2046 2004

Rene Rodriguez, Miami Herald: This long, gorgeous, occasionally maddening movie is the work of a hopeless romantic who knows there is no pain as bittersweet -- or as haunting -- as the pain of a broken heart. Read more

Michael Wilmington, Chicago Tribune: At its best, it drenches the screen with sensuous poetry and touches a core of sadness. Read more

Jonathan Rosenbaum, Chicago Reader: The romantic fatalism is so lush that you're invited to get lost in it. Read more

Moira MacDonald, Seattle Times: 2046 isn't entirely successful: It's very high-concept and can be difficult to follow. But when it was over, I immediately wanted to watch it again. Read more

Richard Roeper, Ebert & Roeper: I think it's a beautiful piece of work. Read more

Steve Murray, Atlanta Journal-Constitution: Think of it as a visual tone poem about longing and loss, a journey through a vale of luminously beautiful tears. Read more

Keith Phipps, AV Club: As memorable and emotionally intense as any of Wong's films. It's a mood as much as a movie. Read more

Bill Muller, Arizona Republic: Wong offers an artful meditation on the nature of love, making effective use of color schemes (yellows, greens and reds), placid shotmaking and diverse music to deliver a sultry portrait of postwar Hong Kong. Read more

Ty Burr, Boston Globe: Long, enigmatic, rapturously beautiful meditation on romance and remembrance. Read more

Carina Chocano, Los Angeles Times: A gorgeous, fevered dream of a movie that blends recollection, imagination and temporal dislocation to create an emotional portrait of chaos in the aftermath of heartbreak. Read more

Bruce Westbrook, Houston Chronicle: Some directors wouldn't know a true love story if it smacked them in the face like a big sloppy kiss. Read more

Lisa Kennedy, Denver Post: In a film that likes teasing mysteries, the greatest revelation is Ziyi Zhang. Read more

Lisa Schwarzbaum, Entertainment Weekly: As a cinematic bath for the senses, it's a rush, a swoon. Read more

Scott Foundas, L.A. Weekly: It all sounds dense and intriguing in Wong's patented, meta-Proustian manner and, of course, the movie has so much style to burn that those seated close to the screen may wish for asbestos jackets. Read more

Jan Stuart, Newsday: The editors of Mad Magazine could have had a ball satirizing Wong Kar Wai's gaseous cavalcade of pretentiousness, 2046, if the filmmaker hadn't gotten there first. Read more

Stephen Whitty, Newark Star-Ledger: If only the movie's pace were a little quicker, its compositions a little less studied -- and those sci-fi interruptions simply missing -- 2046 would be perfect. Read more

Bob Mondello, NPR.org: The result is a sumptuous time-teasing story. Read more

Jack Mathews, New York Daily News: Like Wong's past films, 2046 is lovely to behold, elegantly moody and rich in atmospherics. Read more

Manohla Dargis, New York Times: The result is an unqualified triumph. Read more

Andrew Sarris, New York Observer: Quite simply an incomparably sublime work of art, a triumph of lyricism over narrative in the cinema, and the most exquisite homage to the beauty of women it has ever been my privilege to witness on the screen. Read more

Roger Ebert, Chicago Sun-Times: It's like a sketchbook. These are images, tones, dialogue and characters that Wong is sure of, and he practices them, but he does not seem very sure why he is making the movie, or where it should end. Read more

Andrew O'Hehir, Salon.com: Among the most beautiful and most mysterious movies I've ever seen. Read more

G. Allen Johnson, San Francisco Chronicle: Lovelorn loneliness has never been this mouth-watering. Read more

Colin Covert, Minneapolis Star Tribune: The film is a beautiful reverie, a kind of poem about lovers briefly glimpsed and never forgotten. Read more

Rick Groen, Globe and Mail: A beautifully flawed film. Read more

Peter Howell, Toronto Star: It is best to think of 2046 as a series of short stories, pulp fiction penned by a master mood-setter. Read more

Richard Corliss, TIME Magazine: Want to see a great kiss? There's one in 2046, between Tony Leung Chiu-wai and Gong Li. Read more

Geoff Andrew, Time Out: It may help if you grasp the many allusions to Wong's earlier films (including, notably, Days of Being Wild), but it's far from necessary. This, after all, is undeniably real cinema. Read more

Derek Elley, Variety: Mainland actress Zhang Ziyi proves she's a star of major range and luminosity ... while Hong Kong leading man Tony Leung Chiu-wai carries the pic with the charm of a young Clark Gable. Read more

Michael Atkinson, Village Voice: A sweaty, teeming, hot-to-the-touch life-swarm of a movie. Read more

Stephen Hunter, Washington Post: [Zhang's] identity is so strong that it seems to hold the story together most of the time; it really should have been only about her. Read more