Abstract
Seeking to interpret Wong Kar-wai's three movies set in the '60s, namely ＂Days of Being Wild＂, ＂In the Mood for Love＂ and ＂2046＂, as a trilogy of desire in terms of Lacanian psychoanalysis, this paper explores the intricacies woven by such issues as nostalgia, memory, identity and desire delicately represented in these three cinematic texts. The nostalgia for the '60s in Wong's movies lays bare utopian fantasy, which sustains the subject's desire. Both the biological mother, whom Yuddy fantasizes about in ＂Days of Being Wild＂, and the ＂Woman＂ So Lai-chen, whom Chow Mu-wan idealizes in the films ＂In the Mood for Love＂ and ＂2046＂, stand for the utopian fantasy of a certain plenitude of being or a precious lost object inducing the subject's desire. The first part of the paper examines Yuddy's fundamental fantasy of the ＂footless bird＂ and his obsession with the answer to the enigma of the Other's desire. The second part scrutinizes the detour of the unconscious desire behind the romantic love in ＂In the Mood for Love＂. In the last part, which deals with ＂2046＂, the loss of the beloved one, So Lai-chen, is interpreted as the traumatic core that causes Chow's desire to quest repetitively for women and situations reminiscent of So, the incarnation of the Woman.
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