Latin American Music in 'In the Mood for Love'

The use of Latin American Music in Wong Kar-wai’s In the Mood for Love

Wong Kar-wai moved from Shanghai, his hometown, to Hong Kong at age five. ‘It was a new experience, everything was new, and even the language was different. I belong to a family of almost forty cousins. By the time I get [Sic] to Hong Kong I became the only child, the only one, surrounded by ethos.’ He moved alone with his mother to an area surrounded by cinemas of diverse genres; showing Hollywood films, European films and local films. As his mother liked films very much and they did not have any friends or relatives in Hong Kong they spent almost every day in the cinemas. Hong Kong’s cultural diversity, the period in which he moved and his lonely childhood are influential factors in Wong Kar-wai’s cinema.

Wong Kar-wai’s films have big budgets by Chinese standards, feature well-known actors and pop music. His work embraces commercialism but he brings it into his own style. Even tough his films do not reject conventions and commercialism his work is associated with experimental cinema, perhaps for being postmodern, or possibly for his poetic themes and unique visual aesthetic of saturated colours, jump cut and odd camera angles, An ambiguous place between mainstream cinema and auteur status.  His first film As Tears Go By (1988) already patented his postmodern style. It was screened in Cannes International Film Festival. After this successful debut as a director, he has won more than twenty prizes in renowned festivals including Cannes, Hong Kong Film Award, European Film Award, German Film Festival, between many others. In the Mood for Love (2000), was nominated for BAFTA, Palme d’Or and awarded several prices.

Wong Kar-wai works outside mainstream cinema, belonging to the Second New Wave of Hong Kong filmmakers. His films present the viewer with a mixture of cultures and a pastiche of styles, with a complex juxtaposition of nationality and trans-nationality. ‘Wong’s status as a postmodern auteur sees him delve into “moments” that are linked to both history and the personal, whether directly or indirectly… the ever-present fusion between East and West find context in the themes of love, loneliness and alienation that pervade his protagonists.’

‘It is a restless moment, Hong Kong 1962’. Reads the opening title card for In the Mood for Love. 1962 represents not only the time in which Wong Kar-wai moved to Hong Kong but also a revolutionary period in China. The card immediately suggests the tone of the film and the mood of the characters in relation with the social environment; nostalgia, isolation and loneliness that perhaps felt Wong himself when moving to Hong Kong. The film develops a story about love, indecision and missed moment, recurrent themes in Wong Kar-wai’s films. Chow and Chan live together in a crowded building, soon they discover that their spouses are having an affair. Hurt and disappointed, they start dating, realizing that they have much more things in common between each other than with their own spouses. The characters see themselves stock in the dilemma that if they express their evident love, they will be just as their spouses.

In the Mood for Love ‘…may not be directly or overtly political. However, there is often an “indirect relation to the political” via Wong’s conveying of a particularly intense experience of the period as an experience of the negative…’ The tension between the British colony of Hong Kong and communist China is not directly treated, but it is latent in the atmosphere of the film as it was probably in Wong Kar-wai and his mother when moving from Shanghai. The Hong Kong of the 1960s also triggers Wong Kar-wai’s unique style of filmmaking. A city full of tradition, but also modernity and Western influence. On an interview, Wong Kar-wai declares what can give us an insight into the soundtrack of his films ‘One thing that impressed me of Hong Kong when I first arrived was the sound of the city. The sound of the radios that kept playing different music, western music and local music. They come to you with any reason, and that gave me the sense of this place.’ Wong’s description of the city is an indicative of the influence that Hong Kong have had in his style, observable not only in In the Mood for Love but in many of his films.

The soundtrack of In the Mood for Love is virtually wholly comprised of pre-existing music. The practice of setting pre-existing or pre-composed music to a film -the compilation score- predates the classical model defined by Claudia Gorbman and Katherine Kalinak, that derived from the nineteenth-century opera and musical theatre, and it is marked by an adherence to the European Romanticism. The compilation score has persisted trough the film history in many forms, beginning with live performance of popular tunes in silent films.   

The following chart presents the complete soundtrack of In the Mood for Love. Each cue has been marked in the beginning and end by watching the original DVD. Even though the Latin American boleros were written by different composers, they are all sung by the American singer Nat King Cole.

