Entertainment

A tree with little to give

Crazy story, I know, but lately it’s like, every day the exact same thing happens: clock radio goes off, I get out of bed, I go to the movies and see . . . a rip-off of another movie.

When they came in to pitch “A Thousand Words,” no doubt by calling it “ ‘Jerry Maguire’ meets ‘Groundhog Day,’ ” a studio exec should have raised the palm of rejection and said, “When you stop being sadly derivative and write an original idea that’s as good as those two, come back.”

Eddie Murphy plays a character so trite even Jim Carrey will eventually tire of playing the type, albeit not soon enough. He’s Jack McCall — a cynical, fast-talking literary agent. The worst things Jack does are to talk too much and drag his feet when his wife (Kerry Washington) suggests moving out of their non-babyproof bachelor pad for the sake of their new son. Jack protests that their son doesn’t mind: “He’s a bachelor!”

What a devil. He needs life lessons from a superstar spiritual guru named Sinja (Cliff Curtis) whose book Jack wants to represent, not realizing the material in question is only five pages. (Ha-ha, Jack doesn’t read: He leaves all that boring stuff to his stressed-out assistant, who is played, with heroic but futile dedication, by the talented Clark Duke.)

While meeting with Sinja (and doing yoga in full business attire — stop, you’re killing me, it’s all too wacky), Jack cuts his hand on a tree that later appears in his own yard. Every time Jack says or writes a word, a leaf falls off the tree, and when consulted, the holy man figures that there are a thousand leaves left, and when they’re all gone, Jack will die.

Sinja says he’ll be back in three days with more clues and a back story, so instead of spending a few words explaining things to his wife and calling in sick at work, Jack naturally tries to carry on as usual. This involves excruciating mugging, flustered sign language, misunderstandings with colleagues, occasional screaming at the tree, suicidal thoughts and (when all else fails) being a nice guy.

Even 2003 Robin Williams would have thunked this script in the fireplace by page 50 (though, to be fair, 2011 Robin Williams would probably burn the fur off his forearms reaching into the fire to rescue it). “A Thousand Words” isn’t even consistent; in a development familiar from “E.T.” Jack begins to feel whatever the tree is feeling, no matter where he is. Strike it with an ax, and he gets a gash in his side. Yet in one scene when the tree is watered, Jack bursts out sweating; in another he doesn’t, and the only reason for the difference is that the former seeks to be comical (it isn’t) and the latter to be soulful (it fails).

In the last third of the movie, most of which is shot in a golden haze suggesting a 1991 Massengill commercial, we learn more about what makes Jack who he really is, deep down inside: a screenwriter’s attempt to get rich via shameless pandering. Jack believes that the secret to being an agent is to read merely the first and last five pages of everything that comes in. But that’s not what an agent does: It’s what the executives who greenlit this film did. You can tell they were bored by this feeble property, and for a change the enthusiasm level of the suits was fully justified.