The Other Woman box office: Cameron Diaz and Leslie Mann comedy to top North American box office chart despite mostly bad reviews
April 25–27 weekend box office: Starring Cameron Diaz, Leslie Mann, Kate Upton, and Nikolaj Coster-Waldau, the Nick Cassavetes-directed comedy The Other Woman will easily top the North American box office this weekend. The story of three women who gang up to take revenge on their cheating husband/lover, The Other Woman – which would have been more accurately titled “The Other Women” – opened with a solid $9.3 million at 3,205 U.S. and Canadian locations on Friday, according to studio estimates found at Jennifer Lopez, Elizabeth Banks, Chace Crawford, Brooklyn Decker, and others, opened with $10.5 million in May 2012, while Jake Kasdan’s bawdy comedy Bad Teacher, starring Diaz alongside Justin Timberlake and Jason Segel, collected $31.6 million on its first weekend out in late June 2011.
Also, when it opened in May 2008, the Tom Vaughan-directed Cameron Diaz-Ashton Kutcher pairing What Happens in Vegas earned $20.2 million – or about $22 million in 2014 dollars. What Happens in Vegas ultimately brought in $80.3 million in the U.S. and Canada – or approximately $89 million adjusted for inflation; The Other Woman should end up in the $90-$100 million range, slightly behind Bad Teacher‘s $100.3 million.
Female revenge comedy blockbuster The First Wives Club, the other The Other Woman
Also worth mentioning is that back in late September 1996, Hugh Wilson’s men-are-pigs comedy The First Wives Club, starring Oscar winners Goldie Hawn (Cactus Flower) and Diane Keaton (Annie Hall), and two-time Oscar nominee Bette Midler (The Rose, For the Boys) as cheated-on wives on an anti-male rampage, opened with $18.9 million – or about $34 million adjusted – at 1,922 locations. The First Wives Club eventually cumed at a hefty $105.5 million in North America – or about $189 million adjusted – in addition to an estimated $76 million internationally.
As an aside, The Other Woman 2014 has nothing in common with Don Roo’s 2009 drama of the same name, which was based on Ayelet Waldman’s novel, and starred Natalie Portman, Scott Cohen, and Lisa Kudrow.
Besides Cameron Diaz, Leslie Mann, Kate Upton, and Nikolaj Coster-Waldau, The Other Woman also features Don Johnson, Taylor Kinney, Nicki Minaj, Kenneth Maharaj, Victor Cruz, Alyshia Ochse, David Thornton, and Madison McKinley. The Other Woman was written by feature-film newcomer Melissa Stack.
Paul Walker movie Brick Mansions, horror flick The Quiet Ones flop
Apart from The Other Woman, no other movie is expected to get even close to $20 million at the domestic box office this weekend. At no. 2 on the box office chart, the Chris Evans superhero flick Captain America: The Winter Soldier, also featuring Scarlett Johansson and Robert Redford, should collect less than $15 million on its fourth weekend out.
Not far behind Captain America 2 will be Randall Wallace’s Christian-themed drama Heaven Is for Real, featuring Academy Award nominees Greg Kinnear (As Good As It Gets) and Thomas Haden Church (Sideways), in addition to Kelly Reilly, Connor Corum, and Margo Martindale. Distributed by TriStar/Sony Pictures, the reportedly $12 million-budgeted film based on a national bestseller based on a purported real-life story – a boy who, following a near-death experience, claimed to have gone to heaven and back – should reach an impressive $50 million cume before the weekend is over.
Directed by Camille Delamarre, and starring the recently deceased Paul Walker, in addition to David Belle and RZA, (producer) Luc Besson’s latest lowbrow, relatively low-budget ($28 million) actioner Brick Mansions – 32 percent approval rating and 3.9/10 average among Rotten Tomatoes’ top critics – should collect a mediocre $10 million or so from 2,647 venues on its opening weekend. Faring even worse is John Pogue’s poorly received horror entry The Quiet Ones, starring Pompeii‘s Jared Harris, plus Sam Claflin of Snow White and the Huntsman and The Hunger Games: Catching Fire fame. On its debut weekend, the Lionsgate release should score at most a dismal $4-$5 million from 2,027 sites.
