"THE OTHER WOMAN" Rated PG-13. At AMC Loews Boston Common, Regal Fenway Stadium and suburban theaters. Grade: B
Who would have guessed that Cameron Diaz and Leslie Mann would be this year's Melissa McCarthy and Sandra Bullock? In "The Other Woman," these two comic performers not only outdo themselves in milking laughs from their lines, they also display a chemistry so sparkling you may want to see them together again, soon. A flawed, poop-joke obsessed, neo-screwball comedy, the film is also a femme-centric, Judd Apatow-style, raunchy comedy, although timidly pared to PG-13 in this case.
Diaz is high-powered Manhattan attorney Carly Whitten. Normally, superhot Carly, who lives in a posh bachelor pad in the sky, juggles several men in her life. Now, Carly has fallen in love with Mark (Nikolaj Coster-Waldau aka Jaime Lannister), a strikingly handsome, single executive who creates and sells startup companies. What Carly doesn't know is that Mark is "happily" married to tightly wrapped, mad fairy Kate King (Mann), who lives in their home in Connecticut. Kate gave up her career to concentrate on Mark's and gives Mark most of his startup ideas.
When Kate finds out that Mark has been cheating on her with Carly, Kate goes all "red mist." But instead of hating Carly, Kate wants to make Carly her new best friend. In these scenes, Mann, the wife of aforementioned Apatow and frequent co-star in his films, is sublime. When Kate loses it, her face and voice become a comic perpetual-motion machine, wailing, screwing up her mouth, baring her teeth and turning colors. In one scene, Kate, wearing her wedding dress, watches her wedding video, a bottle of vodka in one hand, a can of whipped cream in the other. It's a marital mental breakdown as operatic physical comedy, and it is inspired stuff.
Diaz, another gifted comic actor, is this film's "straight man," mostly reacting to and making sarcastic remarks concerning Kate's outlandish behavior. But Diaz knows exactly what she's doing, and the two are a match made in comedy heaven.
The film, directed by chick-flick guru Nick Cassavetes ("The Notebook") and written by newcomer Melissa Stack, is hardly a classic. Opening scenes in which Mann blathers about going to "brain camp" go thud. Nicki Minaj in one of six wigs shows up as Carly's snarky assistant and is not terrible. Don Johnson is fine as Carly's oft-divorced father (his last wife was Carly's sorority sister). When Kate begins to exact revenge, she becomes cruel, if not sadistic, and not very funny.
As the woman of the title, Sports Illustrated model Kate Upton is a sweet blank, whose lack of acting skills is not a major issue. She plays Amber, a bikini-clad, over-endowed young woman with whom Mark has been cheating on Kate and Carly. Cassavetes cannot resist a shot of Upton jogging along the beach in her white bikini. This is Cassavetes, the dude, winking at the (few) guys in the audience. I get it, Nick.
("The Other Woman" contains profanity, alcohol abuse and sexually suggestive language.)
Source : http://bostonherald.com/entertainment/movies/movie_reviews/2014/04/cameron_diaz_leslie_mann_are_sublime_in_screwball_comedy
