Review of What Women Want (2000) by Amirah-Renée N — 16 Mar 2012

An ingenious premise wasted on fluffy, inconsequential fare, "What Women Want" had the potential to be so much more. The film follows Nick Marshall (Mel Gibson), a chauvinist ad exec who accidentally gains the ability to hear women's thoughts after being passed over for a work promotion in favour of newly-hired Darcy (Helen Hunt).

At first, Nick uses his new-found power for personal gain, both personally and professionally, as he steals ideas from Darcy and passes them off as his own. I won't give away the ending (unsatisfying as it is), but suffice it say that it wraps things up in conventional rom-com style.

One positive about this movie is Gibson's performance, who embodies the "man's man" charmer persona and carries this film for long stretches. Hunt as Darcy is underwhelming, and there's also a host of uninteresting supporting characters that don't give Gibson a whole lot of help.

However, the script is the biggest problem here. Such a storyline could have been the springboard for a great satire with meaningful things to say about the battle of sexes, but "Women" is content to take the easy road and, in process, disappoint a lot of moviegoers.

Whether or not it gets a lot of such information "right", the point is that "What Women Want" is frustratingly conventional. Skip it.