What Women Want is a major league, big time, chick flick. She was in Pay It Forward and Dr. T. and The Women last month, and you'll see her with Tom Hanks in Cast Away which opens tomorrow. I found it slow starting, but once cranked up, What Women Want is entertaining. Mel Gibson has fine comic instincts, and he and Helen Hunt have good on screen chemistry together. Directed by Nancy Myer, who also directed the remake of The Parent Trap, both Father Of The Bride pictures, Baby Boom, and Private Benjamin, every scene works - just not necessarily together.
Some scenes seem disjointed in their juxtaposition with what's before or after.
It's like the casting, individually very good, but some of the characters don't go anywhere. Bette Midler is a wonderful marriage counselor, and Delta Burk as one of Gibson's secretaries, but they, like Alan Alda, never get to do much. Still, What Women Want will be a very nice Christmas present for guys to give the women in their lives, especially if the guys are willing to sit through it. It's kind of payback for all the testosterone films the women put up with over the past year. What Women Want is rated PG-13 for subject matter and sensuality.