Chris Rock has mellowed with age.

This was the thought that returned to me again and again while watching I Think I Love My Wife. It’s not just that he and Louis C.K. have adapted their movie from the French New Wave film Chloe in the Afternoon. It was the way every scene that seemed to be going for the jugular instead veered off and just clipped a vein. Here and there you think Rock’s Richard Cooper is going to veer into dangerous territory, that maybe he’ll do something to make himself a touch less likable. Maybe instead of just thinking about bad decisions he’ll actually make some, and then I Think I Love My Wife will have its teeth in you.

But it never quite goes there. The question of infidelity remains only a question, peppered by episodic instances and bursts of comedic routines that (while amusing) make the whole enterprise a bit meandering. I did laugh consistently and often, but it never quite rises above being an amusing way to pass the time.

Richard is a successful something-or-other with a beautiful wife (Gina Torres) and two kids he adores. I wasn’t ever exactly sure what he did for a living, despite a disproportionate amount of the movie being set in his office. I do know he wears great suits and has two secretaries. He’s a success by anyone’s definition of the word, with one notable exception: He’s bored out of his mind. The sex is gone from his marriage, and what little free time he has is spent doing the things his family wants to do. In other words, the usual complaints of a marriage that can nonetheless turn toxic if left unspoken.

Into this unhappy mix walks Nikki (Kerry Washington), ex-girlfriend of a friend or Richard’s and a walking, talking promise of wild sex and crazy nights. First, she only wants a letter of recommendation from Richard. We know right away – and Richard is dimly aware – that all she’s really doing is scoping him out. A few incisive questions about Richard’s marriage tell Nikki everything she needs to know. From there, Nikki consumes more and more of his life. Lunches, afternoons, and she just won’t stop showing up at his office in what could charitably be called “clubbing” clothes. All the guilt of an affair with none of the benefits: that’s Richard’s life. And he just can’t shake her, mostly because he doesn’t want to.

There’s a talented supporting cast here – notably Steve Buscemi as Richard’s happily adulterous business partner, and Edward Herrmann as his uncommonly wise boss – but I Think I Love My Wife is very narrow in its scope. Anyone outside the Richard and Nikki sphere is relegated to role of occasional comic relief, spontaneous advisor, or both. Even Brenda, Richard’s wife, serves as little more than a foil or backdrop to further narrative monologues by Richard. We believe she’s a frigid woman only because we’re told she is, not because it’s shown to us.

And that’s all there is to it, really. What can you say about a movie like I Think I Love My Wife? It’s entertaining but shapeless. Some of the humor is genuinely funny, some of it obvious, some of it like a skit inserted into the script to liven up the proceedings. The actors do their work but never shine. The whole exercise feels a little strained, as if it might be happier (and more comfortable) as an hour-long special. Most importantly, it doesn’t feel like anything Chris Rock or Louis C.K. would write. There are worse ways to spend an evening, true, but there are better ways too.