My Blueberry Nights

Review By: Michael Dance
MichaelDance@TheCinemaSource.com

When I saw My Blueberry Nights, I had just come down with a killer cold. I hadn't slept much the night before, and right about in the middle of the film, I felt my eyes starting to get heavy. I tried to keep them open, but as always, it was a losing battle. The next thing I know my eyes are opening, and the scene on screen is different.

I curse myself for being so unprofessional, then look at my watch: I'd been asleep for less than three minutes.

I admit this to you not out of guilt (Ebert recently said bathroom breaks are O.K., so I feel safe) but because I think the experience actually enhanced the film for me: My Blueberry Nights plays much like a dream, in which different vignettes fade into each other, the only common thread being the central character - yourself. Drifting briefly out and then back into the film again didn't interrupt the flow so much as it did enhance the mood.

Here, singer Norah Jones, in her first film, plays the central character, Elizabeth. Elizabeth has just gone through a bad breakup, but other than that baggage, she's a blank slate: a hopeful entity that we can graft ourselves onto. The film takes her, and us, on a trip across the United States, meeting different people who are all in their own ways quite lost.

The first stop is a New York City coffee shop run by the improbably attractive and charming Jeremy (Jude Law). Jeremy and Elizabeth bond over late nights of blueberry pie in scenes shooting the moon for romanticism. But Elizabeth leaves, and next surfaces in Memphis, where she meets a drunk named Arnie (David Strathairn) and the separated wife Sue Lynne (Rachel Weisz) who hates him. Finally, in Nevada, Elizabeth meets a cocksure gambler (Natalie Portman) with daddy issues before turning around and heading back to NYC.

The film is the first English-language effort by acclaimed director Wong Kar Wai, who gives it (like his past films such as 2046 and In the Mood for Love) a vibrant palette of colors which all blend into each other. Jones's sweet face and soft voice fit into that visual style perfectly.

Individual moments are often quite powerful. The standout among the ensemble is definitely Strathairn, who in just a few lines creates a fully realized character buried under the regret of his alcoholism but nonetheless baring his soul. He describes how you're given a white chip at AA meetings as a symbol of your intention to stay sober. "This one is for ninety days," he tells Elizabeth. "I got that far once."

Still, I did have the nagging feeling that the whole thing doesn't quite add up to more than the sum of its parts. The overarching romance between Jeremy and Elizabeth would feel more genuine if I actually ever bought Jude Law as a ...