Not Coming to a Theater Near You

2046 / China / 2004

If this is a sequel (of sorts) to Wong Kar-Wai’s In the Mood For Love it’s only because the actor, who played the main character in Wong’s previous effort, re-appears in a more poignant relationship. The characters, however, are very different.

I’ve only watched this once but it still leaves a lasting impression. The thing I remember most about Wong’s film is the incredible sense of alienation between the main character, Cho Mo-Wan, a writer played by Tony Leung, and virtually all the women in his life; but chiefly, Bai Ling, played by Zhang Ziyi, star of Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon and House of Flying Daggers. It’s a story told, for the most part, from Tony’s point of view, and has more to do with how former love affairs, especially early ones, shape and influence the outcome of subsequent relationships. We spend a great deal of time in the past watching this film and on a certain level, Wong seems to imply that what we are is, in fact, a collection of past events and incidents. He ably demonstrates that the two main lovers who meet each other are not meeting each other at all, but reliving old love affairs. Not many filmmakers are able to do this as deftly as Wong, though it helps that the main character is a writer, one whose work is by nature an exercise in memory told through the lens of an incredible imagination.

Essentially, a hack writer (he pays the bills writing soft porn), writes a novel about a mysterious train which leaves for 2046 taking people to recapture lost memories. It’s said that nothing ever changes in 2046 but then no one’s ever returned save the author. He wants to change. But considering the method and means by which he chooses to free himself from himself we know it’s impossible. So he’s doomed to fail – and the love story within his quest is doomed as well.

I suppose this scenario fits the third category of romance, that is, the great obstacle to love. Here’s a film where the obstacles are the lovers themselves. They want to be together yet, unconsciously, tragically, they want more to have their lover break their hearts thereby completing the cycle of heartbreak which began with a former lover some time in the past.

by Marlin Tyree | Source: CIC/Paramount DVD
11 Jan 2007 6:40 PM | Comments (7)

Comments / 7 total / Submit Comment

1. scot / 14 January 2007 / 5:51 PM / URL

   Thanks for that review, I absolutely loved it. Is there any Wong Kar-Wai film that doesn’t, at least subtextually, talk about the undefinable distance between lovers?

2. tyree / 17 January 2007 / 3:11 PM

   Ha. Not that I know of. Have you seen ‘In The Mood”?

3. scot / 18 January 2007 / 12:03 PM / URL

   Yeah, I saw In the Mood for Love and it remains one of my very favorites to this day. When I initially saw 2046 I was dissappointed by it, I think mainly cause I couldn’t figure out what the hell was going on. Is it a sequel? Is it not? If not why the hell is this same guy here? And why is he acting so differently than 2046?!?! All that said, it was amazing to look at. And that review made me want to watch it again very soon.

4. tyree / 18 January 2007 / 3:43 PM

   I don’t think it was intended to be a “sequel”, but there’s no denying that the films share similar themes. ‘2046’ is a progression, certainly. Something of a throwback, Wong is a real auteur in this regard.

5. scotsedley@gmail.com / 18 January 2007 / 7:26 PM / URL

   Right, and now I know that it wasn’t intended to be a sequel, but thats how it was presented to me at first by a friend.

6. leo / 18 January 2007 / 7:59 PM / URL

   2046 is absolutely a sequel to In the Mood for Love. Tony Leung’s Cho Mo-wan is the same character, and Maggie Cheung’s brief appearance in the film is as the same Su Li-zhen from the prior film (which is why such a big deal is made of Gong Li’s character having the same name).

   Of course, the Cho of 2046 at first seems very different from that of In the Mood for Love, but I see this as one of the many things (and not by any means the most important) that align Wong’s films with Proust’s In Search of Lost Time. The second volume of Proust’s work begins jarringly with a seeming reversal of many of his characters: individuals that were dull and unpopular in the first novel (like Cottard) become celebrated social animals, and certain others suffer opposite reversals. Swann, for example, who was a discreet and sensitive character in Swann’s Way, becomes something of a loud-mouth in the next book.

   Similarly, in 2046, Cho seems to metamorphose from a rather quiet, sensitive soul into a boorish sleaze. But here, as in Proust, the point is not that the person himself has radically changed, but that circumstance has caused him to harden his exterior and close out the outside. (This might be foreshadowed in his speaking the secret of his love into a small hollow in Angkor Wat, a sort of ritual of emotional containment.) But by the end of the film, through voiceover, it’s clear that Cho’s character is the same romantic from the prior film, faithful to a notion of a singular and unrepeatable love over the various ersatz variations that present themselves (Zhang Ziyi being the most tempting).

7. leo / 18 January 2007 / 8:01 PM / URL

   And for more on the film, here’s Matt’s full review.