What Men Want
Starring: Taraji P. Henson, Brian Bosworth, Josh Brener, Richard Roundtree, Tracy Morgan (Rated MA – 117 min).
Unofficial sequel, more a follow-up, inspired broadly by the Mel Gibson, Helen Hunt, Marisa Tomei and Bette Midler rom-com, What Women Want (2000), switches the gender for full modern era comedic effect. Ali Davis (Taraji P. Henson) is a sharp operator flying under the radar at a top notch sports agency marketing world dominated by blokes. This pretty much excludes her of chances to move up the corporate ladder while also being shunned as a participant of weekly staff poker nights. Although Ali has what it takes to gain clients and deliver quality control, her female status is not respected from many of her male counterparts.
After a sip of special clairvoyant tea, followed by a massive girls-night-out of debauchery when an accident occurred on the dance floor striking her head, Ali wakes up with the ‘gift’ of hearing the mostly wild inner thoughts of each and every male within her vicinity. Sending this sharp business woman unusually off kilter at first, she soon learns to use the power to complete advantage from the boardroom to the bedroom in generally funnier than expected circumstances.
Out of touch chauvinistic disrespecting men here are at a premium, thankfully many cut down to size quick by an ever thinking but not too mean spirited Ali. Love conquers all in these movies too, so a subplot of romantic exploits brings both cringeworthy to heart pulsing moments.
Not expecting much going into this comedy, I really enjoyed the rare comic performance from generally high dramatic actress Henson, she’s hilarious setting female empowerment in full stride while communicating reasoning to each of her key targets on being one step ahead.
American Basketball fans and sports lovers in general will enjoy multiple cameos from real life athletic professionals while former NFL star The Boz (Brian Bosworth) is terrific in a love-hate kind of way. Tracy Morgan (50 Rock) has his fans but an acquired taste testing the patience here.
Worth seeing with a bunch of girls or like-minded fans of chick-flicks, the prominently female audience I watched this with roared throughout.
Shane A. Bassett
