What Men Want is one of those perfectly studio crafted Hollywood ideas. You know that Mel Gibson movie from the 90’s? Let’s simply make the lead a different gender and make another one! Better yet, let’s flip the skin color too! Brilliant!!!! What Men Want at least knows it isn’t particularly clever or insightful, and goes for as many broad, funny jokes as it can, mostly succeeding.
The star of What Men Want, like What Women Want, is a member of the opposite sex, Taraji P. Henson. She plays Ali Davis, a kick ass agent for many famous athletes based out of Atlanta. Despite her talent for making the company and her clients happy, Davis still hasn’t been made partner at her firm, most recently losing her partnership to another male doofus. After her boss Nick (Brian Bosworth) accuses her of being unrelatable to men, Ali meets up with her friends (Phoebe Robinson, Wendy McLendon-Covey, Tamala Jones) for a bachelorette party. There she drinks some crazy tea from a tarot reader (Erykah Badu) and winds up in the hospital, where she starts hearing what’s in men’s heads, including her jock-like colleagues (Jason Jones, Max Greenfield), her assistant Brandon (Josh Brener), her next agent prospect (Shane Paul McGhie) and his dad (Tracy Morgan) and her latest boy toy, Will (Aldis Hodge).
What Men Want is your standard rom com plot, so don’t expect the movie to throw any insane twists your way. So instead, I’m gonna focus on why you should see this movie: it’s pretty funny! Yes, it’s a large studio comedy, so there’s gonna be some filtering of the jokes. But the jokes do go to unexpected places. A great deal of the movie’s success is natural star, Taraji P. Henson, who fully commits to whatever the story asks her to do, including fake a completely horrific sexual experience with complete aplomb and laughs aplenty. Pairing her with Josh Brener was a good idea too: his awkward, meek comebacks match well with Henson’s force of personality. I could simply watch just a movie of their day to day shenanigans. The rest of the cast members orbit around Henson’s star, some more successfully (Tracy Morgan, Erykah Badu) than others (Jason Jones, Phoebe Robinson), but everyone’s fully on board and giving it their all. The movie flirts with some truly biting material that it quickly skirts away from, but does just enough to keep the audience invested and the tone light, a tricky balance.
What most people will take away from this movie, other than men are mostly jerks, is that Taraji P. Henson is a star. I’ve said it before, but great actors take a crappy story and make it mediocre, and that’s what Henson does here. I’m guessing she did this so she could have some fun, and recharge for her roles in better movies to come, so have at it Taraji! You know you’re something special when a Hollywood movie filled with talented male actors is completely driven by your prodigious abilities as an actor.