2046 by Wong Kar Wai… depressing, inspiring, confusing. Forced a whirlwind of thoughts and associations during and after the movie, all funneling down to one question: why? Why does this movie feel so tragic and why does it resonate with me, yet cause such a stir when juxtaposed against my life? Perhaps because, as with Murakami’s “South of the Border, West of the Sun”, it is what is wrong with our world. It is unnecessary pain caused by belief in archetypal roles perhaps – a sick society due to a sick framework.
At this point I can see my brother raising his eyebrow and asking “and specifically?”
Specifically, there is something wrong with a society, where people have roles. A role of a lover, a role of a friend, a role of a fling, aqcuaintance, enemy, etc. Not that there is anything wrong with roles, but should they not be second to human understanding?
The main character, for instance, ends up seducing a beautiful woman (don’t remember names of characters). The woman falls in love with him and he does end up loving her STOP. Unproportional affection. Once the framework is established, nothing can be done – people will be hurt. But must it be so? Is not reality a gradual development of feelings based on projections with both influencing each other? i.e. if a projection is broken down, so is the affection?
And even if the framework, this silly initial condition, is a must, even within that there must be a way to maneuver without hurting people… must be a way… of course I am a hypocrite given that I am still a bit reeling from the aftershocks of my first relationship. Or is that just a pretty phrase?
A pretty phrase just as “borrowing others’ time” or, in the same breath claiming that something “will never be lent” when leaving the woman Wong made me fall in love with (yet the main character remains cold) standing in the doorway bringing tears to my eyes.
After this movie I feel drained, exhausted, furious at having been shown what my life might have been like if I was not born to the people I was and did not have the few people who are important to me. Angry at the fact that I am shown, indirectly, my own fears of becoming the main character to whom reality is but a blurry vision seen through the mud-stained glass of his past. And annoyed over fear of the end – something that becomes an obsession of the idle mind of associating myself with each of the characters from the main all the way to his editor – a nice guy with no dignity nor chance – a pervert.
It all seemed like a grotesque pointless masquerade where problems are created out of thin air resulting in eventual death from cancer seeming as but a final stage in the rotting process that started at birth.
And yet still, sitting here writing this, I can’t help but wonder whether all this is itself a result of my paranoid and sick mind enjoying wallowing in it’s own suffering, a healthy criticism of a societal reflection (or [mis]representation), or simply a collection of associations – words strung together through emotions, but otherwise devoid of true substance.
But regardless, whatever this may be, every time I glance Ziyi Zhang above, I feel a sharp pulling somewhere inside, my throat half in size, and tear welling up. Same as when a parting with/missing someone I like…
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