| Photos (see all 19 | slideshow) | Videos (see all 10) |
| Tony Leung Chiu Wai | ... | Chow Mo-wan (as Tony Leung) | |
| Li Gong | ... | Su Li-zhen | |
| Faye Wong | ... | Wang Jing-wen / Android | |
| Takuya Kimura | ... | Tak / Wang Jing-wen's Boyfriend | |
| Ziyi Zhang | ... | Bai Ling | |
| Carina Lau | ... | Lulu / Mimi / Android | |
| Chen Chang | ... | Mimi's Boyfriend | |
| Jie Dong | ... | Wang Jie-wen | |
| Maggie Cheung | ... | Su Li-zhen | |
| Thongchai McIntyre | ... | Bird (as Bird Thongchai McIntyre) | |
| Wang Sum | ... | Mr. Wang / Train Captain | |
| Ping Lam Siu | ... | Ah Ping | |
| rest of cast listed alphabetically: | |||
| Ting Yip Ng | ... | (unconfirmed) | |
Directed by | |||
| Kar Wai Wong | |||
Writing credits(in alphabetical order) | ||
| Kar Wai Wong | screenplay | |
Produced by | |||
| Wai-Chung Chan | .... | line producer | |
| Ye-cheng Chan | .... | executive producer | |
| Gilles Ciment | .... | co-executive producer | |
| Eric Heumann | .... | co-producer | |
| Stéphane Kooshmanian | .... | associate producer | |
| Amedeo Pagani | .... | co-producer | |
| Zhong-lun Ren | .... | executive producer | |
| Marc Sillam | .... | co-producer | |
| Kar Wai Wong | .... | producer | |
Original Music by | |||
| Shigeru Umebayashi | |||
Cinematography by | |||
| Christopher Doyle | |||
Film Editing by | |||
| William Chang | (as William Chang Suk Ping) | ||
Production Design by | |||
| William Chang | (as William Chang Suk Ping) | ||
Art Direction by | |||
| Alfred Yau | |||
Costume Design by | |||
| William Chang | |||
Production Management | |||
| Olivier Chiavassa | .... | production manager | |
| Chiu Wah Lee | .... | production manager | |
| Helen Li | .... | production manager | |
Art Department | |||
| Ping Lam Siu | .... | property master | |
Sound Department | |||
| Michael Baird | .... | sound designer | |
| Yu Teng Hsu | .... | boom operator | |
| Claude Letessier | .... | supervising sound designer | |
| Du-Che Tu | .... | sound designer (as Tu Duu Chih) | |
Visual Effects by | |||
| Johnny Alves | .... | digital effects artist | |
| Florent Andorra | .... | digital artist | |
| Jérôme Arthuis | .... | processing: DuboiColor | |
| François-Xavier Aubague | .... | visual effects supervisor | |
| Christophe Belena | .... | coordinator scans/recording/color grading: Duboicolor | |
| Nadir Benhassaine | .... | visual effects coordinator: BUF Compagnie | |
| Mélodie Boileau | .... | visual effects coordinator | |
| Nicolas Bonnell | .... | visual effects producer: BUF | |
| Coralie Boulay | .... | visual effects editor | |
| Florent Cadel | .... | digital artist | |
| Nicolas Daniel | .... | video operator: Duboicolor | |
| Sébastien Drouin | .... | visual effects supervisor | |
| Laurent Gillet | .... | visual effects: Buf Compagnie | |
| Rip Hampton O'Neil | .... | technical director: Duboicolor (as Rip O'Neil) | |
| Sonia Holst | .... | visual effects coordinator: Buf Compagnie | |
| Abdel Ali Kassou | .... | processing: DuboiColor | |
| Didier le Fouest | .... | digital colorist (as Didier Le Fouest) | |
| Damien Macé | .... | compositor | |
| Karine Marchandou | .... | digital grading manager | |
| Philippe Palmieri | .... | digital artist | |
| Xavier Perol | .... | digital artist | |
| Boris Plateau | .... | digital compositor | |
| Olivier Pron | .... | concept artist | |
| Olivier Pron | .... | digital artist | |
| Guillaume Raffi | .... | visual effects coordinator: Buf Compagnie | |
| Sebastien Rame | .... | digital compositor | |
| Eddy Richard | .... | digital artist: BUF | |
| Mathilde Tollec | .... | digital artist | |
| Daniel Trujillo | .... | digital artist | |
| Jean-Marc van Rijswick | .... | digital artist: BUF | |
| David Verbeke | .... | visual effects supervisor | |
| Dominique Vidal | .... | visual effects: BUF | |
| Sophie Gateau | .... | digital artist (uncredited) | |
Stunts | |||
| Wei Tung | .... | stunt coordinator | |
Camera and Electrical Department | |||
| Ian Freeman | .... | grip | |
| Pung-Leung Kwan | .... | director of photography: second unit | |
| Yiu-Fai Lai | .... | director of photography: second unit | |
| Chi Ming Wong | .... | gaffer (as Wong Chi Ming) | |
Editorial Department | |||
| Serge Anthony | .... | color timer (as Serge Antony) | |
| Fabien Pascal | .... | color timer | |
| Laurent Pelé | .... | assistant editor | |
Other crew | |||
| Stephanie Cheung | .... | production secretary | |
|
|
|
|
|
| The White Countess | Slaughterhouse-Five | 8½ | Diarios de motocicleta | Fa yeung nin wa |
|
IMDb User Rating:
|
IMDb User Rating:
|
IMDb User Rating:
|
IMDb User Rating:
|
