This is a masterpiece. The key here is the emotional restraint found throughout the entire movie. At the very end of the film, he's finally able to speak everything that he truly feels, and it's left up to the audience to imagine the depths of his confession. The passion of his love will remain as a physical manifestation in the temple ruins well beyond his own life. It's an eternal secret. Incredible poetry at work here.
Chow whispers his secrets into the hole of the temple wall, then covers the hole with mud so no other person will know his heart--it is poetic and tragic; but the real beauty of this scene is how Wong Kar Wai lingers on the temple ruins with his camera. The imagery and the music chisel a profound sense of permanence into the viewer. What is in the past is past, and time marches on, forever, for all eternity, painful as that may be.
I love how the movie ends - a second before the screen fades to black, there is a shot of a stone with a 'hole' too, as if inviting the viewer to tell a secret into it, and cover it up with mud, just like what Tony did in the beginning.... remarkable.
In the old days, if someone had a secret they didn’t want to share, they went up a mountain, found a tree, carved a hole in it, and whispered the secret into the hole. Then they covered it with mud and leave the secret there forever. CR.
This scene is a highpoint in cinematic history, combining beautiful cinematography and a melancholic soundtrack of the highest quality with an incredibly powerful story. Simply fantastic.
This movie... What a surprise! It took me a while to realize I was watching a masterpiece. The photograpy, the plot, and the actors are flawless. And this final scene struck me like a lightning. I watched it and rewatched it till I literally had no more tears to shed. Such a perfect combination of beauty and sadness. Although the story is heartbreaking, with two humans who deeply love each other but can't fullfill their sentiments, being moved and shaken in such a tragic way made me feel overwhelmed like I haven't been in a long time. It's a great reminder about our priorities in life... Love, as cheesy as it may sounds, really is the most powerful and the greatest emotion we can experience, and it can make us both extremely miserable and also the most gifted and special beings on this rock wandering through the universe we call Earth.
I have never cried as much as when I first finished this movie. I couldn’t breathe. It moved me so deeply I still haven’t really recovered years later. Disgracefully sad
If you take this sequence out of the context, it might seem as one of the most boring 3 minutes in film history for the reason that literally nothing happens, yet there is so much emotion inside. Amazing. One of the best finales of all time.
Just like how the Buddhist monk looks at Mr Chow and wonders what he's up to. Little did he know it was a man who's whispering his missed opportunity with a woman that she met at a wrong time into a hidden place and has to bury it for eternity.
This scene.. is one of the scenes that i'll never ever forget in my entire life.. the music, the story, the place.. everything about this movie was beyond perfect and this scene made it even more stronger. This might be the best movie i've wathed in the name of love. There's no touching, no kissing, no making love but still it shows us the REAL love. Soo stong. To me it is the greatest romantic movie.
Year after year, I come back here to be intoxicated with this melody. For a moment, I plunge back into the past. My memories fill me as if they were yesterday. Pain, nostalgia give way to a sweet bitter kiss. Life in its most abstract form is a rough diamond that we must polish down to our appearance. Thank you so much for this post 🙏🏾✨❤️♥️🧡💛💚💙💜🤍 Année après année, je reviens ici pour m'enivrer de cette mélodie. L'espace d'un instant, je replonge dans le passé. Mes souvenirs me remplissent comme si c'était hier. La douleur, la nostalgie cèdent la place à un doux baiser amer. La vie dans sa forme la plus abstraite est un diamant brut que nous devons polir jusqu’à notre apparence. Merci beaucoup pour cet article 🙏🏾
the cinematography prior to this scene was vivid and dream-like, with the passage of time being non-linear, sometimes apparently in standstill - those scenes were memories being reconstructed of Mr Chow. cut to present day, the colors appear realistic and we are now in a place unrelated to what we've seen before. he stands in front of a hole and whispers lengthily into it. these memories are his whispers and this is him, trying to rid it once and for all.
I just love the music in the final sequence. It's titled "Angkor Wat (Theme I)" by Michael Galasso off the In The Mood For Love soundtrack if anyone is interested. It's so moody. Each time I listen to that piece of music it instantly arises an emotional response from within. I can't say that many other pieces of music has that effect on me.
Have you noticed that in the final frame before the fade out there appears a hole....the director is giving the audience the opportunity to whisper our secrets. Genius and poetic film making!!!
When you least expect it, something comes into your life and marks you forever. It can be anywhere. It can be in any decade. Regardless of race, ethnicity or religion. And that thing that comes in, it's going to be the most valuable thing in your life. And there will be many who, for different reasons, will not be able to have that. You'll have to let it go and you'll forget something so valuable and beautiful. That unites us to human beings, has always united us and will always unite us. It's just strange to think that powerful feelings like those are going to be lost in the vastness of everything that exists. It's just heartbreaking.
It's soooo sad and so beautiful at the same time, I'm so happy my film studies teacher made us watch this movie, I totally downloaded this song and Yumeji's theme onto my laptop.
This is one of the worst things I've ever seen. I don't mean cinematically - it's a masterpiece; I mean in a way that anybody who has ever lost somebody they loved deeply and dearly will understand. Horrible, horrible, horrible.
