Review: My Blueberry Nights (2008) ****
“It’s a long ride, Beth. I didn’t want to go alone.”
Natalie Portman to Norah Jones (right) in My Blueberry Nights.
My Blueberry Nights is another gorgeous and melancholy meditation on longing and love from Wong Kar-Wai, his first in English. If it doesn’t quite reach the heights of some of Wong’s previous work, it still deserves to be appreciated in its own right.
Singer Norah Jones plays Elizabeth, a woman looking for a man who doesn’t want to be found. Jude Law is Jeremy, an Englishman who runs the Manhattan diner where the trail Jones is following goes cold. The two have a kind of connection, but the timing is bad. Elizabeth isn’t ready to let go of the man who has rejected her and Jeremy has a few issues of his own. Rather than stick around and sulk, Elizabeth decides to hit the road in that great American tradition of picking up and moving on when things turn sour.
As she works her way across America, her story weaves in and out of those she encounters along the way. In Memphis she meets David Strathairn (Good Night and Good Luck), a heartbroken cop who is drowning memories of his disintegrated marriage to Rachel Weisz (The Constant Gardner, The Fountain) in a bottle of whiskey.
Farther down the road, Elizabeth meets Natalie Portman, a cynical poker player who isn’t as tough as she talks. Estranged from the father who taught her to play the game, she refuses to pick up the phone and say hello until it turns out she may lose her chance to say goodbye.
It won’t come as a surprise to fans of Wong that My Blueberry Nights is not a densely plotted film. Like some of his other work, it’s an expression of feeling or a meditation on a mood rather than a strong narrative. He is a poet more than a storyteller and this is a kind of ode to the breaking and fixing of hearts.
Befitting its wispy, loosely structured song-like quality, the film relies heavily on its soundtrack, an appealing mix of jazz and R&B plus a couple of Cat Power tunes and a Norah Jones tune thrown into the mix. Meanwhile, the terrific Ry Cooder fills the spaces in between. As a side note, I have to admit I’m a sucker for Neil Young’s Harvest Moon in any form and Cassandra Wilson’s cover put me over the edge from like to love with this movie.
As audiences have come to expect from Wong, My Blueberry Nights isn’t only lovely to listen to, it’s beautiful to look at. Photographed by Darius Khondji (Seven, The City of Lost Children), Wong’s America is a dreamy neon reflection in a rain soaked city street. Punctuated with time-tripping interludes of slow motion and time-lapse photography, he isn’t presenting a travelogue. This isn’t America as it exists in real life. It is America as it exists in a dream state, tinged with longing and loss and ripened by memories both sweet and sour. It’s a mythic America where you can get lost, only to return reinvented.
Much has been said about the acting talents of Norah Jones since My Blueberry Nights landed with something of a thud at Cannes in 2007. Criticism of the singer is not only off the mark, it’s entirely unfair. She may not be blessed with great range, but she’s fine. Furthermore, the movie doesn’t completely belong to her. It’s a conglomeration of stories and she’s simply the filter through which they’re told. Her arc opens and closes the movie, but the story doesn’t rest with her performance. The supporting cast picks up the slack, digging into their roles and leaving a more lasting impression. Natalie Portman provides a timely jolt of energy towards the end of the film, but best of all is a weary and broken David Strathairn. His tale of trying to quit his wife and the bottle is genuinely heartbreaking.
Ultimately, My Blueberry Nights is a simple sketch of a film, but it’s not a simplistic one. Built on a foundation of beautiful photography and buoyed by some good performances and a terrific soundtrack, it’s about love lost and it’s about learning to let go of things you’re not ready to let go of. It’s also about how the thing you really want might be right in front of you though you might have to get away from it to be able to see it clearly. These ideas aren’t original, but they’re timeless. Besides, even a minor work from a master is worth seeing and My Blueberry Nights most definitely deserves a look.
