Michael Neumann "There's an art to being incidental", says Abe Polin, king of the Hollywood extras, and here's a case in point. This gentle, affectionate comedy is nothing more than incidental entertainment, but it works, thanks to the textbook timing and genuine rapport between Alan King and Billy Crystal as Abe and his estranged son Abbie, who wants to mend fences with the man he calls "a professional embarrassment" after suffering a mild heart attack (brought on by a chronic lack of attention). The sentimental attachment to all those noble, nameless Hollywood extras is like a page borrowed from Frank Capra's scrapbook, but if the film tugs the heartstrings a little too hard at least it compensates by not force-feeding the humor, settling for smiles instead of belly-laughs. Abbie's sensitivity to his father's eccentric behavior can be tiring, and Jobeth Williams' gratuitous role (the concerned girlfriend) is simply irritating, but where else can you expect to meet the man who invented 'the courtroom wallah'?

John Hedtke I kind of feel that Billy Crystal did this film in part to get closure with his father (who died when Billy was 15). It's an amazingly good film and shows off the depth of acting Billy Crystal and Alan King can do. They played very well off of each other in this movie.It's always nice to see JoBeth Williams on the screen, who I've always thought was scrumptious. A number of the extras who work with Alan King are extras who you've seen in films forever. **SPOILER** Whenever I tell people about this, I tell them about the recurring question Billy Crystal asks his father: "Don't you feel like a putz?" The final punchline of the joke is a classic. (If you haven't seen the film, I'm not going to reveal that much--it's very moving and has even made me think of something similar.)Go see it. You'll sniffle and laugh throughout.

theowinthrop This film proves with JUST TELL ME WHAT YOU WANT that Alan King was capable of a good film career. The story here does not deal with secretive billionaires and their angry mistresses, but with a man who left his family in New York City decades before to pursue a career in Hollywood. But Abe has never been more than a background extra. When his son Abie (Billy Chrystal) is recovering from a heart attack, he goes to Hollywood to see his father for the first time in years. Abie discovers that his father has never even had a real speaking part (the closest is when he was the sixth or seventh man in SPARTACUS to yell "I am Spartacus!"). Naturally, given the shattering effect that Abe's abandonment of the family had, it does not seem to Abie that his father had much to show for it. Abe, who has become part of the Hollywood community (he is usually seen with his fellow extras, but we see he does know Sean Connery by first names). He is reasonably happy - but Abie keeps dismissing him as a hack, not an artist.The arrival of Abie's girlfriend Lisa (JoBeth Williams) does not help matters at first, but she manages to bridge the anger and contempt that the son feels for his father, and slowly they do find some degrees of similarities. Abie loves playing the trumpet, for example, and does it well. But Abie discovers that there is something physically wrong about his father - a sudden memory problem causing the father to recite a scene he liked from INHERIT THE WIND. The prognosis is grim. So Abie decides to help his father accomplish his greatest wish: get a full scene in a movie with actual dialog.Most of the comments here have been fairly negative, insisting that it is a very lachrymose and overly sentimental tale. There is no denying that it is (ultimately) a tragic story - but the performances (particularly King as a proud and touchy man, who will not admit that his life has been less than a success) are good for the three leads. King's performance mingled pathos and comedy quite well. Witness the scene where he was trying to choose among his friends for the extras in a science fiction film, where he is dressed in a lobster costume. King shows his sauciness at a self-important assistant director, but he also shows the start of his mental/physical collapse in the same sequence (quite a change of pace). Similarly his interview with the casting director for the speaking part that Abie sneaks into is done with great charm and dignity. It was a first rate performance - and proved that King was an actor.

Stevesgirl My father was from NYC and my mother was raised in LA. I have seen every film I ever wanted to and this one has the most meaning. I highly recommend it to anyone who has a loving heart. It is the finest thing I have ever seen on the screen.