2046
Sony Pictures Classics | Release Date: August 5, 2005 CRITIC SCORE DISTRIBUTION
78
METASCORE
Generally favorable reviews based on 34 Critic Reviews
Positive:
27
Mixed:
7
Negative:
0
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Critic Reviews

Critic scorePublicationBy date
100
Boston GlobeTy Burr
The new film lives up to expectations and, indeed, pushes past them into virtually unmapped territory. Read full review
100
San Francisco ChronicleG. Allen Johnson
A rare, sumptuous movie treat. Read full review
100
Seattle Post-IntelligencerSean Axmaker
The result is rich, lush -- simply exquisite. Read full review
100
Austin ChronicleKimberley Jones
A riot of sight and sound that, however baffling, has an irresistible, elemental pull. Read full review
100
Christian Science MonitorDavid Sterritt
Filmed to perfection by the great Christopher Doyle and others. Read full review
100
The New York TimesManohla Dargis
Like Hitchcock, Mr. Wong is at once a voyeur and fetishist par excellence. Read full review
100
PremiereGlenn Kenny
I'm glad that 2046 is different from "Mood" even while being strangely of a piece with it. Like "Mood," it’s a movie of utter wonder and ravishment. But the key here is different. Read full review
91
Portland OregonianShawn Levy
One of those undeniably beautiful things. The film is, in fact, an encyclopedia of beauty -- the beauty of desire, the beauty of nostalgia, the beauty of music and clothing and smoke and pain, and, chiefly, the beauty of women. Read full review
91
Entertainment WeeklyLisa Schwarzbaum
There are many places a visitor may go astray in 2046 -- places where the filmmaker appears to be a bit at loose ends too. Still, Wong's invitation -- ''Let's get lost'' -- is irresistible. Read full review
90
Dallas ObserverJean Oppenheimer
It's the best thing Wong has done in years--perhaps ever. Read full review
90
Village VoiceMichael Atkinson
Mood is everything, trumped up by a score so rich with pop songs, bossa nova drama, and symphonic mournfulness it's almost a movie on its own. 2046 may be a Chinese box of style geysers and earnest meta-irony, but that should not suggest there aren't bleeding humans at the center of it. Read full review
90
Los Angeles TimesCarina Chocano
Wong brilliantly blends musical styles and eras to create an intoxicating mood. Read full review
90
SalonAndrew O'Hehir
You may feel lost or bewildered at times in 2046 (and I certainly did), and you may feel that Chow is suffering from self-inflicted wounds. But every new adventure with every new girl vibrates with possibility, and the filmmaking is so stunning that you may not care that this is less a movie with a plot and characters than a hermetically sealed universe of romantic regret. Read full review
88
Chicago TribuneMichael Wilmington
iIt's a film for art- and foreign-movie devotees. But it's also a movie for audiences who simply want to get turned on. Read full review
88
New York PostLou Lumenick
2046 is a bit overlong and not for all tastes, but fans of "In the Mood for Love" will relish this second helping, which is more emotionally substantial than the first. Read full review
80
NewsweekDavid Ansen
In this gorgeously melancholic fresco of love affairs, Tony Leung Chiu Wai plays a womanizing pulp-fiction writer in '60s Hong Kong. Read full review
80
The A.V. ClubKeith Phipps
Just as memorable and emotionally intense as any of Wong's films. It's a mood as much as a movie. Read full review
80
L.A. WeeklyScott Foundas
The result is a film chilly and externalized in all the ways that Mood was bottled up and woozily dreamlike. Read full review
80
TV Guide MagazineMaitland McDonagh
An intoxicatingly beautiful, maddeningly elliptical and utterly enthralling meditation on the fleeting pleasures and haunting aftermath of doomed romance. Read full review
75
The Globe and Mail (Toronto)Rick Groen
Only a master director could make such a beautifully flawed film. Read full review
75
Miami HeraldRene Rodriguez
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 full review
75
Philadelphia InquirerSteven Rea
Nat King Cole croons a Christmas chestnut, an opera wafts into the ether, Latin jazz sways. It's all terribly atmospheric, and if you're in the mood for atmosphere, 2046 delivers. Read full review
70
Chicago ReaderJonathan Rosenbaum
Wong uses his brief evocations of the future mainly as a way of poetically lamenting the past. Read full review
70
TimeRichard Corliss
Even if a Chinese movie doesn't sound like your idea of summer fun, give 2046 a chance. Its pearly artistry and gorgeous faces should put you quickly, deeply, in the mood for love. Read full review
67
Baltimore SunChris Kaltenbach
The film is the work of a visual genius who may have overextended his storytelling ability, but with fascinating results. Read full review
63
Chicago Sun-TimesRoger Ebert
Since it is by Wong Kar Wai, 2046 is visually stunning. He uses three cinematographers but one style, that tries to evoke mood more than meaning. The movie as a whole, unfortunately, never seems sure of itself. 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 full review
63
New York Daily NewsJack Mathews
Like Wong's past films, 2046 is lovely to behold, elegantly moody and rich in atmospherics. And the women caught in Chow's web are extraordinary beauties. Read full review
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