Just watched this for the first time. Man, this was so sad... I don't even know what I'm supposed to think about anything now. Why is love such a strong and tragic concept? Love is probably the one thing we live and yearn for the most, and to have loved and lost like this, it's the worst feeling ever. I felt like there was so much chemistry and romance between them and I really wanted to see them end up together, but when the final coda appeared and I read it, it left me so devastated and speechless. What a film... So beautiful but so tragic. Perhaps I misunderstood it. Love is often misunderstood, an enigma. Especially these days. But I hope I don't suffer the same fate as Mr. Chow because all those years away from her and having to accept it as just a fading memory would have drove me insane. I guess that's every love we lose though... A memory. I wish I knew what he said into the hole. Idk I just got so emotionally invested in this film and these characters and it just left me feeling a certain sadness. Hopefully my future love will last and there will be no more painful memories or secrets for me to have.
This is the most beautiful, bittersweet and poetic film I've ever seen. I just noticed that his ring finger is bare, and thinking about his unrequited love for Mrs. chan is painful! Those lonely years, maybe thinking about her as days passed by, that it suddenly become bearable and finally decided to let his suppressed feeling go
This is so incredibly beautiful. I have seen many, many movies, but this scene sticks in my head like none other. Everything about this scene--and indeed the whole film--is absolutely perfect filmmaking.
I feel like he whisper his secret into the hole, and as he buried his secret, he let go... but his whisper, his secret stays there, run through the sandstones, run through the whole place....
This movie is a piece of art. I don't know about you but this scene in particular made me cry. I didn't know why then (because I don't usually cry) but now that I'm watching it for the second time I understand : the beauty of the photography, Angkor Wat, the music (so intense), the acting of Tony Leung. It's just perfect, perfectly moving. I'm in love with this movie.
he whispers his secrets into the hole, and then covers it with mud. it's supposed to be a method to keep secrets as he once said to his friend during dinner in singapore.
The young monk observes that (already) "old" man from the city coming in this temple to whisper at rocks, as so many did before Chow. The kid watches them everyday and he surely wonders why all these adults are doing those spiritual confidences. They probably appear to him as non-believers because they come from the "materialistic" city. But the kid can't understand the power of "romantic" love yet, he is too young and he will maybe never experience it himself because he is a monk. That scene is very beautiful to me because it shows perfectly how love, and specially the "impossible love" feeling, is one of the most intense human experience. Only those who already have experienced it ("us", the audience, who are adults and not monks) can understand. Those who haven't are naive about it (kids, monks). But in the end, even atheist or agnostic people (city people more or less) tend to refer to gods or "spirits" to avoid the pain of love despair. In my opinion, that final scene is mostly about naivety : naivety about love, naivety of adults who doesn't believe in non-materialist stuff anymore. Wether it's from gods or from someone you like, people need love.
mi primer final, me persigue siempre.. lo vi a los 11 años... lo veo a los 34... me define... el dolor es algo que solo siginifica algo para nosotros mismos... que esto viva por la eternidad en mi corazon.. gracias wong kar wai
I actually saw 2046 first and completely ignorant of this precedent. In 2046, I sort of found Chow despicable because of how he treats the women around him and how cold he is even for that one woman who has genuine feelings for her. I get that she does miss someone (as she appears in flashbacks), but I never really understood the connection he had with Su and why he could not let her go. But after watching this, I finally understood where he was coming from and I started having sympathy for him. Its not that what he is doing to that other woman is right. He is just simply could not move on because he never had the chance to be in that moment of being in love with Su. He has so many repressed feelings he now has to live with
The ending reminds me of Rossellini's Voyage In Italy where the ancient ruins may have mysteriously created a miracle of the heart at the end but here no miracle resulted except the lingering of what is unsaid or what could have been. Both achingly beautiful.
Shaking, beating, what a great love!!! Take the chance, if you can get it!!! I wish all people, who are able to feel the great romance, are able to get, PLEEAAASSSE, don*t miss it!!!
I return to this scene again and again. The shots of the beautiful but crumbling Angkor Wat, the confession of the unrequited lover (received by stone, under the impassive gaze of a monk), and the bittersweet strings communicate a deep yearning that we all perhaps share. It also says something about how individual will and desire are so often crushed by the sweeping movements of state and empire-a political aspect to the film that is often forgotten in the face of the story’s powerful emotional thrust.
The lonely monk, an uninhabited temple. The hole dug in the temple wall already there..If someone has a secret they don’t want anyone to hear, they bury it in a tree. The monk made the hole, he once spoke into. Perhaps telling of his secret love for the world, and yet it’s mirrored by our protagonist sharing how he’s world is his his love, and yet once great creations of hopes in his mind become ruins. perhaps. One can only imagine. Choosing to be alone forever, never being alone with in the ruins. My heart aches for such beauty.
This is a wonderful film and very evocative of that era. If one considers the depth of the man's feelings contained in that small hole, consider the magnitude of meaning contained in the cavernous ruins of that temple.
What if you met someone at the wrong place and time? Then fall for them but never really get to love them, and then lose them abruptly? Do you become thankful that you felt something so beautiful for another person even if its just for a while? Or do you become resentful, wishing that in never happened in the first place, knowing you now have to live life not being over that person?
