent. As a result, The Disaster Artist by Writer, Director and Actor James Franco who plays Wiseau and Wiseau’s character, Johnny, accurately gives a visual perspective on the crazy on set stories of a first time director and actor.
Perceptually speaking, the iconic scene on top of the roof top where Johnny tells Mark, his best friend, about his frustrations with his then fiance. In Disaster Artist, it is shown that Wiseau wanted an entire green screen over the sky for no particular reason other than because he can. This created one of the awkward 2003 CGIs seen. The shifting perspectives of the chroma keyed landscape did not fit or gel with the narrative and the perspective.
Many other scenes like this were ridiculed within the movie, not just narratively speaking.
This entire scene was shot in 18 seconds and had 6 separate shots. In film making, cinematographers would usually have an establishing shot to let audiences know and understand the space that the character and the camera is in. Even in the most dire of action sequences, there is a setup of what and where our character is in. Each shot lasted only about 3 seconds and that was not enough to establish
Why our character is there
What our character is doing
In what time frame of the movie is our character doing there
Because of the sheer speed of cuts, the audiences are left perceptually disoriented. This became one of the hall mark meme scenes because of it.
Architecture
Having being shot in 2003, Wiseau probably planned for it to be set around that time period with many buildings and architecture of San Francisco. Most of the film takes place in his townhome and the interior design is reminiscent of old school film sets who try too hard to make a home look neat and tidy.
City Scapes like this are still present in american landscape making the urban architecture still relevant, even though it was shot 16 years ago. Due to production issues and budget($6mil estimated), this was shot just outside the studio set that they rented to shoot most of the movie in. Interestingly because of the inexperience of the director of cinematography, the urban shots that lacked continuity gave a different sense of spatial architecture that was perhaps not quite seen in cinema during that era.
Cultural
The Room is a culture in itself. But the relationships drawn between the spatial aspect of the film and cultural aspect is important to note too. From the above GIF, we can see the american past time of Foot Ball but during this scene, is played in Johnny’s townhome. This is irregular and offsetting to most because of the rough nature of Football, one would not expect to play this, even passing, indoors. Most are unsure of scenes such as this if it depicts a part of american culture but in a spatially offsetting environment.
Immersion
The spatial aspect of the film broke all forms of immersion most of the time. Weird locations for weird activities. There’s nothing much to talk about it. Maybe the lack of immersion from the environment.
Art
Jim Campbell, Tilted Plane, 2011
Having seen this at Whitney Museum in New York for the Programmed: Rules, Codes, and Choreographies in Art show, it was totally mind boggling. To me, Campbell’s work was able to stand amongst giants like Nam June Paik. Tilted Plane exists as what I’d like to call a kinetic sculptural movie. It is non-interactive, but tells a sort of narrative from the movements of the lightbulbs.
Perceptual Space
The shifting lightbulbs on solely the Y-Axis(up and down) indicates a shifting, tilted plane, as Campbell puts it well. Titled Plane immerses users by altering user’s Y-Axis with the ups and downs. Lightbulbs that are set on the same brightness, layed out in a repetitive order like our Experience 2 Project, creates sort of a trans. Being seemingly uncountable from it’s sheer numbers, it makes users think they are in some sort of a infinite plane that is ever shifting.
When I stepped into the space the first time, I was greeted with people sitting at the sides admiring the steadily paced motions of each lightbulb, almost like a wave. People then started to take pictures but I noticed no one picture looked the same even though it was the same amount of lightbulbs in a dark room. Every photo, just like every moment within Titled Plane, would be different. The space was ever changing, or rather, perceptually it is.
Architecture
Showcased in Whitney Museum, one of the most renowned museums in the world, show cased on the fifth storey, possibly constructed with fake walls on 3 sides, a sharktooth scrim cloth(I assume), a modular ceiling that allowed ease of movement or repair for the lightbulbs that were being hung from the top of this structure.
It’s architecture seems rather simple, but requires much thought after learning IM.
Cultural
In my opinion, there was not much cultural impact.
Interaction
There was no interaction on a digital level. On the other hand, walking in and being part of the spatial piece could be what makes it immersive over other digital means.
I noticed users interacting with the piece by touching or even moving the lightbulb. As its goal was never to make it interactive, bur rather, tell a story. Human participation or interaction may harm the piece through accidents. Regardless, if the work could involve, I feel it could be more personal or interactive.
