Wong Kar-Wai
2046

"2046" by Wong Kar-wai is a sequel to "In the Mood for Love" and follows the writer Chow Mo-wan (Tony Leung), obsessed with the woman he lost. Chow, in 1960s Hong Kong, seeks both the woman and himself among various lovers and in the writing of a science fiction novel, reaching, aboard a hyper-technological train, a future place in a hotel room, number 2046, where lost memories can be found.

Hong Kong is a state of mind, cigarette smoke, neon lights suspended between tufts of fuchsia clouds.

Ice-cold intercity trains in motion, carriages scattered with madeleines and pistachios, heading to lost loves. Mirrors and reflections like fragments and stagnant mosaics of lost identities. A massive train heading to places where one can find remembered love. Faces lost in emotional mists that seem to speak in silence. In this sequel, Wong Kar Wai stages a grand surreal equestrian circus where the silken effect captivates and the substance lies in latent essence. We are far from the cinematic and divine touch of "Fallen Angels", from that Hong Kong that Christopher Doyle’s cinematography transforms into an emotional labyrinth, the city as a physical and tangible space reflecting the lives and anxiety of the characters. To distort the stylized dream of "In the Mood for Love" is like awakening from that long Asian mirage, making it accessible to all, Northerners and Anglo-Saxons, globalizing the memory of that dream is like losing its entire mnemonic heritage forever.

And we Mediterraneans, lovers of Magna Graecia, this sequel, this 2046, we imagine it like this, then.

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Heat.

Intercity Salerno – Reggio Calabria – Wagon A-23

Intercity train 7957 departed from Salerno at 17:46, under a sky that seemed to be holding its breath. A bit like Lollo in the movie Trapeze. Saro sat in seat 42F, by the window, gaze lost among the hills stretching towards the Tyrrhenian; in reality his ticket was for 42E, center seat, but he’d left his glasses at home. He carried with him a notebook where he jotted down all the ideas and oddities of the day, but he wasn’t writing—all these months he hadn’t written—a freelance journalist who wrote essays and editorials for different portals.

Suddenly the door of the carriage opened with a hiss. She entered.

Alessandra.

Amber skin, flowing black hair, moonlike skin like the night about to shroud everything… She wore a copper-colored, ultra-light and semi-transparent dress, revealing two legs sculpted like Greek columns. She sat in front of him, crossing her legs with a naturalness that pierced him through. Saro felt his heart race, as if the train had taken a turn too sharply; in truth, it had been traveling straight for hours.

She looked at him. She didn’t smile. But her eyes, large and liquid, already seemed to know everything about him.

"Am I disturbing you?" Alessandra asked.

"No," he replied, too quickly. "Not at all."

The train moved. The wagon lights flickered. Alessandra lightly rested her elbow on the small table, staring at him as one would a child.

"I'm going to Reggio. But I don't know if I'll get there."

Saro looked at her, puzzled. "What do you mean?"

"I don't know if I'll get there... I mean, I don't know if I want to get there. Every time I get on this train, it feels like stepping into a story I didn't write." What do you do for a living, she asked.

He finally smiled. "I write. Or at least... I used to write."

"And what did you write?"

"Stories, tales, novels. But not the kind that end well."

She stared at him again. "Then maybe we're on the same route."

The train sped between Paestum and Sapri. The sun was setting, painting the sea orange and gold. Alessandra began to tell her story. Of a man she’d loved, who left her to chase a dream in Tokyo. Of a father who never understood her restlessness. Of a hotel room, 2046, where she returned every year to remember who she had been.

"2046?" Saro asked, struck.

"Yes. That was the room number. They said whoever entered it never wanted to leave. Because time did not pass there. And you could spend every night with the one you had lost."

The train slowed down at Lamezia Terme, the carriage emptied out. Only they remained. The silence between them was dense, as if time had stopped flowing.

She stood up, went to the window. He felt her magical body brush against him and, for the first time, felt that irresistible mix of grace and temptation, that blend of floral perfumes interwoven with the aromas of sweat rising from Alessandra’s open blouse. The carriage was narrow and she softly began to rub against him, delicately brushing him with her hips to open the window. She stared at him for a moment.

