I’ll never understand completionist critics. It’s better, they would have it, to see 10 unique films than only eight unique films with two re-watches littered in the mix. There are so many movies that it would be a waste to spend your precious waking minutes revisiting old film friends. In the most extreme and (in)famous example, the New Yorker’s long-time critic Pauline Kael vehemently refused to ever revisit any film. Even for a canonical picture like Battleship Potemkin (1925) or something more indisputably complex like Nobuhiko Obayashi’s House (1977), Kael, supposing she was honest, would have resisted any temptations to re-evaluate. Once was enough.

Once is not enough for In the Mood for Love.

Read the full article at the Boston Hassle.