My Blueberry Nights. China/Hong Kong/France 2007 (Released in the US in 2008). Directed by Wong Kar-Wai. Written by Wong Kar-Wai and Lawrence Block. Cinematography by Darius Khondji. Editing and production design by William Chang Suk-Ping. Music score composed by Ry Cooder. Starring Norah Jones, Jude Law, Natalie Portman, Rachel Weisz and David Strathairn. 1 hour 30 minutes. MPAA rated PG-13 for mature thematic material including violence, drinking and smoking. 4 stars (out of 5)
Filed under: Reviews
Hope to get this here soon. I thought it was originally set for a late ‘07 release, but dunno what happened. Of course I can’t read anything about it, but I’m in for a viewing. I know it’s received mixed reviews, but I trust your 4 stars over most others, and the cast intrigues me, though I fully expect to be annoyed at least once.
Yes, I’m with Daniel. I’ve had a little more difficulty slipping into the proper mindset for Wong Kar Wai in the past, but I’m still curious to see this when it finally opens here.
Nice review, Craig. I think we’re very much in the same ballpark on this one. The only disagreement I have is with Natalie Portman. I just think that we’re figuring out that she was never the great hope that she seemed. Plus, i think Weisz is quite good.
Yay, a glowing review of the film!!! I have heard too many horrible things about MBN, so I welcome your review with open arms.
I can try to catch this next Monday or it opens on the 1st of May, and I am dying over here to see it.
Loved this film and all Wong’s films. You won’t regret to watch this, really!
The movie leave you speechless, Glimmer? :)
I honestly can not imagine glimmer speechless. It defies imagination.
Figures it would take Ryan’s podcast with the L&TRG screenwriter to bring our precious glim out of hiding. I hope to see you at CP one day soon, young man.
Don’t forsake me, glim. Unless, of course, you have…uh, nothing to say.
i’m speechless…yet there is so much to say. ha ha…..
miranda i have no idea what CP is. ha ha. i’m such a novice. ;)
and i can’t forsake you until after i see gone with the wind. ;)
Miranda Wilding
Figures it would take Ryan’s podcast with the L&TRG screenwriter to bring our precious glim out of hiding
miranda, you know me too well/ you know better than you know your…eyebrows. :)
oh ok..yes i’m that slow….CP…. i get it now…..i really just revisted that street. :)
Yes, you revisited that street. With a vengeance, glim – and I am forever indebted to you…
“i can’t forsake you until after i see GWTW.” That made me laugh out loud. glim, you’ll probably think it’s the corniest, most overblown spectacle you’ve ever witnessed. This is what I’m thinking. But I don’t know.
However, I have a strong inkling that you’ll dig the vibrant colours (VERY advanced for a Christmas 1939 release – in the extreme) and Vivien Leigh’s performance. Even people that loathe this film (you’ll always find a few – *sigh* nothing’s perfect) think that Vivien was extraordinary and the perfect person to play Scarlett.
Ecstatic you’re back, glim. Here, there and everywhere…
I just saw the film and I loved it… the images were so evocative and Norah Jones was beautiful! I just bought the soundtrack and can’t stop listening to it – one of my definite faves!!
Glad to find another Blueberry fan Jess, and thanks for commenting.
I think the soundtrack for me was the kicker and I’m planning on picking it up this weekend.
liked the film. but the soundtrack didn’t work for me. that’s right i wanted less music. :)
And thanks to glimmer, I’ll be able to see My Blueberry Nights this weekend.
[cue music: "Circle of Life"]
*ha ha ha * :)
Interesting Glimmer. Did you just not like the music that was in it?
not really. but i’m not bothered by this things since i’m not expecting to like music in movies…
i just which music had less music in general.it usually doesn’t add anything for me…..
if anything it make me more aware i’m watching a movie (not a big problem since i can pop back into movie mode quickly) since music in real life music just doesn’t happen from nowhere..(at a certain volume every time )and if it did it wouldn’t be a bit of music that telling you how to feel/create a mood. )
so music in films. pretty much no…
i also think music in films kills the repeatablity viweing factor abit….
movies would be fine for me without music. i’d miss it little. :)
Huh. So I’ve finally read this now. Great, great review. I was terribly impressed with MBN as it was my first WKW experience. The visuals were completely mesmerizing, though I didn’t find the story to be much deeper than the average romantic piece. Glad I didn’t miss anything major, or at least that’s what I’m understanding from what you’ve said here. Now to find time to read the MZS piece.
