MY BLUEBERRY NIGHTS
Rating: *** ½ (out of ****)
Cast: Norah Jones, Jude Law, David Strathairn, Rachel Weisz, Natalie Portman
Writer: Wong Kar-wai, Lawrence Block
Director: Wong Kar-wai
Now playing at the Varsity.

Wong Kar-wai’s My Blueberry Nights is a very good Wong Kar-wai movie. This caught me by surprise. Of all living directors, there is almost nobody I admire more than Wong, whose Hong Kong films, including 2046, In the Mood for Love, and Chungking Express are beautifully photographed, and emotionally rich mood pieces about love, loss, and longing. He has made around a half dozen of the finest films ever made in any language and has won a shelf full of international awards, but when My Blueberry Nights premiered as the opening night film in 2007’s Cannes Film Festival, it met with critical apathy. Now, almost a full year later, it is finally opening in a halfhearted limited release with 20 minutes trimmed off by Wong (the extended version is playing in other territories – hopefully it will be made available on DVD), and with the critical tone having been set at Cannes, few critics have found many nice things to say about it.

I walked into My Blueberry Nights expecting the worst. Apart from the critical jeers, I feared that Wong may have taken his distinctive style as far as it could go with the ambitious 2046, a “summation” of all his previous work, as Wong put it. And how would he survive the trip over the Pacific? Many critics have complained that Wong has a tin ear for English dialogue. But surprise - My Blueberry Nights is a wonderful film, and one that confirms by belief that Wong is one of the contemporary giants of cinema, no matter what language he’s working in.

Norah Jones, in her acting debut, plays Elizabeth, a heartbroken woman (there seem to be no other kind in Wong’s world) who, after a painful break-up, finds herself in a café in Soho, New York, where she strikes up a friendship with the owner, a British expatriate named Jeremy (Jude Law). She makes frequent visits back to the café, always at closing time, to talk to Jeremy and eat a piece of blueberry pie, the only one of Jeremy’s pastries that hasn’t been finished by then. Jeremy, also suffering from a broken heart, begins longing for Elizabeth, but without announcement, she heads on a meandering cross-country journey.

The second act is set in Memphis, where Elizabeth works two jobs: a family restaurant by day, a seamy bar by night. At the bar, she meets Arnie (David Strathairn), a middle-aged drunkard perpetually celebrating “his last day of drinking” and pining for his own separated wife, Sue Lynne (Rachel Weisz). In the third act, Elizabeth befriends professional poker player Leslie (Natalie Portman). Together, they travel to Las Vegas, while Leslie’s complicated relationship with her father becomes increasingly clearer. All throughout, Elizabeth continues writing postcards to Jeremy, who desperately wants to see her again.

Some critics have said that Wong’s English dialogue is stilted. I disagree. It’s certainly not the sort of pseudo-naturalistic talking you’d find in most mainstream movies, but then, I don’t think his Cantonese dialogue was exactly realist either, nor do I think that’s his intention. His dialogue is more poetic and lightly stylized, and I often found it quite beautiful. Others have said that his depiction of New York is out of touch with reality, to which I say, well, duh! Wong’s versions of New York, Connecticut, Las Vegas, and the Arizona desert are heavily romanticized versions of their real-life counterparts, as if he was trying to visualize these places as we’d like to see them. Jeremy’s café and its surrounding streets and subways are particularly beautiful, and made me want to hop on a plane and visit Soho.

A renowned visual stylist, Wong is working for the first time with cinematographer Darius Khondji (Se7en, Funny Games) after years with Christopher Doyle. Khondji’s photography is dominated by neon blues and greens in the Soho scenes and luscious reds in the Memphis section, and his frequent use of close-ups and step-framing (a favourite device of Wong’s) make this one of Wong’s most beautiful films, and one of his most visually intimate. Wong and Khondji’s visual strategy includes long, lingering shots of their attractive cast’s faces. During one such shot of Norah Jones asleep on a café counter, as the camera soaks in her beauty, I realized that Wong wants his audience to feel love for his characters – not lust, but love. Mike Lasalle of the San Francisco Chronicle, on of the film’s supporters, wrote, “He’s committed to replicating, in visual terms, what it’s like to feel passion. Wong invites you to fall in love, not with a particular woman, but with love itself and with a specific moment in time.” Exactly.

Norah Jones, making her acting debut, exists as a catalyst for the action, and as a figure for viewers to insert their own conception of love. She is not the most comfortable of actors, and her role is the least developed of the central characters, but she does fine. The rest of the ensemble – Jude Law, David Strathairn, Rachel Weisz, and Natalie Portman – fit perfectly within the context of a Wong Kar-wai film. Strathairn is particularly excellent: his low-key delivery and slightly nasal voice, combined with the weathered details of his face, hint at a character with a virtual ocean of sadness underneath.

If 2046 was the summation of Wong’s career, maybe he intended My Blueberry Nights to introduce his career to a broader international audience. Devotees of his work will enjoy spotting references to his past films. The theme music from In the Mood for Love plays over one scene, while Portman’s card shark is an American version of Gong Li’s character from 2046, and I think the final scene owes a lot to the conclusion of Chungking Express. (Incidentally, the blueberry pies of this film might be stand-ins for the pineapple cans of Express).

But despite these references, My Blueberry Nights may be Wong’s most accessible film to date for non-fans. What Wong has done is take his signature style and transplanted it to an American setting. And far from repeating himself, Wong’s style has become richer, more sensual, and more satisfying as the years go by. Critics who chastise Wong for not conforming to some unwritten rules of how American films are supposed to be made are missing out by refusing to embrace the beautiful, self-contained, and completely original universe that Wong has created in this film and others. If you’ve enjoyed Wong’s films in the past, I can’t understand why you wouldn’t enjoy this. If you’re unfamiliar with his work, this is a great place to start.