Literary agent Jack McCall uses his "gift of gab" to get various book deals, and he is not afraid to stretch the truth to get them.

Only Jack's assistant Aaron Weisberger realizes he is telling the truth, and goes to his house to keep track of how many leaves remain.

Jack tries to break the curse by being a better person by giving food to the homeless, and donating some of his money to charity, but that plan fails.

With his life falling apart and the tree running out of leaves, Jack confronts Dr. Sinja and asks how to end the curse.

Unfortunately for him, the promotion causes him to be like Jack was, thus he gets his own smaller office Bodhi Tree (though it's implied to be a prank since no leaves are shown falling off as Aaron speaks).

Jack and Caroline get back together, buying the family-friendly house she had asked for, with the bodhi tree in their front yard.

[11] A Thousand Words grossed $18,450,127 in North America, along with $3,594,150 in other countries, for a worldwide total of $22,044,277, against an estimated production budget of $40 million.

The site's critical consensus reads, "Dated jokes (A Thousand Words was shot in 2008) and removing Eddie Murphy's voice – his greatest comedic asset – dooms this painful mess from the start.

[15][16] Frank Scheck of The Hollywood Reporter calls the film another example of "how the talented performer's poor choice of material continually undercuts him".

Although Scheck praises Murphy's efforts, he concludes, "The formulaic script by Steve Koren doesn't manage to exploit the absurd premise with any discernible wit or invention, and the star is left floundering.

"[17] Roger Ebert of the Chicago Sun-Times gave the film one and a half out of four stars and wrote: "The poster art for A Thousand Words shows Eddie Murphy with duct tape over his mouth, which as a promotional idea ranks right up there with Fred Astaire in leg irons."

[18] Justin Chang of Variety wrote: "Alas, even Murphy's largely wordless, physically adroit performance can't redeem this tortured exercise in high-concept spiritualist hokum.