I seriously could not take my eyes of off Norah Jones. Standing around, sleeping on the counter, whatever – I was in. Don’t remember the last time I experienced that. You can have Angelina, whomever, and yes, I’m serious.
As I awesomely predicted in the first comment of this thread, I was indeed annoyed – by both Portman and Weisz, only the first of whom I eventually came to accept. I’m speculating because I can’t otherwise explain it, but I think it was Weisz’ accent. That’s me, the accent freak.
Anyway, a beautiful film that symbolizes “romance” in numerous ways.
Well Daniel, just because I didn’t catch it, doesn’t mean you didn’t miss it. Maybe I’m just dense, but at a certain point I just stopped trying to force it to be something and just let it be what it was.
That sounds kind of fruity, but it makes sense in my head.
Anyway, I’m really happy it worked for you and I hope it inspires you to catch some more Wong. I’d start with In the Mood for Love, but other people might have other opinions.
I’d start with the beginning, As Tears Go By, and just keep going until you hit his greatest accomplishment, 2046 (in my honest opinion).
Don’t be surprised if you fall in love with at least a few of the films during your Wong odyssey, Daniel. The irrepressible charm of The Chungking Express, for instance, is, I think, flatly undeniable. Of course, the fact that you taken in by Wong’s visuals as well as Norah Jones is a very good sign. Again, don’t be surprised when you find your heart racing as Wong’s camera makes love to the women in his films. From Faye Wong to Maggie Cheung to Ziyi Zhang to Gong Li and really all of them… He’s the world’s great romantic filmmaker.
Yeah, listen to Alexander. He knows Wong much better than I do.
(I forgot to mention I agree with you on Norah. Ok, not the greatest acting job, but I was captivated by her)
…you *were* taken in, Daniel!
How many Wong films have you seen, Craig? I think starting with In the Mood for Love is a perfectly reasonable choice. I just typically like to go in order, though I realize there are countless reasons why people cannot do so, as I myself have frequently gone through directors’ filmographies in no order whatsoever.
We must fight the forces of order, Alexander.
Eros ‘The hand ” was amazing: . He needs to work with With Gong Li more. He has said that she is the strongest actress in Chinese cinema.
Sorry, but MBN, was awful. Norah needs to stick to music.
Welcome Bobbi. The first part of your answer is as correct as your second is wrong! (I kid…I know MBN doesn’t work for everyone)
Thanks for the recommendations, Alexander. If it’s a sign of things to come I’m pretty excited. The soundtrack added a lot to it, too.
I know I can’t compare it to any of his other films, Bobbi, but I agree with Craig about the criticism of Norah Jones. I thought the part was perfectly written for her. I think Nick Plowman hit it best in his review – that a more accomplished actress would have been too overpowering.
Well, Craig, the day has finally dawned…
It’s officially the four of us: Nicky, Danny, you and myself. Just finished reviewing MBN several hours ago and I’ve been making the rounds commenting at FATACULTURE and GETAFILM as well.
I gave MBN four stars and it may even make it to five sooner rather than later. I think some moviegoers and critics really wanted a stronger plot line and were perhaps underwhelmed by Norah for whatever reason. But it’s pretty bloody easy to be embarrassingly bad in a movie and I’ve seen it happen more than a few times. She only had a few scenes that belied her inexperience and she effectively carries the film on her very first try. Ms. Jones possesses GREAT charisma and presence. So why all the hate?
I was really knocked out by WONG KAR WAI’S filmmaking, which I’ve heard much about but never had the chance to savour for myself. Incidentally, I don’t buy the old style vs. substance deal over all. But especially not where this particular film is concerned.
I personally think that MBN has plenty of BOTH. But I could NEVER commit myself to one or the other without knowing what was going on. There are a lot of very stylish films that are indefensibly ridiculous and many substantial movies that are really boring.
But MBN is not only a film but an EXPERIENCE that sweeps over you with its lush romanticism. Either you’re up for that or you’re not. So if someone is exceptionally tight, rigid or left brained they likely won’t enjoy it.
