Though Steve Carell adds little to The Incredible Burt Wonderstone, the rest of the all-star cast keeps the film from being utterly mediocre.

The Incredible Burt Wonderstone is nearly a “good” film, perpetually dragged down by Steve Carell’s worst performance yet.

The film may be incredible, but in title only: Carell (Hope Springs), try as he might to play the wonderful magician, can’t quite fill Burt’s shoes.

This isn’t to say Carell doesn’t have comedy chops — he’s been great in films such as The 40 Year Old Virgin — but when the lead actor in a movie is also the leading cause of the film’s failure, that’s where the real problems begin.

Such is the case with The Incredible Burt Wonderstone, the tentpole magician comedy romp that should have been. Featuring an all-star cast and a largely funny (if banal) script, Burt Wonderstone’s biggest quandary is Burt (specifically, Carell) himself.

The plot is as cookie-cutter as possible: Burt and Anton Marvelton (Steve Buscemi, Hotel Transylvania) are lifelong friends living their dream as a famous magic duo on the Las Vegas strip, but the act has become outdated and the friendship strained. When dastardly up-and-coming shock artist Steve Gray (Jim Carrey, Mr. Popper’s Penguins) puts their show out of business, Burt has to learn to be a better person, rekindle his relationship with Anton and design a fantastic new trick that will put the duo back in the spotlight.

The story hits all the standard Hollywood notes, including a worthless love interest (Olivia Wilde, People Like Us) clearly shoehorned into the plot just to make it absolutely clear that Burt isn’t a gay character (despite the fact that Burt and Anton are based on Siegfried and Roy).

Forgetting the pointless plot, however, Burt Wonderstone still has its fair share of funny moments. The film never quite reaches a comedic apex, instead merely ambling along from one bizarre set piece to another. There are numerous gags and one-liners pervading the film, but the promise of incorporating the ridiculous pomp and circumstance of Las Vegas stage magic into an off-the-wall comedy never quite comes to fruition.

That being said, the raw talent in Burt Wonderstone’s cavalcade of stars gives a lot of life to an otherwise mediocre movie. For his part, Carrey absolutely steals the show, chewing scenery in the best way possible. Audiences haven’t seen Carrey play a character as unhinged as Steve in a long time, and although he’s in Burt Wonderstone for a generous amount of time, he still feels underused.

Elsewhere, Buscemi, James Gandolfini (Zero Dark Thirty), Alan Arkin (Stand Up Guys) and a resurgent Jay Mohr (Hereafter) all have delightful turns as the kind of wacky one-note characters viewers should expect from this movie.

Yet despite how close this movie comes to simply being “good” (on the basis of its comedy), Burt Wonderstone is perpetually dragged down by Carell, who never finds a comfortable niche throughout the film. Burt’s character arc is designed to take him from a joyless, arrogant veteran to a blank-slate hero, yet Carell is unable to effectively depict either aspect.

Burt’s character requires a different type of acting than Carell has become accustomed to, and throughout the early parts of the film, Carell’s “stupid but nice guy” acting crutch peeks through constantly, as if it’s the only comedic effect he knows how to correctly utilize.

The portrayal is so mismatched and ultimately flat that Burt feels all but dead throughout the whole movie – he’s neither an interesting character nor a relatable one, leaving nothing but the other characters’ jokes to carry the audience along.

Ironically enough, viewers will often find themselves moaning through yet another scene with a robotic and disinteresting Burt, waiting anxiously to see more of Steve’s sickening antics.

Burt Wonderstone is light comedy at its lightest, where the writing was just good enough for some of the actors to make it work and just poor enough to make the film’s less funny moments stink like cold fish.

Between cast and concept, it’s a film that had tons of potential but simply didn’t deliver.