The Words (*1/2 out of ****)

For film about literature, The Words is constructed how I'd imagine a 4th grader trying to write something meaningful. Sure there is some attempt at intelligence and a plausible story, but the tale is so poorly constructed that eye rolling and yawns would be induced if you weren't well thinking "this is the child trying their best". However that is not the case here, directors/writing duo Brian Klugman and Lee Sternhal are two people who should know how to make a at least somewhat likable film. 

Bradley Cooper is starting to be typecast as a struggling writer it appears with his character Rory. He marries the girl of his dreams Dory (Zoe Saldana) and tries to make it as a big shot writer. Too bad nobody likes his work. Unwilling to grow up he fortunately comes across a manuscript in an old bag. The manuscript is a beautifully written story which Rory steals as his own. Well when things don't go smoothly when the original writer (Jeremy Irons) shows up. He's the real kick, none of this is real in the film, it's all a story. An author named Clay (Dennis Quaid) wrote this story and his reading it at a showing and later a grad student (Olivia Wilde). If two mediocre stories weren't enough, we also learn the events of the stolen story in first person (With Ben Barnes playing the young Jeremy Irons).  So this is a story within a story within a story that is actually just another story. 

The Words has many problems. Stories are plagued with unneeded narration that explains exactly what each character is thinking (defeating genuine character development). The film is incredibly predictable, basically telling the same story three times. There is scenes of boring and unintentionally funny melodrama that is more painful to watch then laugh of at it's failing. This doesn't feel like a human story, just something thrown together from half finished ideas. It's one of the worst films I've seen this year and I look forward to never having t watch it again. 

*1/2 out of ****