THERE’S A CERTAIN SUSPENSION OF DISBELIEF required with any Wong Kar-wai film. He’s a master of mood and an evocative, at times fabulist, storyteller. The audience is better off releasing their grip on the sometimes ugly realities of their own lives and giving themselves away to his version of the narrative. His films are transporting, and the theme he returns to again and again is love, in all its many splendored forms: unrequited, passionate, otherworldly, dumbstruck, drug-struck, and tragic.

The thing about “My Blueberry Nights,” his first English-language movie, is that it seems to be easier to be carried away in Mandarin than in English. Maybe it’s the critical, resistant-to-change side of me coming out, but the entire time I was watching “Blueberry,” I was imagining the story being told in Chinese, imagining the Jude Law character as a soulful Chinese bubble-tea shop owner, spinning his tales of the keys and hearts left on his counter to a broken-hearted young woman, and sort of liking that version better.

Not that Jude Law doesn’t do a swell job—he does. He’s soulful and attractive, a good listener who looks like a great kisser. In the beginning of the movie he acts circles around singer Norah Jones in her silver screen debut. However as the story progresses and we follow her cross-country search for herself, Jones seems to open up. Or, more accurately, as she encounters other sad, lost kindred spirits, she serves as a very adequate reflecting pool, allowing their shames and fears, desires and disappointments to wash over her upturned, neutral face, her own clear brown eyes betraying absolutely zero judgment.

She’s waitressing her way across America, through honky-tonk bars, dive diners, and middling casinos. Along the way she’s waylaid by David Strathairn, an alcoholic who can’t find his way out of the suffocating stranglehold of his love for estranged wife Sue Lynne, played by Rachel Weisz. Sue Lynne is a gorgeous, too-loved woman, who has conceivably been ruined by her effect on men and her willingness to play that effect. She carries both a Southern accent and a scene of drunken distress very well, considering she’s working with a script that suffers from some serious hokiness.

Norah Jones’ Lizzie runs into Natalie Portman’s character in Nevada and the two have the best chemistry of the film. Portman’s fun and sexy take on her gambling addicted character is bright and affecting. She’s the perennial daddy’s little girl, even as she’s desperately trying to outrun his influence. Isn’t that always the case?

The film’s story is told in something of a triptych form, with bookends, and there is plenty of slowed motion familiar to Kar-wai movies. Interestingly his cinematographer on this movie was Darius Khondji, a departure from his frequent collaborator Australian-born Christopher Doyle who shot, among many others, “Days of Being Wild,” “Chungking Express,” “Fallen Angels,” “Happy Together,” and “In the Mood For Love.” The soundtrack was disappointing as well, with Kar-Wai choosing songs that seem better suited to a night of karaoke—they’re so widely known, popular, and easy to like. I love Otis Redding as much as the next person, but how many times can I hear how “young girls do get weary…” in one movie?

Overall, the women are lovely, silhouetted in clinging dresses, tight skirts, and sweet blouses. You can always count on beautiful, well-dressed women with Kar-wai. The acting is good enough, clichéd script notwithstanding, and the story is sweet, if not life changing. It certainly feels like a Wong Kar-wai film. It looks like a Wong Kar-wai film. It’s just not quite as great as a Wong Kar-wai film. •