It never occurred to me that I’d rather see Lynndie England in a movie than Norah Jones. Nothing works in My Blueberry Nights. Even Wong Kar-wai’s famous ability to pick music deserts him. Regardless of what’s playing on the sound track, it’s “After Midnight” you hear — the film looks like a ten-year-old beer commercial starring Eric Clapton.

What has Wong Kar-wai been doing for the last eight years? None of it makes sense. He seems more lost than any of his characters. Today we live off revivals of Days of Being Wild or As Tears Go By, but when In the Mood for Love came out in 2001 it was a film you pressed close, you looked into its eyes, it was tragic, true, and hot. Its sound track got us through many nights or car rides home — “Quizás, quizás, quizás.” Seven years later, it’s over. The thrill is gone, the nights are cold.