It was actually the perfect time for this to show up at my doorstep. We had our first real summer weekend here with temperatures well into the 80s. Just a gorgeous portion of the year and certainly the ideal period to run across something this extraordinary.
This is my favourite film – my #1 – of the entire year at this juncture. Only bad news is that it is apparently being released on DVD in North America on July 1. So, rather than going to see it month by month (as I usually do for repeat viewings of films I become obsessed with) I think I’ll make it a week to week schedule. I want to get quite a few screenings under my belt before the disc hits the streets. Don’t care what anyone says. Watching well loved movies in your own home whenever you feel like it is both a joy and a privilege. But it will NEVER be on the same level as that seat up in the balcony. Nothing can ever come close to that.
Quite the sumptuous, beautiful, elegant, poetic bloody miracle. Yet another thing that we agree on, Craig.
Fabulous review. You rock, my darling.
SO MUCH…
Miranda “But MBN is not only a film but an EXPERIENCE that sweeps over you with its lush romanticism. Either you’re up for that or you’re not.” couldn’t have said it better myself. As I said at CP, I’m relieved you were as intoxicated by it as I was. I didn’t want to say anything when you said you were planning on going because I didn’t want to jinx it, but I was hoping you’d fall for it.
For some reason, I take some movies personally and it feels like a little victory every time someone is on my side. This is one of those movies.
“For some reason, I take some movies personally and it feels like a little victory every time someone is on my side. This is one of those movies.”
The polar opposite reactions to Speed Racer must have been a rollercoaster ride for you.
Well, Craig, you adorable boy …
Cynics are notable closet romantics, right? Two sides of the same coin.
The lavender roses I got the same night didn’t hurt. But, as I told you previously, that’s pretty much done.
(I’m sure that’s why I got them. Not only is my favourite colour – after black and white – purple but I am heading out. Funny how they’ll pull out all the stops for you as soon as you reach the door. It’s inevitable.)
But I have much bigger fish to fry.
Oh yeah…
Sartre, my reactions to Speed are ongoing. I was disappointed and a little mystified by the critical and box office savaging it took…probably why I never wrote my promised review. MBN was different in that I went in knowing critics didn’t care for it, with Speed, I came out of the midnight screening with a big smile on my face only to find nearly unanimous critical hatred and public indifference. Still haven’t quite decided what to make of all that.
Still cannot wait to see this Speed, 6th of June….come faster.
hahaha Nick. I’m glad to see your hopes are undimmed by the trashing this movie has taken.
Finally wrote my review, so I’m making the rounds and reading what others have written.
The mood obviously captured you much more than it did me, Craig. I gave this film break after break, but (like I said in one of the watercooler threads) when Weisz had her drunken breakdown, I lost what little respect I had for the film. And the issue isn’t with films that primarily function as ‘mood’ (I love Herzog’s work, and all of his films are ‘mood’ pieces rather than actual narrative works), but the melodrama that infuses the mood Kar-Wai is crafting. I just couldn’t take it.
I imagine my complaints on the film have generally lined up with everyone else’s. I doubt I’ve said much that’s ‘new’ about the film. And really, I have no clue how Jones’ acting didn’t feel like a nails down the chalkboard to you. The first 10 minutes were brutally painful to me, and I was working extra hard to give everything and everyone (including Jones) the benefit of the doubt. Later on she’s tolerable, but at the beginning she’s just awful. It makes me wonder if we saw the same movie, considering how different our reactions have been.
Perhaps I’ll give this another whirl in a year or two, but I strongly suspect this is not my type of picture. I’ll have to sample some of Kar-Wai’s other work first, though, so I have a bit more context to place MBN within.
Fair enough, Evan, but I almost didn’t feel like Jones actually was “acting” in the traditional sense, or even supposed to be. She was just there, existing sometimes as a conduit for the other stories and sometimes as, let’s be honest, a pretty face to look at.
I’ll make a quick comment here then get into it a little more deeply at MovieZeal after I’ve read your review.
