If you take Judd Apatow’s wife, a former model turned actress, and a much younger model turned actress then you get The Other Woman –  a decent comedy that allows Cameron Diaz to prove she’s more than just a hot body.

The Other Woman is about married man Mark King (Nikolaj Coster-Waldau) who is married to our seemingly inept everyday house wife, Kate (Leslie Mann). Carly (Cameron Diaz) is the new apple of Mark’s wandering eye. Uneasy about a planned meet-the-parents dinner with Carly and her father Frank (Don Johnson), Mark makes a last minute decision to run home to his oblivious wife. Left with a lame excuse about bad plumbing Carly decides to take it upon herself to surprise Mark at his home only to discover he is married.

Kate, thankfully not being as oblivious and out of it as we were originally inclined to believe takes the unusual step of showing up at Carly’s office to make friends with her husband’s mistress. The two decide to take him down and eventually discover he’s cheating on both of them with Amber (Kate Upton). The three woman get together and create a devious plan to make the two timing, backstabbing, cheating sleaze bag regret his womanizing ways.

Some of the strongest moments of The Other Woman are from Cameron Diaz as her comic timing and exuberant physicality balances extremely well with Leslie Mann’s cerebral humour, and Upton’s cluelessness. One of the funniest scenes in the movie is when Carly shows up to Mark’s house and Kate answers the door, to which Carly responds by tripping, breaking a gigantic urn, as she calls it, and falling into the bushes aside their house. There are several scenes in this female driven movie that deliver true laugh out loud comedy that never seems to tire. It is certainly refreshing to see Diaz in a role where she is not just simply the object of male fantasy (ahem The Counselor), but rather a strong career-minded woman.

The Other Woman is certainly not an original idea, but it works extremely well for a fun girls’ night out that certainly packs the laughs without too many dark turns. While Kate Upton should probably stick to Sports Illustrated, the movie is well served by the fantastic chemistry between Diaz and Mann that I would love to see repeated again in the near future.

The Other Woman is smart, physical, laugh out loud funny, and sexy.

[star v=3]