Just Tell Me What You Want

"I wouldn't call that bitch a taxi to take her to hell!"

It's not what you'd expect to hear from someone who is madly in love. Max Herschel (Alan King) has very strong feelings for Bones, his long time mistress (Ali McGraw). You could call it love, or obsession, or addiction, or co-dependence. Whatever it is, it drives him to some pretty curious measures when she flees his overbearing, conniving ways and weds a young writer, Steven (Peter Weller). Max will rescind all of Bones' assets (to whom he endowed her in the first place) and even ally with his enemies to formulate a strategy to get her back.

It's not pretty. Jay Presson Allen adapts her drenched in acid novel with wicked wit and rather dense plotting. This is not a simple scenario. 1980's JUST TELL ME WHAT YOU WANT is a very frustrating experience, an uncommonly intelligent, very well acted NYC comedy drama that simply just doesn't know how to connect its disparate elements. Who can we blame? Allen? Director Sidney Lumet?

To say the plot thickens really is an understatement. "Congeals" is more accurate. The screenplay goes into fine detail to show the mechanics of Max, what makes him tick, how he runs his businesses and life (his women, mainly). He is an enigma to the world, never allowing interviews of himself or past and present employees (they sign a clause when they're hired). We learn of his associations and rivalry with Seymour Berger (Keenan Wynn, most excellent) and Berger's crafty, duplicitous grandson Mike (Tony Roberts), all movie studio moguls in Hollywood. Lumet and Allen stage several scenes of corporate intrigue that really educate us on who these vipers are. That is a plus.

But it is also a minus. This movie spends so much time with other characters besides Bones and Max that the main idea is missplaced for reels at a time. The movie seems distracted and pleased with its cleverness. This is especially true in the L.A. scenes. I thoroughly enjoyed and was impressed with the dialogue among the characters, rife with allusion and wit (especially between Bones and Steven, a playwright) and was fascinated with the mechanics of Max's revenge, but it made JUST TELL ME WHAT YOU WANT feel like a screenwriter's tough assignment. This should have been a balls-to-the-wall (I don't mean over the top) character study that cut squarely, primarily to relational dynamics rather than just merely business.

It's so puzzling. How I admire so much about this movie and how it still fails. Lumet directs in his usual unobstrusive, almost theatrical style. This film is far less accomplished than his THE VERDICT or PRINCE OF THE CITY from around the same time period but still well mounted. The performances are probably career best for all concerned. King is just sensational as the egotistical blowhard who always gets his way and will connive any method to ensure that. Sometimes he's vulgar and brash, other times a charmer, but always with an ace up his sleeve. McGraw rarely showed such acting chops in her earlier films, always seeming childlike but here quite the modern, headstrong woman. She deserved more notice for this role. The script is a marvel of invention, with some rich characterizations, but it's still maddeningly disorganized.

Probably the best known scene in JUST TELL ME WHAT YOU WANT involves Bones whacking the living you know what out of Max when she happens upon him in Bergdoff Goodman. She continues to beat him senseless as he stumbles toward his limousine. It is a small masterpiece of slapstick, a scene that is very inspired in its comedic violence. It's also the most obvious sequence, but it (and the bravura final conversation between the principals) has the sort of energy and focus that the remainder of the film lacks.