I’ve noticed that I am writing about increasingly smaller chunks of this movie at a time. “In The Mood for Love” is constructed like a Chinese meal, with tiny bites of film designed to be picked up with chop sticks.

We get another musical interlude. Our protagonists are collaborating on their writing project again. Now they are more animated in their interactions, sharing laughs, freely enjoying the process.

There is no sadness or longing in these scenes — no sense that they need to hide something. Mr. Chan and Mrs. Chow, for the first time in the film, seem to be their full, authentic selves.

But after the interlude, they are in another restaurant and back in familiar roles — with Mr. Chan acting as her husband. Mrs. Chow wants to play out a confrontation with her husband, where she asks if he has a mistress.

In the first run through, Mr. Chan denies an affair at first, but then casually owns up to the charge. Mrs. Chow gently slaps Mr. Chan. He sits peacefully for a moment, then says that she should really let him have it once he admits to what he’s done.

Mrs. Chow responds that she wasn’t expecting him to own up to it so quickly and asks to do it again. So they do a second rehearsal. (As a personal note, it’s yet another perfect synchronicity that I come upon this scene after running through a full day of public speaking rehearsals.)

The rehearsal plays out much the same way, with Mr. Chan being slightly less eager to own up to his indiscretions. But this time, Mrs. Chow doesn’t slap — she gives no response at all and retreats into silence. She adds that she wasn’t expecting what he said to affect her so much.

They she begins crying and embraces Mr. Chan. He tries to console her, saying he probably won’t own up to it at all, she shouldn’t take it so hard. But the subtext of the scene is that her strong emotions go both ways now — she’s both hurt by what her husband has done to her and feels more strongly towards Mr. Chan than she is willing to admit.

This scene is followed up by a short sequence where the landlady gently chides her for staying out as often as she does, then asks if her husband will be home soon. She concludes by saying that husbands and wives need to spend more time together, that he shouldn’t travel so much.

Mrs. Chow is in a sad situation — and caught in a fairly typical double standard. It is her husband who is in the wrong, but she’s the one made to feel guilty for it.

And notice that we are more than two-thirds through “In the Mood for Love” and the couple at the center of it still have not even kissed.