Critic's Notebook: Cannes, a k a Asia West

The New York Times > Movies: "Why the delay? Some people impishly suggested that the director, who has been known to reshoot and recut his films until the last possible minute (and beyond), was still on location or in an editing room somewhere. A joke making the rounds in the cafes and hotel bars suggested that Mr. Wong was working out a deal with festival organizers whereby his next movie would be given the Palme d'Or in 2007 and shown in 2008. Or perhaps the title of '2046' referred to its projected completion date.

The dominant personalities — Michael Moore and Quentin Tarantino — may have been American, but Asia was the continent most heavily represented in competition, with 6 of the 19 entries. In addition to "2046," from Hong Kong, there were two each from South Korea and Japan and one from Thailand.

The other programs were also full of Asian films, ranging from the quiet, well-received "Passages" by the first-time Chinese director Yao Chang to the lavish, crowd-pleasing "House of Flying Daggers" by the eminent Chinese auteur Zhang Yimou. There were, among other offerings, a smattering of Hong Kong action spectacles, a science-fiction anime feature from Japan ("Ghost in the Shell 2: Innocence," in the main competition) and a Korean War picture ("Sword in the Moon," in Un Certain Regard). You could extend the theme of Asian dominance by noting that by virtue of "Kill Bill: Vol. 1," Mr. Tarantino, the president of the jury, might qualify as an Asian filmmaker himself.

This is not the first time that Asian films (and their admirers) have had a significant presence in Cannes: 2000 was the year not only of "In the Mood for Love" but also of "Yi Yi," "Chunhyang," "Eureka" and "Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon." Recently this festival has become one of the premier Western showcases of Asian cinema, a development that reflects both the tastes of the programmers and the state of global film culture in the first decade of the 21st century. What Europe was 30 years ago, Asia is today: a continent with at least a half-dozen artistically and commercially thriving national cinemas producing work in a dizzying variety of styles and genres, from challenging festival fare to populist blockbusters. Their influence is felt around the world, in the high-flying martial-arts wire work that has lately become a Hollywood cliché and, more interestingly, in the delicate urban anomie (a specialty of Mr. Wong's) that permeates Sofia Coppola's "Lost in Translation."