Fruitless Search For The Meaning Of Love And Pie (from This Is Local London)

Film of the week
My Blueberry nights (12A)
Star rating: **
Dir: Wong Kar-wai
With: Norah Jones, Jude Law, Rachel Weisz, Natalie Portman

Watch the trailer here

Odd that Wong Kar-wai's romantic drama wasn't out in time for Valentine's Day, as it's as drippy as a Channel-swimming Labrador. Like his previous films, the Hong Kong director's English-language debut aims to appeal to the head, the heart and the eye. Only in the last category does he succeed. In other respects the arthouse darling's bid for multiplex affections is a bland dish, more mashed potato without the butter than cinnamon-dusted blueberry pie.

My Blueberry Nights finds Wong's semi-regular leading man, Tony Leung (In the Mood for Love, Happy Together), replaced by Jude Law. After his turn in The Holiday, Law is becoming the go-to guy for directors in search of a vaguely sexy, mildly reassuring male presence. The Alfie star is the magnolia paint of romantic heroes, a safe bet against which more radiant pieces can be placed.

In this case that means Norah Jones, the singer-songwriter here making her acting debut. Jones has admitted to some trepidation at leaving the recording studio to appear front of camera, but she's a perfect fit for the part of Elizabeth, a young woman reeling from a break-up.

Vulnerable yet determined, attractive in all manner of ways, from her indie-girl looks to her kindly but no-nonsense attitude, she's one of the brightest things in the movie - no mean achievement when you are competing with Wong's Technicolor palette.

It is while searching for her errant boyfriend that Elizabeth meets cafe owner Jeremy (Law). A sweet-natured sort, he has been listening to his customers' tales of woe for years. He genuinely cares about their problems. In short, Jeremy is about as believable an owner of a busy New York diner as Hannibal Lecter. Law's attempt at a Manchester accent adds another few miles to the credibility gap. If his Jeremy is from t'cobbled streets I'm t'next landlady o't'Rovers Return.

While chatting to Jeremy after hours, Elizabeth wonders why her boyfriend, why anyone, would treat another person so badly. Sometimes there is no reason, Jeremy tells her, just as there's no rational explanation why customers gobble up the cheesecake every night and leave the blueberry pie untouched. It's perfectly wonderful, yet overlooked. Elizabeth, connecting with the story of this neglected foodstuff, asks for a slice of the pie. Are you getting this metaphor yet? Could we be more spoon-fed?

Reasoning that distance makes the heart heal faster, Elizabeth hits the road, sending postcards to Jeremy along the way. Her first stop is Memphis, where she meets David Strathairn's alcoholic cop, Arnie. Though estranged from wife Sue Lynne (Rachel Weisz) Arnie can't let go of her, or the past. Elizabeth is finding out what becomes of the broken-hearted in the wider world, with their tales putting her own experiences into perspective.

Strathairn (Good Night, and Good Luck) subtly wrings the last drop of poignancy from his character. Weisz, like all the women in Wong's film, seems out of place. While matching the aesthetics of this sumptuous movie, she's at odds with reality. It's like seeing a swan in a hen house: you can't believe such a sublime creature would find itself there. Nor, for that matter, is it easy to credit anyone dumping Jones.

Weisz, struggling bravely against the handicap of her beauty, acquits herself well in a scene where her character's resolve crumbles. In this instance the Wong style matches the acting substance, with his psychedelic colours and all-shook-up camerawork reflecting the character's disorientated state.

At other times, however, you long for Wong to ease up a little on the directorial tricks. The man is incapable of delivering a dull shot, whether showing a subway tearing across an electric blue sky or a river of white ice cream melting into hot cherry pie. More often than not, though, his techniques get in the way of the drama, or add nothing to it.

Elizabeth's last encounter is with a gambler, Leslie, played by Natalie Portman. The spiky friendship between the worldly Leslie and Elizabeth adds some desperately needed grit and humour to the picture. Though at first she seems as out of place as the rest of Wong's womenfolk, Portman grows into her role and leaves the action too soon.

Following its heroine, the story by Wong and Lawrence Block goes in a straight line from start to finish. There is no wandering down interesting byways as in Wong's previous films, and that's a pity. Road movies are about as well travelled an idea as Route 66. Given how he has played around with storytelling in the past, Wong might have been expected to be the director who made them worth exploring again.

With his English-language debut over, it will be interesting to see where Wong heads next. As his leading lady discovers, the most fascinating road travelled is always one's own life.

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