“If Eddie Murphy’s career were an injured horse, it would be shot and the carcass buried in the remotest part of the desert to ensure no one ever stumbled upon it.”

That harsh sentence, written on June 12 by Rick Bentley in The Fresno Bee in California, is as good an example as any of the prevailing sentiment about Murphy these days. With two big flops in a row, Imagine That and Meet Dave, another risky project on the way, A Thousand Words, and a diva reputation, people seem to be confused. Why does Hollywood keep hiring this man?

The answer offers insights into how the gears of the modern motion picture business grind.

Murphy is still considered Hollywood royalty. One reason is that, contrary to conventional wisdom, studios have long memories.

People who prophesied that his career was over in 2002 with The Adventures of Pluto Nash which cost about $100 million to make but only sold about $7 million worldwide in tickets, looked awfully foolish when Norbit, five years later, sold $159 million worldwide in tickets and was a smash on DVD.

“He is explosive, given the right project, the right circumstances, the right concept, the right director,” said Jeffrey Katzenberg, the chief executive of DreamWorks Animation. But has Murphy has lost his movie mojo? “Absolute nonsense,” Katzenberg said.

Murphy, 48, is one of a declining number of actors whose name alone can get a movie made. Murphy still asks for $20 million a picture and a cut of the gross

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