It appears likely that The Expendables will win the weekend, although I would be stunned if it didn’t experience some kind of significant Saturday fall-off, given the likely word-of-mouth. “I was talking to a friend last night, and he told me the Stallone flick is like a Michael Dudikoff movie from 1986!”

As I wrote yesterday morning, Eat Pray Love, which will most likely come in second, is a far less disappointing film. The big surprise would be Scott Pilgrim vs. the World taking the second-place slot, although I don’t see this happening — this is strictly an Ed Douglas smarty-pants geek film. Yes, it made me contemplate suicide but I got over that. It signifies the end of transcendent cinema culture as I’ve known it all my life, but now, at least, I’ll be more willing to accept death when it comes.

Make no mistake that the best film opening this weekend is not Scott Pilgrim vs. the World, Eat Pray Love or The Expendables. The best film opening this weekend is David Michod‘s Animal Kingdom, which currently has a 93% Rotten Tomatoes rating, which is nearly 15 points higher than Scott Pilgrim‘s.