IMDb User Rating:
|
| Full cast and crew | Company credits | External reviews |
| News articles | IMDb Drama section | IMDb China section |
| Add this title to MyMovies |
Review: 2046 (2004) By Ken Lee
Several years in the making and highly anticipated, _2046_ (2004) should pacify director Wong Kar Wai's fans, at least, for its end-of-an-era feel and look. At its core, this is a decidedly (or deceptively) simple movie, in spite of its fractured and non-linear narrative. It tells the tale of an emotionally wrecked man, Chow Mo Wan (played by Tony Leung), a reprised character from Wong's critically acclaimed earlier oeuver, _In the Mood for Love (2000)_, and the many beautiful women he keeps and fails to keep, in a time-space continuance that is laden with sepia-tinted memories: a monologue, if you will, of Chow's torrid love affairs, love spats, and the ensuing heartbreaks resulting, no doubt, from the pangs of a failed liaison Chow is trying to escape. It'd appear that the failed relation with Su Lizhen (Maggie Cheung) in _In the Mood for Love_, who has a "special appearance" in this film, has changed Chow irrevocably, which is key to understanding Chow's troubled soul.
But it is not a sequel necessarily, per se, to _In the Mood for Love_. This film can still be watched on its own, though it'd certainly help if you could link moments in _2046_ to the director's earlier works, for it's laden with jumbled continuity (take the character of Lulu, for example, first seen in _Days of Being Wild (1991)_), hidden meanings (read: Neo-Godardian) and other fun stuff, sorta an insider's joke, if you dig such esoteric things. But I digress. And it's been said that this is a culmination of all the previous filmic experience of director Wong (bordering on narcissism); hence its "end-of-an-era" feel and look is duly appreciated and a point well taken.
In _2046_, Chow's isn't an easily likable character owing to the frailty and the vagaries of his own personal emotions and peccadilloes, but that makes him only human and real, and his character, believable. Take the following exchange:
Su Lizhen (Gong Li) to Chow Mo Wan (Tony Leung): Do you know my past?
Professional gambler Su (she who is of the same name as that of Maggie's character in _In the Mood for Love_) asked Chow, dissonantly, questioning the latter essentially whether there is a future for the both of them, if he cannot forget his past. And it's for the same reason, or so we're led to believe, that Bai Ling (Zhang Ziyi) is left devastated, as Chow cannot treat her any differently from the scores of other women he's seeing; hence eliciting the following memorable line from Bai which I'm sure speaks to most of us one way or another:
Bai Ling (Zhang Ziyi) to Chow Mo Wan (Tony Leung): You may not like me. But I'll like you all the same.
What fools we are made by love. :)
Contrasting Chow as a man who dwells in the past and in need of closure to move on, Tak (Kimura Takuya) isn't ambiguous when it comes to matters of the heart.
Tak (Kimura Takuya) to Wang Jingwen (Faye Wong): I do not know what your answer may be. (I dread to know.) But I need to know.
Here is a man who is not afraid to love and says his love. And he needs to know if his love is unrequited. And in seeking happiness, the message seems to be that there is no other way. Now why does this remind me of all the sorry tales with which we are all-too-familiar with men-who-cannot-commit-or-decide? :) And so the film is thusly replete with impressions of repeated variations of the same theme: the pointlessness of returning to the past. Which is why we have the following line:
Bai Ling (Zhang Ziyi) to Chow Mo Wan (Tony Leung): Why can't it be like before? (The same reason why nobody returns on the 2046 train, in Chow's sci-fi novel of the same name. Seen in this light, it is also a double-entendre for director Wong: Why can't this film be like the one before in the form of _In the Mood for Love_? Where does he go from here?)
Those familiar with Wong's earlier works will notice his signatures throughout: quick cutting, slow motion, fast motion, freeze frames, black and white, tilt shots, color filters, neon-sign lighting, aided ably by three able cinematographers. Production value of _2046_ is expectedly top-notch. Music by Shigeru Umebayashi is haunting and sets the right mood. Zhang Suping (William Chang Suk Ping) does a wonderful job in creating an enrapturing atmosphere set in the late '60s.
How great it is, in an otherwise desolate world of unease, vulnerability, hopelessness, and pathos, we have directors such as Wong to feast our senses. Highly recommended.