The Words (2012)

Dora: Rory, what the hell? What's the matter with you?
Rory: I...I don't....How the fuck do you end up here? I mean..I look at my life, I look at your life, I look at his life, I look at my father's life, I look at everybody's life, and I don't have a fucking clue how anybody ends up where they do...I don't know
Dora: You don't have to know. There's so much time, Rory.
Rory: I'm talking about my fucking life here
Dora: What about your life?
Rory: It's not right! Nothing's right!
Dora: How's that supposed to make me feel?
Rory: I'm not who I thought I was. I'm not. And I'm terrified I never will be.

The Words (in the movie) is a book written by an accomplished writer Clay Hammond (Dennis Quaid) about a plagiarist who acquires all the fortune and the adulation that he wished for, but only to be troubled by the truth. Rory Jansen (Bradley Cooper) is just another young writer who after months and months of rejection finally finds an admirer in a publisher, only to be told that his book is "too interior" and the world might not be ready for it. As chance would have it, he happens to find the unclaimed work of some unknown writer and somewhat unconsciously plagiarizes the story, word for word, since he so badly wanted those words to be his own.

When Rory's wife Dora (Zoe Saldana) reads his book, she feels there were parts of him in the novel that she had seen were there but that never came out. On her insistence, Rory lets his boss (at the literary agency where he works as a supervisor) read the book. Rest, as they say is history....But there's just one glitch....The old man (Jeremy Irons) who actually wrote the book pays him a visit only to let him know the actual story behind the story. The old man's intention is not to blow the whistle on Rory, but to let him know about "the joy and the pain that gave birth to those words" and when those words were taken, so was the pain.

Although there isn't anything original about the story, the concept could have taken a much deeper, darker path, but the directors, Brian Klugman and Lee Sternthal, probably lacked the boldness. Somewhere along the way, they lose the plot about whose story they really want to tell. Is it Rory? Is it Clay? Or is it the old man? The only great parts are when Jeremy Irons appears on screen, while the rest of the cast leave much to be desired. Turning the plot to the story of Clay makes the story bland, thanks to the poor acting by Dennis Quaid. Dennis Quaid is just good for action/thrillers, and the role of a middle-aged successful writer writing about the dark corners of one's mind is just too much for him. And combined with the fact that he is also supposed to play a skirt-chaser at the same time lets the plot go completely haywire. And why is even Olivia Wilde a part of the story? Anyone could have played that role. Is she the same "13" that we so loved to watch? I kept waiting till the end thinking there still might be a twist that would link her to one of the other characters. But, no. She plays just another dumb, pretentious, Columbia graduate who's there to have a fling with a successful writer. Bradley Cooper, although is interesting for the most part, still lacks the ability to convince while playing a man who has failed himself and is caught in a quandary between morality and the lives of others.

Rating: 6/10
(At the start of the movie, I so wanted it to be a 8/10)