WHAT WOULD NORAH JONES BE LIKE WITHOUT THOSE SONGS?

MY BLUEBERRY NIGHTS: Norah Jones, Jude Law, Natalie Portman, Rachel Weisz, David Strathairn (Written and directed by Wong Kar-wai; The Weinstein Company) Opening date to be announced

We all know that Grammy winner Norah Jones is an extraordinary singer-songwriter. But can she act? We’ll find out when Wong Kar-wai, the Hong Kong director of the breathtaking “In the Mood for Love” and “2046,” unspools his first English-language film--a quirky road movie in which Jones plays the central role. Her character, a dreamy single New Yorker, binges on a blueberry-and-whipped-cream creation in a China Town café and falls asleep with her head upon the bar.

And that’s when the adventurous café manager (Jude Law, at right with Jones) leans across the bar and steals an especially sweet kiss. We don’t know if the kiss is the start of something big, but we do know that before long Jones comes down with a bad case of the jitters and attempts to calm down by taking a cross-country journey. Maybe she’ll return for another blueberry binge, and maybe she won’t.

Why did Wong Kar-wai choose the inexperienced Jones for this challenging project? “She’s a natural,” he told Dennis Lim in a New York Times interview, adding that he had instructed her not to take acting lessons. According to Lim, the fledgling actress did not feel much like a natural. ''I have no idea what he saw in me or where he saw it,'' she told Lim. ''When I got the call, I thought he wanted some music for his movies. It's weird because I feel like I've looked uncomfortable in every music video I've been in.''