What Women Want

2000 "He has the power to hear everything women are thinking. Finally... a man is listening."
6.5| 2h7m| PG-13| en| More Info
Released: 15 December 2000 Released
Producted By: Paramount Pictures
Country: United States of America
Budget: 0
Revenue: 0
Official Website:
Info

Advertising executive Nick Marshall is as cocky as they come, but what happens to a chauvinistic guy when he can suddenly hear what women are thinking? Nick gets passed over for a promotion, but after an accident enables him to hear women's thoughts, he puts his newfound talent to work against Darcy, his new boss, who seems to be infatuated with him.

Genre

Comedy, Romance

Watch Online

What Women Want (2000) is now streaming with subscription on Prime Video

Director

Nancy Meyers

Production Companies

Paramount Pictures

What Women Want Videos and Images
View All
  • Top Credited Cast
  • |
  • Crew

What Women Want Audience Reviews

Konterr Brilliant and touching
Organnall Too much about the plot just didn't add up, the writing was bad, some of the scenes were cringey and awkward,
Nicole I enjoyed watching this film and would recommend other to give it a try , (as I am) but this movie, although enjoyable to watch due to the better than average acting fails to add anything new to its storyline that is all too familiar to these types of movies.
Jerrie It's a good bad... and worth a popcorn matinée. While it's easy to lament what could have been...
asafoetidabaumgartner The standard formula for a feature film: Protagonist + antagonist + plot point one -> changed protagonist + what do I do now? + antagonist -> protagonist + do the wrong thing + antagonist -> protagonist + Aha! + antagonist -> resolution of sorts.is okay as far as it goes, but "What Women Want" demonstrates that a flick can follow the formula and still fail to succeed! The problem is that the audience has to care about the protagonist and the antagonist. I didn't give a damn about Mel Gibson's problem with being passed over in favor of Helen Hunt at the ad agency he works for. So, when he nigh onto electrocutes himself and finds he now can hear women's thoughts--well, it was an interesting concept, but, apparently, once a schmuck, always a schmuck. He discovers his ability enables him to be attractive to women, so he puts the make on the coffee barista lady (Marisa Tomei) and then drops her without a second thought. It gives him a window into his daughter's world (predictable subplot). But, in the thing that is most important to him, viz., his job status, it enables him to steal Helen Hunt's ideas, which ends up getting her fired. Later, he repents and scurries about trying to set things right. I was so repelled by his opportunistic appropriation of his boss's ideas, that I actually couldn't bear to watch it, so I fast forwarded over some of the scenes (a luxury one does not get in a cinema). I didn't like him. I didn't care about him. So, I didn't care about him getting religion in the final reel. I felt sorry for Helen Hunt (time was, I would have paid to watch her read a telephone book--remember those?), but I was glad I decided not to watch him destroying her self-confidence.It seemed that the writers of "What Women Want" were enamored of their characters, but they really didn't care about them. They manipulated the characters like puppets for formulaic effect. All too mechanical for my taste.In the end, Gibson is supposed to be a changed guy, but a) I didn't believe it and b) I didn't care.
erawillmoth I did not like this film at all, even despite the fact the humour was executed well. The main point of the movie seemed to be to show the main character Marshall, played by Gibson, that women actually did have feelings and personalities. The way women were portrayed in the movie, however, seemed to me to be counterproductive to this, since the majority of them (I won't say all because I don't have a photographic memory of the film) came across as shallow and as being mere accessories to the plot, rather than characters in themselves. The only women who had one iota of personality (excluding Marshall's teenaged daughter, who probably had a personality to make up for the fact that the filmmakers morally couldn't sexualise her) seemed to be the secondary main character McGuire, whose thoughts still managed to centre the majority of the time on Marshall and her opinions of him, or, conveniently, on some new idea Marshall could exploit.The main problem of the film to me was that Marshall did not seem to learn anything at all. He apparently was so misogynistic that it didn't occur to him women were independent beings capable of thought and this 'myth' for him seems to have by the end been debunked, but the idea that he supposedly learnt that women were equal to men didn't come across. In fact, the film seemed to make valid his opinion that women were only there for sex with men (eg. the end, in which Marshall ends up having sex with McGuire). McGuire's personality, in fact, seems to have been written into the film purely to make her 'hard to get', and therefore further drives home the message that women are there for men's benefit.This is the most misogynistic film I have ever seen.
jwells97 This was the most fun I've had movie-watching in at least a year. It had me laughing, talking to the characters (mainly "Oh, no!" and "Watch out!"), and eager to see what would happen next. I guess it's true that women are difficult for men to understand because what we're are thinking often contradicts what we're saying. What DO women want? The casting was wonderful, the acting was superb, and the direction was perfect. I heard that Tim Allan had been considered for the lead role. He would've been a great choice, but so was Mel Gibson. Bravo to one and all! Now how about doing a similar movie with a woman hearing men's thoughts, hmmmm? Just as Shirley Temple helped distract grateful Americans from the Great Depression, we need more comedies like this to distract us from equally-distressing things.
Wuchak ...this one's quite good."What Woment Want" (2000) is about a chauvinistic executive (Mel Gibson) who accidentally receives the power to hear women's thoughts, which is both scary and enlightening (and funny). Helen Hunt plays his romantic insterest while Lauren Holly is his ex-wife and Marisa Tomei his one-night stand. Ashley Johnson is also on hand as his daughter, who is shocked when she sees her distant father showing signs of really caring.The ending gets a little too mushy, but "What Women Want" is consistently entertaining throughout. It's basically a story of redemption -- a chauvinistic man learning the error of his ways in a fun way, and changing.The film runs 127 minutes and was mostly shot in Chicago with some senes in the Los Angeles area.GRADE: B+