 The score of In the Mood for Love is largely comprised of pre-existing music. However, the compilation score fulfils many of the functions ascribed a classical film-music model. Yumeji’s Theme was written by Japanese composer Shigeru Umebayashi for the film Yumeji (1991). This cue functions as a leitmotif for encounters between Chow and Chan. It is in a Romantic style and the scenes where it appears are in slow motion with almost no ambient sound. The music then acts as protagonist and the function of leitmotif becomes more evident. The Latin American songs also function as leitmotif but they will be analysed more in detail afterwards. Another classical film-music practice of In the Mood for Love’s soundtrack is the setting. Pre-composed music can be effective in denoting particular time periods and geographic places. It can establish a strong connection with the location of the film. ‘It allows the filmmaker to locate the music in a particular sociocultural milieu by subtly reminding the viewers that the film’s characters are also consumers of this music’. This is the case of In the Mood for Love, as Wong Kar-wai said him self, Nat King Cole was extremely popular in Hong Kong during the sixties, his music was been played in almost every restaurant and night club. Especially if we consider that the first time we hear Nat King Cole is in the scene of a restaurant, we can accept that the Latin American music is been used as period music, helping the film to be set in a specific time.

‘...much of the compilation score’s expressiveness derives less from its purely musical qualities than from the system of extra-musical allusions and associations activated by the score’s referentiality. In other words, because of the compilation score’s heavily reliance on pop and rock tunes, its meaning within a film is often dependent upon the meaning of pop music in larger spheres of society and culture.’ The use of pre- existing music in film is extremely associated with the use of pop songs, being this common practice in Hollywood cinema during the nineties. Even tough the composers of the Latin American music featuring in the film might not be of a global fame but just local stars in their home countries, Nat King Cole is a widely known celebrity. Therefore, it is not casual that the versions of the songs featuring in the film are sing by him. ‘Social Practice of celebrity is the social discourse that surrounds music, but does little to comment on the parameters of the music itself. Indeed, much of the discourse around popular music is on the celebrity of the artist’ Therefore, the Latin American music is not only operating in the competence of musical style but also in the competence of social practice. The audience perception of the music might be on one hand Latin American music, and on the other hand the celebrity of Nat King Cole. This can be taken further and in association with a classical film music practice one could say that ‘The celebrity of the artist becomes leitmotivic in the film through the mode of Social Practice’. Nat King Cole becomes leitmotivic in the sense that he is the main connector between the different Latin American songs, connecting Cuban and Mexican composers. In other words, the audience perception of leitmotif is not only based on the repetitive use of Latin American music but also in the repetitive feature of Nat King Cole.

By using previously composed music directors must cope with some obstacles. ‘The music is radically different from the “elastic” tune traditionally composed for film scores in small malleable pieces that can be easily cut or extended to suit a scene.’ Music that has already been made within a previous context has its own formal autonomy that ‘…generally resists the fragmentation and variation that are the hallmarks of the classical score’s leitmotivic or thematic structure.’ Therefore, the leitmotivic use of previously composed music will be different to the classical model not only because of the social practice but also due technical reasons. First, the music will not be exposed to variations been played exactly the same every time, and also, in it smallest appearance will last at least a minute, as we can see in the chart with only one exception. Even tough the pre-existing music is not always played in its full duration, it remains structurally intact, this is to say that the music has not been edited. Therefore, it is the film that adapts to the music, respecting the music’s own formal structure.

‘Well-known music of any kind was thought to carry associational baggage for the spectator, and not only was this potentially distracting but these associations might also clash with those established by the narrative.’ According to Jeff Smith, we can distinguish two different levels of audience. An audience familiarised with the music-that will react different to-an audience that does not know the music.

‘On one level, an audience of uninformed viewers may interpret the song as a background music pure and simple. As such, they may make judgments regarding the overall style and its appropriateness to considerations of setting, character, and mood. However, an audience of informed viewers will recognize the song’s title, lyrics, or performer, and will apply this knowledge to the dramatic context depicted onscreen. In such a way, musical allusion also serves as an expressive device to either comment on the action or suggest the director’s attitude toward the characters, settings, and themes to the film.’ 

