2046
2046 ★★½ 2004 (R)
Wong's quasisequel to 2001's “In the Mood for Love” is a swoony, hopeless romance about lovers who meet each other at the wrong time to fall in love. Womanizing Chow (Leung Chuiwai) is a pulp fiction writer who moves into Room 2047 of Hong Kong's Hotel Oriental and gets involved with the beautiful women who briefly occupy Room 2046 (“2046” is also the name of the scifi novel Chow is writing). There are two exgirlfriends named Su Li (Gong Li and Cheung), whom he left behind in Singapore; Lulu/Mimi (Lau), who is murdered; prostitute Bai Ling (Zhang), who becomes Chow's confidante; and Jing (Wong), the daughter of the hotel's owner who's in love with a man her father disapproves of. It certainly looks gorgeous; Japanese and Mandarin with subtitles. 129m/C DVD . CH HK FR GE Tony Leung Chiu-Wai, Gong Li, Takuya Kimura, Faye Wong, Zhang Ziyi, Carina Lau, Chang Chen, Maggie Cheung, Wang Sum, Lam Siuping, Thongchai McIntyre, Dong Jie; D: Wong Kar-Wai; W: Wong Kar-Wai; C: Christopher Doyle, Lai Yiufai, Kwan Punleung; M: Peer Raben, Shingeru Umebayashi. N.Y. Film Critics ‘05: Cinematog.; Natl. Soc. Film Critics ‘05: Cinematog.