Lela Rochon, Loretta Devine, Dennis Haysbert, Michael Beach, Gregory Hines, Donald Faison, and Mykelti Williamson rounded out the rest of the cast.

He announces he is leaving her for a white woman with whom he works, sending her into an emotional tailspin that culminates in the two fighting over their assets after she burns his car, clothes and some of his other belongings, and then sells the rest of his things for a dollar each, and he retaliates by draining their bank accounts.

Bernadine gets a large divorce settlement from her ex-husband and finds love with a widowed civil rights attorney who encourages her to pursue her catering dream.

The soundtrack includes the number-one hit songs "Exhale (Shoop Shoop)", sung by the film's star, Whitney Houston,[3] and "Let It Flow" by Toni Braxton as well as "Not Gon' Cry" by Mary J. Blige, "Sittin' Up in My Room" by Brandy, and "Count on Me" by Whitney Houston and CeCe Winans, all of which reached the top ten of Billboard's Hot 100 chart.

Film critic Susan Stark from The Detroit News stated, "For all the pleasure there is in seeing effective, great-looking black women grappling with major life issues on screen, Waiting to Exhale is an uneven piece.

"[7] Reviewer Liam Lacey from The Daily Globe and Mail wrote of the film, "[It] never escapes the queasy aura of Melrose Place: just another story about naive people with small problems.

The site's consensus states: "Waiting to Exhale looks at life's ups and downs from an underseen perspective -- albeit one that's poorly served by uneven acting and a sporadically interesting story.

writer and Stanford Law School professor Ralph Richard Banks states that the film is a perfect example of the problems African-American women have in finding serious relationships.

[10] Interviewed in the spring of 2011 on an episode of The Talk, Angela Bassett confirmed that a sequel was in the planning stages, with all the female principals signed on to star, and Whitaker returning to direct.