The relationship between these two levels gets more complex in In the Mood for Love. It is very unlikely that either an informed or uninformed audience will acquire Wong’s ‘setting’ use of the Latin American music. Only people that lived in Hong Kong during the 1960s might recognize this music as period music. Whether one is familiar or not with the music, it would be more pertinent to make a cultural distinction. Latin American audience will react differently to Chinese people, and Chinese people might react different to Americans. For a Spanish speaking audience could be impressive to hear music sang in their own language -with an American accent- in a film where everything seems to be Chinese. This can be as distracting as it can be captivating, and it could also have a comic effect. Latin Americans might get engaged with the film as this particular music strongly represents their culture. However, they will definitely question what does this music has to do with China. Chinese people not aware of Wong’s intention might wonder where this music is from, and they might feel the film less Chinese. American people might wonder what Nat King Cole is doing in a Chinese film singing in Spanish. In any case, the timbre of the Spanish language is contrasting with the sound of the Chinese language and is adding an attractive “colour” to the soundtrack.

In regards to language, lyrics are also a matter of analysis as they can intrude into the narration. Michael Chion defines vococentrism as the human voice at the top of the soundtrack hierarchy. Lyrics can divert the attention from the dialogues to the music. Wong Kar-wai’s use of boleros in In the Mood for Love is an interesting case of vococentrism. The lyrics of the boleros are only recognizable by a Spanish-speaking audience, depriving a significant percentage of the viewers from the information they provide. Therefore, only few may focus on the lyrics, whereas the others will follow the typical vococentrism of the dialogues. The meaning of the words could create associations different from those intended by the director. But they could also provide new information, or enhance the one given by the visuals and dialogues. Arguably, in the case of In the Mood for Love, the majority of the potential viewers will be excluded from the information the lyrics provide.

The lyrics of the songs Aquellos Ojos Verdes and Te Quiero Dijiste contrast the characters’ subdued behaviour. ´Because the characters of this film tend to speak so infrequently, these songs become central, often occupying both the material and the semantic functions of the speech.` The meaning of the lyrics represent the repressed feelings of the characters. Who obviously have feelings for each other, but they never say so until it is too late. In a way, the lyrics are telling what the protagonists do not dare to say. As an example, this is the translation of a few paragraphs of Te Quiero Dijiste (You Said I Like You).

Cute doll                                                                                     Muñequita linda
golden hair,                                                                                 de cabellos de oro,
pearly teeth,                                                                                de dientes de perla,
ruby lips.                                                                                     labios de rubí,

Tell me if you love me,                                                  dime si me quieres
as I adore you,                                                                         como yo te adoro,
if you remember me,                                                                 si de mí te acuerdas
as I do.                                                                                                como yo de ti. 

The song Quizas, Quizas, Quizas exemplifies very well the uses of lyrics as a narrative device. And because there is a world famous version in English, the association with the meaning of the lyrics is global. The song appears very late in the film, when the characters have realised that their chance to express their love is going. The theme of indecision and ‘missed moment’ has become evident in the film. A literal translation of the song would be as following.

And so the days pass,                                                                Y así pasan los días
and I am desperate,                                                                   y yo, desesperando
and you, you answer;                                                                 y tú, tú contestando
perhaps, perhaps, perhaps.                                                        quizás, quizás, quizás
 

Whenever I ask,                                                                      Siempre que te pregunto
when, how and where                                                             que, cuándo, cómo y dónde
you always tell me;                                                                  tú siempre me respondes
perhaps, perhaps, perhaps.                                                      quizás, quizás, quizás

You're losing time                                                                    Estás perdiendo el tiempo
thinking, thinking;                                                                     pensando, pensando
so what else you want,                                                             por lo que más tú quieras
until, until.                                                                               hasta cuándo, hasta cuándo 

The first time we hear the song is when Chow ask Chan if she wants to come with him to Singapore. We do not hear her answer and the song starts. It is the song that answers: Perhaps, Perhaps, Perhaps. Here, the song is not enhancing the narrative or the mood, it is actually telling the story. As discussed before, this will be only perceived either by an audience that speaks Spanish or that it is familiarised with the song. Probably, Wong’s intension is to provide a subconscious message rather than an explicit one.

Having understood the meaning of the lyrics within the context of the narrative, we can now approach to a deeper analysis of the Latin American music in function with the film.

