Maybe some books just shouldn’t become movies. Kazuo Ishiguro’s bestselling 2021 novel “Klara and the Sun” was a work of rare poignancy — though not rare for Ishiguro, whose elegant novels (“The Remains of the Day,” “Never Let Me Go,” “When We Were Orphans,” among others) explore the quiet emotions of characters who often cannot voice their true feelings. Klara, his heroine in this book, is a lonely robot, or in the book’s parlance an Artificial Friend, who in a not-too-distant version of the future sits in a shop window waiting to be purchased. Fourteen-year-old Josie, who is seriously ill, soon brings her home, and Klara begins to learn about the various kinds of frailty that come with being human.

It’s a gentle, lovely book, and it needed to come to screen with the lightest of touches — as “The Remains of the Day” and “Never Let Me Go” did, years ago. Unfortunately, the new version directed by Taika Waititi (adapted by Waititi and Dahvi Waller) never quite finds that delicacy. Jenna Ortega (“Beetlejuice Beetlejuice,” TV’s “Wednesday”) plays Klara with a sweet goofiness that’s quite charming, but the performance feels more rooted in physical comedy than in the character’s actual vulnerability. Amy Adams, as Josie’s mother Chrissie, brings her usual thoughtfulness to the role but doesn’t have much to do, and Mia Tharia as Josie clicks nicely with Ortega but remains something of a blank slate, a problem probably having more to do with the screenplay than the performer.

Waititi and his cinematographer Michael Berlucchi create some striking visuals: The screen playfully pixelates whenever Klara enters a new environment — her system is recalibrating, as are we — and Klara’s relationship with the sun, which she sees as a sort of guardian, is depicted in some beautiful scenes that glow with magic light. But the tone is all over the place — Natasha Lyonne, as the Store Manager who initially teaches Klara about life outside the shop, seems to be acting in an entirely different movie, one much brasher and more satirical — and this “Klara and the Sun” too often is cloying when it should be moving. Ultimately, the movie is like Klara herself: sweet and earnest and not entirely there.

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‘KLARA AND THE SUN’

2 stars (out of 4)

MPA rating: PG-13 (for thematic elements, some violence and strong language)

Running time: 1:56

How to watch: In theaters Oct. 23

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