It is 1962 in Hong Kong. A married couple, the Chows, moves into a room rented from a loud and boisterous family. Next door, another couple, the Chans, moves into another room on the same day. Mr. Chow, played by Tony Leung, works at a newspaper. His wife is seldom around; in fact, we never see her face. He is kind and quiet, and he wants to write fiction. Mrs. Chan, played by Maggie Cheung, works as a secretary for a philandering boss; she organizes his trysts with his girlfriend and fends off his wife on the phone. Her husband is always away on business; we never see his face either.

These are the two main characters in this delicate waltz around the gossip and intimacy that comes from living in close quarters. The city of Hong Kong seems to encourage such intimacy; many shots are half-blocked by walls, staircases, furniture, forcing the characters together in the frame. Mrs. Chan begins to doubt her husband's telephone calls saying that he needs to stay just one more day on business, while Mr. Chow begins to wonder about his wife when she tells him she's working late but isn't there when he decides to stop by and surprise her. The two of them hesitantly strike up a friendship based on mutual loneliness and proximity; it would be impossible in this setting not to get to know your neighbors, especially ones with whom you have so much in common. He tells her about his dreams of writing martial arts serials; she tells him that she has always enjoyed reading them. They encounter each other in the alleys leading down to a noodle stand near their building. Eventually, because of their loneliness and a growing attraction, they go out to dinner, where they confirm each other's suspicions: their spouses are having an affair. They begin to work out the process by which the affair started, but it's not surprising when feelings for each other develop.

Maggie Cheung and Tony Leung are two of the best actors working, and it is unfortunate that most Americans don't know who she is, and most would confuse him with the Tony Leung from Jean-Jacques Annaud's bloated The Lover (I made the same mistake). Leung won Best Actor at Cannes for his performance here.

The film reminded me strongly of the paintings of Edward Hopper (famous for his oft-parodied Nighthawks): his deep, rich, saturated colors, his preoccupation with loneliness and drab hotel rooms and empty streets. If his paintings showed motion, it would be the fluid, slow camera movement of this film, the lingering gaze of the camera on a half-obscured shoulder, a cigarette twirling smoke into the air, a streetlight through rain. The film has a strong film noir feel; the subject is the same—betrayal—as is the use of shadows, directional lighting, and claustrophobic city scenes. Instead of the bitter sense of doom that comes from noir, here it's the nostalgia of missed chances, as the film says, like looking through a dusty window pane.