The chart shows that, after Yumeji’s Theme, the Latin American music dominates much of the soundtrack, and as I already discussed, it does not merely function as diegetic music. The first time we hear this music is in a restaurant where the two main protagonists share a meal. It is a quiet moment full of contrasting emotions. They already seem to like each other and have discovered that they have many things in common, but it is the first time they talk about their spouses’ affair. The narrative functions described above are not yet obvious, but the intention here is more related with Wong’s establishment of setting. The music (Aquellos Ojos Verdes) starts in synch with the cut to the restaurant, it is played in its full duration while accompanying the conversation of the characters, there is a few seconds of silence and a new song (Te Quiero Me Dijiste) starts now. The fact that songs are played in their full duration and that there is a silence in between the two of them suggest that the music is been played in a vinyl or a radio at the restaurant. The location of the music is blurred and Wong’s ‘setting’ intention becomes factual. It could be the music of the restaurant, but it is not acoustically set as diegetic. We only make sure that the music is non-diegetic when the scene changes location and the song keeps going, the camera shows the characters walking in slow motion without any diegetic sound, evoking Yumeji’s Theme’s treatment of the music. In this scene, the function of the Latin American music is confusing, being a subtle way to introduce it in the soundtrack.

The leitmotivic function of the Latin American music is directly related with those of Yumeji’s Theme, which relay its function of love theme to the boleros as the story progresses. As briefly mentioned before, Yumeji’s Theme functions as a leitmotif for every encounter between the two protagonists that are just starting to meet each other. This happens three times in a row in the beginning of the film. The first time they have not spoke yet; all they do is to exchange glances. Between the first and the second time we hear the theme, they have already met each other. However, the scenes are extremely similar and have the same purpose: The slow motion of the camera, the absence of diegetic sounds and the emotional characteristics of the music, strongly suggests an affair between the two protagonists. Not only Yumeji’ Theme, but also these audio-visual techniques function as leitmotif.

As the story evolves and they start dating, Yumeji’s Theme yields presence to the boleros, especially for those moments where indecision and the feeling of ‘missed moment’ are to be portrayed. The second time Aquellos Ojos Verdes is played, is again in the same restaurant, but this time the lyrics gain significance in the context of the narrative: they have been dating, but they do not want to be as their spouses, therefore, they oppress their feelings. The love theme evolves from the excitement of a new affair to the repression of their feelings.

Yumeji’s Theme will dominate the soundtrack again, being played three times in a row. The slow motion and the lack of diegetic sound are also recurrent here. This time Yumeji’s Theme will embrace a scene in which they are thinking of each other; another one in which they seem happy together; and last, when they finally talk about their feelings. This conversation only happens after Chow decides to leave Hong Kong. Therefore, it is too late, and the chance has gone, Yumeji’s Theme will not be played again in the film because it does not portrait the emotional characteristics of the narrative anymore, the affair has happened, the moment is missed. Now it is the time for Quizas, Quizas, Quizas (‘Perhaps, Perhaps, Perhaps’) and all the narrative implications that it carries.

By the end of the film, the Latin American music becomes predominant in the soundtrack. The first time Quizas, Quizas, Quizas appears has already been analyzed in regards to the lyrics. The Latin American music is now been treated similar to Yumeji’s Theme, it does not suggest to be diegetic anymore, it shares the soundtrack with very little dialogue and sometimes it is also being played over slow-motion scenes. In it second appearance, Quizas, Quizas, Quizas starts after Chan rings Chow, but been incapable to speak she remains silent and hang up. The music is reinforcing her indecision by means of the lyrics. The third and last time we hear it, is reinforcing the theme of ‘missed moment’: a few years have passed and now they are trying to find each other. It is a crucial moment of the story, contemplative and silent. Here, the music serves to enhance the nostalgia of the characters, and the lyrics are reinforcing the storytelling, the days have pass, and they never expressed their love, their chance has gone. It is like the character’s inner voice, or furthermore, it is like the voice over of the film. 

