I initially saw "2046" on the big screen at an art house and immensely enjoyed its visual beauty and moody romanticism, but I came away feeling puzzled by the narrative. I found the film more satisfying on DVD, where you can watch it repeatedly until the pieces of the puzzle gradually fall into place. Still, I think "2046" is difficult to interpret, even after repeated viewings. But what I like best about it is the way it captures the feeling of yearning for the past.
In the role of the protagonist, Tony Leung dominates the film, and I was enthralled by his performance. The women in Leung's character's life are played by attractive actresses Ziyi Zhang, Faye Wong, Gong Li and Carina Lau, all of whom look striking in their 1960's clothing and hairstyles.
I would describe the narrative in "2046" as being driven by Chow Mo Wan (Tony Leung) recounting his relationships with three different women. The relationship given the most screen time is that of Chow with a dance hostess (Ziyi Zhang), and while he appears to be happy to have her as a lover and bar buddy, it seems to me he's never really in love with her. On the other hand, he is evidently very attracted to a hotel owner's daughter (Faye Wong), but she doesn't reciprocate his feelings because she is in love with a Japanese businessman (Takuya Kimura). Chow's third relationship—chronologically occurring before the other two—is with a professional gambler (Gong Li) who apparently comes up with an indirect way of rejecting him.
But I would be remiss if I didn't mention another important aspect of "2046." Chow writes science fiction, and we are shown parts of two of his stories involving a futuristic train taken by passengers who want to recapture lost memories. One of the stories is ostensibly about a Japanese man falling for an android cabin attendant. But I think it's quite obvious that this story is really about Chow's attraction to Faye Wong's character.
The title of the movie "2046" refers to the number on the door of the hotel room in which Ziyi Zhang's character resides. Actually, this number embodies additional allusions as well, but I won't discuss them here: you can get additional information about this in the DVD special feature "Numerology of '2046.'" And by the way, when writer-director Wong Kar Wai speaks the title of his movie on the DVD, he says "two oh four six."
I should mention that "2046" is Wong Kar Wai's follow-up to "In the Mood for Love" (2000), continuing the story of Chow Mo Wan from that earlier film, with Tony Leung playing Chow in both movies. However, in the behind-the-scenes documentary on the DVD, Wong characterizes "2046" as an echo of "In the Mood for Love" rather than as a sequel to it. Incidentally, the actress Maggie Cheung was romantically paired with Tony Leung in "In the Mood for Love," and she reappears very briefly in "2046."
One of the best parts of "2046" for me is the music on the soundtrack. In addition to evocative original music composed by Shigeru Umebayashi, there's interesting period pop music, including Nat King Cole's "Christmas Song," Dean Martin's "Sway" and Connie Francis's "Siboney." There's also music from Truffaut's "Confidentially Yours" and Kieslowski's "A Short Film About Killing", as well as some music from Vincenzo Bellini's operas "Norma" and "Il Pirata." One of my favorite special features on the "2046" DVD allows you to select one of the movie's musical numbers and branch directly to the part of the film where that number is heard.
Another special feature on the DVD consists of interviews with Wong Kar Wai, Tony Leung and Ziyi Zhang, and I found this worth watching. There's also a rather dull short production featurette misleadingly titled "Anatomy of Memories," but in fact about how the French company BUF supplied the computer-generated effects for the sci-fi part of "2046." Finally, there are two deleted scenes and an alternate ending on the DVD, but I did not feel rewarded for having watched them.
On the next page, I've given all the details for the "2046" DVD.
