I've hardly ever seen a film take off so marvelously and crash so painfully as My Blueberry Nights. When the movie begins, it seems there's no way it can fail. It's packed with an exquisite cast, a jazzy score, and a boozy, dreamlike atmosphere that would make Charles Bukowski beam with pride. The film appears destined for indie greatness -- until slowly but surely, the whole thing starts to collapse under the weight of its own self-indulgence and becomes a bittersweet dessert I'm almost ashamed to admit fails more than it succeeds.

Talented songstress Norah Jones makes her acting debut as Lizzy, a young woman who wanders into a quiet New York City diner the night she splits up with her long-time boyfriend. She finds comfort, however, in the words and blueberry pie of Jeremy (Jude Law), the diner's dashing owner, whose own emotional baggage isn't too different from Lizzy's. Over the next few nights, the pair find solace in each other's company, though the time eventually comes for Lizzy to take off and head out on a journey of self-discovery. Her travels bring her from Memphis, where the sees the relationship between a cop (David Strathairn) and his estranged wife (Rachel Weisz) fizzle out, to Nevada, where a card shark (Natalie Portman) enlists her help in cleaning up at the tables. But Lizzy's mind keeps drifting back to the Big Apple, where Jeremy waits patiently for the day his and Lizzy's paths cross once again.

My Blueberry Nights is the English-language debut of Wong Kar Wai, a Chinese director whose work comes as close to art as films can get these days. From the acclaimed In the Mood for Love to his section of the Eros anthology film, Wai opts to emphasize moods, emotions, and a memorable visual sense over guiding the audience through a series of creaky plot mechanics. I was fully aware of this going into My Blueberry Nights, and I even readied myself to be taken on a truly tantalizing romantic odyssey. Instead, what I got was a journey into sheer pretentiousness, a look at what happens when a director's desire to be artistic interferes with the audience's enjoyment of a film. Simply put, watching My Blueberry Nights feels like a chore, something viewers feel like they have to do. 

The one vital component My Blueberry Nights lacks, the one thing keeping it from being the profound experience it desperately wants to be, is soul. Just about everything about the story feels like it's done out of duty, all the pieces of the plot set up they way they are because, well, other movies did it too, so why not this one? There's no driving force behind the characters, and as a result, Wai's trademarked visual style (which, admittedly, is very colorful and eye-popping much of the time) seems like merely dressing trying to cover up the bitter taste of a thin, stale, and unmotivated storyline.

Even the cast follows the film's tendency to look a lot better than it actually is. Jones is very photogenic and lends her lovely singing talents to the soundtrack, but her performance here is a little too flat, even for a character who's supposed to be a bit naive and too trusting of others. Similarly, Law's pretty-boy looks don't suit his character, a world-weary diner owner who dedicates most of his screen time to trying to track Lizzy down. Meanwhile, the usually reliable Weisz screams her way through her role, and Portman isn't the slightest bit convincing as a hardened gambler, especially with her phony-baloney accent. The film's one truly great performance belongs to Strathairn, delicately elevating the role of a lovelorn sadsack to a lost soul tortured by a love he knows he can't win back.

My Blueberry Nights is the kind of movie you don't want to hate. You know what the filmmakers are hoping to achieve, and they come so close at times that it really hurts when they can't keep it up for very long.  My Blueberry Nights knows where it's going, but it takes the most boring way possible to get there.

MY RATING: * 1/2 (out of ****)

(Released by the Weinstein Company and rated "PG-13" for drug use, language and brief violence.)