“Beyond Borders” offers viewers a well-intentioned but flawed melodrama.

Directed by Martin Campbell (“Goldeneye” and “The Mask of Zorro”), Angelina Jolie plays a gorgeous Londoner named Sarah who just happens to be super nice, too. She almost constantly sports a wounded expression. Needless to say, the character lacks depth.

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The story begins at a 1984 benefit ball when Sarah witnesses a handsome, daring doctor crash the event because funding for his work in Africa had been pulled. From the moment the roguish doctor, Nick (Clive Owen), bowls over Sarah (wearing white satin and pearls) on his way to the front of the party, anyone could see the two would meet again.

And meet again they do, as Sarah cleans out her savings and flies to Ethiopia to distribute food and medicine at a refugee camp run by Nick and a host of other relief workers.

Nick initially mocks her naiveté and perceived vanity, but of course, he eventually comes around to appreciate Sarah’s heart of gold.

On a side note, one wonders how Sarah’s clothes stay an almost spotless white in the middle of the dusty African desert. It seems in Hollywood, aesthetics are more important than reality.

Sarah goes back to London for a few years and gets a job with the United Nations, before journeying to Cambodia to provide relief for Nick’s operations again. She later follows him to Chechnya.

Nick and Sarah’s romance feels forced, and screenwriter Caspian Tredwell-Owen weaves myriad movie clichés into the script, such as when Sarah has to give a speech, only to run off the stage, choked up.

Also, even though 10 years pass during the course of “Beyond Borders,” no one’s face suffers the ravages of age. Surely the make-up artists could have done better.

The movie’s greatest strengths are the fascinating backdrops against which the rather ordinary melodrama plays out. The movie takes us to three damaged, war-torn areas of the world, and the scenes involving the native people of those areas are among the most interesting.

While the local politics provide needed drama, a subplot involving a CIA-type agent who has connections with Nick only provides distraction. The shady operative feels out of place in “Beyond Borders.” Character development is much more necessary than ridiculous intrigue.

This is the same old flat love story, but at least the scenery is cool.