LOS ANGELES — Hell hath no fury like a woman scorned — and this weekend, three of them are poised to take down a proven force at the multiplex.
After three weeks atop the box office, the blockbuster “Captain America: The Winter Soldier” is expected to narrowly lose out to the romantic comedy “The Other Woman.” Starring Cameron Diaz, Leslie Mann and supermodel Kate Upton, the latter film is likely to debut with a healthy sum of around $18 million, according to those who have seen pre-release audience surveys.
The “Captain America” sequel, which stars Chris Evans as the shield-bearing Marvel superhero, has collected more than $200 million domestically since opening April 4. The well-reviewed picture could bring in an additional $15 million this weekend.
Of the new films hitting theaters this weekend — which also include the Paul Walker action film “Brick Mansions” and horror flick “The Quiet Ones” — “The Other Woman” has fared worst with critics. On Thursday, the rom-com had notched a 34 percent fresh rating on Rotten Tomatoes.
The picture stars Mann as a suburban wife who finds out her husband (“Game of Thrones” star Nikolaj Coster-Waldau) has been cheating on her with Diaz and Upton’s characters. The three women then band together to plot revenge against the philanderer.
Financed by 20th Century Fox for roughly $40 million, “The Other Woman” was initially assigned an R rating by the MPAA. But after Diaz and Emma Watts, the studio’s president of production, went in front of the MPAA to appeal the rating, the decision was overruled and the film was given a PG-13.
“Brick Mansions,” meanwhile, is likely to open with $8 million. The movie is one of the last that Walker starred in; the 40-year-old “Fast & Furious” star was killed in a car accident in November.
A remake of the popular French film “District B13,” “Brick Mansions” features Walker as an undercover cop who is tasked with taking down a crime lord in a dangerous, walled-off portion of Detroit. The picture was financed for $28 million by EuropaCorp, the European production company headed by Luc Besson, who wrote the film.
An independent film that Walker starred in, “Hours,” came out only weeks after his fatal car crash but did not connect with a broad audience. There is, however, much anticipation for his final turn in the seventh “Fast & Furious” film, which Universal Pictures will open next summer. Because the actor had only completed a portion of his scenes for the movie at the time of his death, his two brothers are currently standing in for him during filming to help finish the movie.
The only other new film opening this weekend is “The Quiet Ones,” a horror film that may only bring in a paltry $5 million in opening weekend sales. Set in London, the movie follows a professor (“Mad Men’s” Jared Harris) who, along with a team of students, perform an experiment on a haunted girl.