Sunday update: Captain America: The Winter Soldier pulled in a better-than-expected $16 million as per studio estimates. Heaven Is for Real earned $13.8 million, Brick Mansions $9.6 million, and The Quiet Ones $4 million.
Kate Upton, Cameron Diaz, and Leslie Mann The Other Woman 2014 photo: 20th Century Fox.
Captain America: The Winter Soldier to pass $100 million on opening weekend?
April 4: The Avengers effect has yet to subside. Captain America: The Winter Soldier, a sequel to both The Avengers and Captain America: The First Avenger, debuted with an estimated $10.2 million from Thursday night (April 3) screenings in North America, including $1.2 million at 344 IMAX locations. Directed by Joe and Anthony Russo, and featuring Chris Evans, Scarlett Johansson, Sebastian Stan, and veteran Robert Redford Captain America: The Winter Soldier is poised to enjoy the biggest April weekend opening ever at the domestic box office, even after factoring in inflation.
At 3,938 theaters in the U.S. and Canada, Captain America: The Winter Soldier will surely surpass the current April record-holder, Justin Lin’s Fast Five. Starring Paul Walker, Vin Diesel, and Dwayne Johnson, the Rio de Janeiro-set actioner collected $86.19 million from 3,793 venues on its first weekend out in late April 2011 – or about $89 million in 2014 dollars.
Early estimates claiming that Captain America: The Winter Soldier would debut with around $85 million sounded absurdly low key. In fact, as explained by Ray Subers at Box Office Mojo chances are Captain America 2 will open domestically with at least $100 million, possibly reaching as high as $120 million if it follows the late Thursday/overall weekend pattern of both Alan Taylor’s Thor: The Dark World, starring Chris Hemsworth and Natalie Portman, and Shane Black’s Iron Man 3, starring Robert Downey Jr. and Gwyneth Paltrow.
For comparison’s sake, Joe Johnston’s Captain America: The First Avenger, also starring Chris Evans in the title role, scored $65.8 million – including approximately $4 million from midnight only screenings – at 3,715 North American locations in late July 2011. Captain America: The First Avenger went on to gross $176.7 million in the U.S. and Canada.
For the record, adjusted for inflation the top domestic opening weekends in April to date belong to the aforementioned Fast Five, followed by Justin Lin’s Fast and Furious (2009), also with Paul Walker and Vin Diesel; Louis Leterrier’s Clash of the Titans (2010), with Sam Worthington, Liam Neeson, and Ralph Fiennes; Peter Segal’s Anger Management (2003), with Adam Sandler, Jack Nicholson, and Marisa Tomei; and David Hayter’s The Scorpion King (2002), with Dwayne Johnson and Michael Clarke Duncan. Captain America: The Winter Soldier performer Robert Redford has one movie on the list, at no. 11: Adrian Lyne’s Indecent Proposal, a widely discussed 1993 “sex” drama also starring Demi Moore and Woody Harrelson.
International box office
Internationally, Captain America: The Winter Soldier has to date grossed an estimated $95.8 million. Its top markets last weekend were South Korea, with $10.98 million; the United Kingdom, with $10. million; and Mexico, with $8.6 million. Elsewhere in Europe – e.g., France, Germany, Spain, Italy, The Netherlands, Norway, Belgium – Captain America 2 has done just okay-to-middling business.
Captain America: The Winter Soldier opens in Russia, Australia, and China this weekend. It opens in Brazil and Turkey next weekend, and in Japan on April 19.
Captain America: The Winter Soldier cost a reported $178 million, not including marketing and distribution expenses that could easily add another $90 million or more to the film’s price tag. Captain America: The First Avenger cost a reported $140 million.
Written by Christopher Markus and Stephen McFeely, besides Chris Evans, Scarlett Johansson, Sebastian Stan, and Oscar winner Robert Redford (as Best Director for Ordinary People), Captain America: The Winter Soldier features Hayley Atwell, Anthony Mackie, Cobie Smulders, Frank Grillo, Maximiliano Hernández, Samuel L. Jackson, Emily VanCamp, Toby Jones, Jenny Agutter, Garry Shandling, Dominic Cooper, Thomas Kretschmann, Bernard White, Stan Lee, and the voice of Gary Sinise.
Chris Evans and Robert Redford Captain America: The Winter Soldier photo: Zade Rosenthal | Marvel | Walt Disney Studios.