Quizas, Quizas, Quizas is also important as a structuring device for the last part of the film. In addition to the narrative implications discussed above, the song is also helping the film to move towards the days and the years. It is bridging the lapse of time that passes when they are searching for each other, and it is also bridging the years that Chow spends in Singapore. In it last appearance, the song leads to a new title card: ‘That era has passed. Nothing that belonged to it exists anymore’. The absence of the Latin American music will now be meaningful to the narration in the same way than Yumeji’s Theme did before. After this title card, we will not hear the boleros anymore because they do not portrait the emotions of the character. The story has evolved and the main theme for the last minutes of the film is the oblivion. Chow physically buries his love to Chaw in a piece of paper. The only original composition in the film will now be heard, a melody driven piece that represents Chow’s pain and also his acceptance to the missed love.  A completely new composition is brought to the soundtrack to portrait an emotion that was not present in the film before. The Latin American music is not part of the soundtrack any longer as the character surrenders to what the boleros were representing.

Having analysed the Latin American music in each particular moment of the film, it is now important to examine the overall connotations of it in regards to the film and the whole soundtrack. The obsessive repetition of Yumeji’s Theme and Quizas, Quizas, Quizas, is a significant mechanism to suggest circularity over linearity. Quizas, Quizas, Quizas, in particular, is not only expressing what is absent in the dialogues by means of the lyrics, but also by means of the repetition. The reiteration of the song is subtly revealing that although the story progresses and the time passes, the characters are always dealing with the same dilemma. It feels as though their indecision were frozen in time. ‘The protagonists are caught in a constantly evolving space where time can stand still or be momentarily captured, but will eventually succumb to expiration’. The repetition of the same music and the slow motion camera support this notion of freeze moment, mechanisms that will not be used any more by the end of the film in order to carry the eminent culmination of their dilemma.

Arguably, the functions that Latin American music fulfils in the film could have been achieved by other musical genres. Chinese music or any other non-Latin American song sung by Nat King Cole could have set the film in the Hong Kong of the 1960s. Many songs in any other language could have enhanced the indecision of the characters, and so on. Latin American music is not the obvious choice to fulfil the functions that this narrative requires. It contributes to a poetic expression whose resulting aesthetic is unique. In fact, this choice is not exclusive to In the Mood for Love, but can also be found in four more of his films: Days of Being Wild (1990), Chungking Express (1994), Happy Together (1997) and 2046 (2004). In these films the function of the music may play a different roll than in In the Mood for Love, but the resulting aesthetic is similar.

The relation between sound and picture is taken to a higher, expressive level in these films. Michel Chion explores fields such as audiovisual counterpoint and audiovisual dissonance, encouraging composers and sound designers not to say with the sound what is been told in the picture, but on the contrary, to add a new value; the sum of two completely different factors will not be 1+1=2 but 1+1=3, this third product being a completely new one; different to what the two initials are on their own. Perhaps the most remarkable consequence of the juxtaposition of Latin American music and a Chinese film is the resulting counterpoint. The bolero is a style marked by the exaggeration of the emotions, especially sentimentality. This over-sentimentalism contrasts with the characters’ subdued behaviour. Therefore, as an extension to Michel Chion’s audiovisual counterpoint we could state that the boleros are creating a sort of ‘emotional counterpoint’. But more in depth, in In the Mood for Love and in the films previously mentioned, Wong Kar-wai is achieving what we could name a ‘cultural counterpoint’ by juxtaposing a musical genre that represent contrasting cultures to the one depicted on screen.

Latin American music is used to signify narrative events, similarly to the classical film-music model, being used as leitmotif, to enhance emotions and to set the film in a specific period. The resulting cultural implications from the China-Latin America juxtaposition have a direct relation to the Hong Kong of the 1960s in which Wong Kar-war grew up. This anachronistic placement of Latin American music is a hallmark in Wong’s aesthetic, and it is a filed that has not been exploited to a great extent by directors. This anachronism not only makes the film aesthetically fascinating but perhaps also makes it more accessible, in this case, to a Western audience. Latin American people - in fact, Spanish speaking audience in general - and Nat King Cole’s admirers will identify with the film by means of the music. A wider use of this ‘cultural juxtaposition’ between music and picture could be obtained with originally composed music. Composers can help directors overcome the obstacles of using pre-existing music in film.  The potential uses of a cultural counterpoint between music and picture could be such as to generate a comic effect by the experience of the unexpected; also, to create a parallel world, in which the music has it own narrative separate to the film, a sort of audiovisual dichotomy; it could also be used to create a feeling of ‘land of nowhere’ where a combination of cultures generates a ‘global location’ rather than a specific one. A multitude of yet unexplored expressive possibilities might arise from such a novel creative approach.