Hollywood ? “The Master of Disguise” sounds like it should be a natural for Dana Carvey, who has created a gallery of hilarious characters and impersonations on “Saturday Night Live” and elsewhere. But even his protean talent can’t dent this ponderously unfunny and uninspired comedy. It’s hard to imagine anyone over 10 being diverted by its broad buffoonery, and kids deserve better than this in the first place.

It’s even harder to imagine that Carvey is actually credited with co-writing the script (with Harris Goldberg), but it’s true. Anyway, Carvey is Pistachio, a nerdy waiter in his father’s Italian restaurant apparently in New York’s Little Italy (but clearly on a studio back lot). Pistachio has a compulsive habit of mimicking the restaurant’s patrons, but his father Frabbrizio (James Brolin), who emigrated from Palermo with his family in 1979, has never told his son that they come from an ancient line of masters of disguise, crime fighters as effective as Superman. But a close call in the guise of Bo Derek don’t ask left Frabbrizio eager to pursue a less risky line of work.

But the bad guy, Bowman (Brent Spiner), who Frabbrizio packed off to prison, has served his sentence and is out for revenge. When Frabbrizio is kidnapped by Bowman and Frabbrizio’s wife (Edie McClurg) is diabolically endangered as well, it’s time for Pistachio’s Grandfather (Harold Gould) to pop up and teach his grandson the tricks of the ancient House of Disguisey. This is the premise for the series of clunky, witless adventures Pistachio has with his glamorous, newly hired assistant (Jennifer Esposito).

Remarkably little that Carvey does in his various disguises is even faintly amusing. Gould frenetically goes over the top, but Brolin wisely takes a more relaxed approach. Not much of Esposito is demanded beyond looking good, which she does.

It is not entirely surprising to learn that first-time filmmaker Perry Andelin Blake, who directs with a sledgehammer touch, has been a production designer. The film, which mercifully runs but 80 minutes, has an artificial fantasy look that is more amusing and imaginative in its baroque gaudiness than in any other of its aspects. “Disguise the limit” is the film’s punning promotional slogan, but “Rock Bottom” is more like it.