Then she smiled.

The train had arrived at Reggio Calabria station.

But neither of them got off.

The train passed Gioia Tauro. Outside, darkness had become liquid, and the rare station lights floated by like lanterns.

Saro and Alessandra didn’t speak anymore. But the silence between them had become a language. Every gesture, every look, every breath was an unspoken sentence.

She had taken off her shoes. Her legs, now stretched out under the table, often brushed against his. Soft contacts, on the verge of accidental, sometimes almost on purpose. Saro felt the blood pulsing at his temples, but he couldn’t move; he was motionless, like an ancient Cheops.

"Will you come with me?" she said suddenly.

"Where?"

"Into my past."

He didn’t answer. But stood up.

Alessandra took him to the restaurant car, now empty. They sat at the back, where the light was dimmer and the half-light pressed close around their bodies, drawing them in. She ordered two glasses of Nero d’Avola wine; the waiter served them silently, as if knowing better than to disrupt the moment.

"Once," she said, "I was in love with a man who wrote letters he never sent"

The wine tasted of the South: warm, intense, a little melancholic. Alessandra moved closer. She touched his hand. Then his wrist. Then his neck.

"May I tell you a story?" she asked.

Saro nodded.

"There was a woman who always traveled on the same train. Every time she sat in the same seat, hoping to meet the same man. But he was never there. So she began to imagine him. She would talk to him, laugh, and spend every night with him. One day, he really appeared. But she no longer knew what to say."

"And then?"

"Then he took her hand. And she stopped searching for him."

Alessandra moved even closer. Their faces were just inches apart. The train jolted slightly, as if in approval. She told him: this is the Eternal Present. She took Saro’s hesitant hand and, as if guided by a probe with no foundation, began with incredible naturalness to let him explore her body.

While the train traveled somewhere unknown, minutes, hours slipped by in the utmost twilight and silence.

The train rushed between Scilla and Villa San Giovanni, but for Saro, geography no longer existed—only she did.

Alessandra had moved next to him. Not across. Next. As if the border between their bodies no longer mattered.

"Have you ever wondered," she said, "how many versions of yourself exist? The one you dream, the one you show, the one you hide. I see them all."

Saro looked at her. Her scent was warm, spicy, like a ripe fruit left in the sun. Her eyes weren't seeking confirmation. They sought play.

"And you?" he asked, his voice uncertain.

"I’m only the one I choose to be now. The future bores me. The past haunts me. The present... excites me."

She turned to him. Her legs folded beneath her, and her dress rode higher still, almost vanishing. Not by chance. By choice.

Alessandra took the glass of wine left from the restaurant car. She brought it to her lips, then offered it to him. "Drink. But not to forget. Drink to remember."

Saro did so. The wine was warmer now. Or maybe it was her.

"Once," she said, "I made love to a man on a train. Not because I loved him. But because I wanted the train never to arrive."

Saro looked at her, unsettled. "And now?"

"Now I want you to desire me enough not to know who you are anymore."

Alessandra stood up. She took him by the hand. Led him to the small empty compartment at the end of the car. She closed the door. The sound of the train became muffled.

"Here, time doesn’t enter," she said. "Here, it's just you and me. And desire."

She moved closer. Her hands slipped under his shirt, slow, precise. Her eyes did not ask permission. They commanded.

"Don’t say anything," she whispered. "Words are for those who are afraid."

Saro obeyed. His body responded before his mind. Her hands were like the hot wind of August: impossible to hold back, unforgettable forever.

They loved each other in silence. Without hurry. Without a future. Only the Eternal Present. A present that burned, that consumed, that left the taste of iron and wine on the skin.

When they opened the door again, the train had stopped. But no one boarded. No one got off.

Alessandra dressed slowly. Then looked at him.

"Tomorrow you won’t look for me. But every time you hear the sound of a train, you’ll think of me. And you’ll wonder if I truly exist."

Saro didn’t reply. He couldn’t.

She left him a note. No name. No number. Just a sentence:

“2046 is not a room. It’s a moment. And you have been there.”

Then she left.

The train started again. But Saro didn’t notice.