Melancholy and the infinite sadness

Review by Vives Anunciacion
Inquirer Libre, December 5, 2004

2046
Written, Directed and Produced by Wong Kar Wai
Starring Tony Leung Chiu Wai, Gong Li, Zhang Ziyi, Faye Wong
PG 13 / 124 minutes
Block 2 Pictures and Paradis Films / Shanghai Film Group / Jet Tone Films
Opens today

Wong Kar Wai may be one of the few filmmakers of world cinema, Lav Diaz included, who can get away with almost anything which eventually become cinematically notorious. 2046 is a feverish recollection of chance encounters and prolonged repression.

2046 brings back playboy sleaze writer Chow Mo Wan (still played by the controlled Tony Leung Chiu Wai) in the cramped hotel rooms of Hong Kong and Singapore during decadent 1960s Asia. 2046 tells the many passionate encounters between Mo Wan and the different occupants of hotel room 2046 (and 2047). He then translates these encounters into his futuristic erotica for a Singapore newspaper. When Chow and Su Li-zhen Chan (Maggie Cheung) cross paths at the stairwell, one is reminded that this is a sequel to the transcendental In the Mood for Love.

The movie doesn’t play out straightforwardly, as only Kar Wai can present it in distorted, play-rewind-play-fast forward-play-rewind narration. 2046 retains the stylish patina and obstructed perspectives of In the Mood with the help of photographers Chris Doyle, Lai Yui Fai, Kwan Pun Leung. Zhang Ziyi (as the desensitized prostitute Bai Ling) shows she can do more than just kick and fly in the air and parleys with slick Tony Leung. 2046 may not turn out as seminal as In the Mood, yet it remains an overwhelming and stunning achievement in filmmaking as much as it is an interesting contribution to world cinema.

While there remains a visual resemblance to In The Mood, 2046 is less emotionally intense and passionate. Even then, this downward spiral into missed opportunities flows with unending pathos. Hopeless romantics will find this movie depressing as hell. 2046 is not a love story – it is a “unloved”-story: about the never-ending search for warmth that can fill the emptied shells called our souls.