First of all, what you said on the reviewing the reviewers thread about criticism is absolutely right. There’s just no telling what’s going to work for someone and what isn’t. Nothing every works for everyone or is hated by everyone.
For me, there are usually a handful of movies I completely hate, another handful that I fall in love with and then the vast majority that straddle a kind of middle where I can give them the benefit of a doubt and recommend them or be cranky about it and pan them.
With a movie like MBN, I just loved it. I liked the way it made me feel for days afterward. And it was very much a mood. Notions of acting or plot didn’t apply any more than they would in a dream I had. Unlike so many films it’s not a facsimile of reality so much as an exploration of a state of mind. In such a case, the same rules don’t apply for me.
I’d never say that everyone should love this movie, or even like it, but I really am mystified by the scorn heaped upon Jones. I’ll grant you that I’m perhaps blinded by a pretty face, but a performance can only truly fail for me if it’s asked to carry a great weight, be it emotional, dramatic or comic, and it falls short.
In the case of Nora, the film didn’t depend on her. Though the arc was hers, she was mainly just an observer. Her line readings were a little stilted, but in the context of the film’s heightened, artificial reality, it didn’t matter. It actually added a sweet naivety to her performance that made it all the more attractive to me.
Worthy of an academy award? No. Plumbing the depths of the human soul? No. Engaging? Absolutely.
Appreciating this film more than ever, while still sort of classifying it as “minor Wong,” I think that it may turn out to be a pretty decent starting point for a Wong peregrination for novices to his work. Then again, I also fear that it may have turned off many here who now don’t wish to take a look at his earlier efforts. I hope the former instinct based in, if nothing else, curiosity, takes hold.
In time, MBN will be a classic. A minor one, an engaging one, but a classic nonetheless.
All this talk makes me want to revisit Francis Ford Coppola’s One From the Heart, a movie that had a lot of the same style over substance arguments leveled against it.
I haven’t seen it since the 80s, but I wonder if it’s worthy of a critical reappraisal.
“style over substance”
Why is that always immediately considered a bad thing? Especially if the style is fresh and the substance isn’t?
It’s an argument I’m finding myself using less and less. Though, I think you do need a little substance if you’re going to go over an hour in length.
My frazzled attention span is such that I need something to hang on to after awhile.
Awesome, Craig. You WOULD think of that, wouldn’t you?
I’ve actually seen ONE FROM THE HEART in a theatre during my experimental phase. It was playing at a single screen that was having a FFC mini fest. After directing THE GODFATHER TRILOGY and producing THE BLACK STALLION, I would have followed Francis anywhere at that point.
(Not so much now. But then I’ve geared down and am much more choosy about of my filmgoing excursions.)
It was a real EXPERIENCE (with a capital E – much like MBN is, but far more flawed – I don’t think you could call OFTH any kind of a masterpiece if your life depended on it). NASTASSIA KINSKI has the kind of glittering it girl charisma that comes along once in a generation, though I don’t know if she had any actual acting expertise at that point. Same sort of presence as MARILYN MONROE.
I always think that TERI GARR should’ve had more of a shot at leads. Her famous meltdown in TOOTSIE lead to a deserved Oscar nod. I always liked her. She may have been slightly quirky but I always thought it would’ve been cool if she could’ve have broken out of the character actor ghetto.
Like MBN, OFTH is poetically whimsical and depends much more on mood and tone than your average motion picture.
I saw MBN again last night. Had to. It was closing. So, unless it shows up at one of our discount theatres, that is most definitely that. But it haunts me still with its melancholy gorgeousness.
Great call, my beloved crab boy. I wouldn’t have thought to make that very apt comparison. MBN and OFTH would make a fabulous double bill. I think they’ll both be tremendously appreciated by high toned cineasts one of these days…
You’ve sealed the deal Miranda. I’ll be seeking out OFTH soon.
Teri Garr is awesome and you’re right about Kinski…she had a certain something something even if she hadn’t quite developed as an actor.
Masterpiece or no. Flawed or no. It sounds like it’s worth revisiting it.
I saw it in high school I think and wasn’t at all prepared for it and didn’t make much of it.