The race for this weekend’s box-office bragging rights includes Alliance Films’ fantasy Inkheart and action/horror Underworld: Rise of the Lycans, though the wide releases will court different audiences.

Inkheart arrives on 182 English and 47 French screens, while Warner Bros. is opening the film on over 2,500 screens stateside. Brendan Fraser stars as a dad who has the ability to bring characters to life out of books.

Fraser’s Journey to the Center of the Earth was one of Alliance’s top performers last year, earning over $12.5 million at the Canuck box office.

Underworld opens wide in Canada via Sony Pictures, while Columbia bows the latest installment in the vampire/werewolf series on 2,800 screens in the U.S.

The film, starring Bill Nighy and Michael Sheen, is rated 18A, while Inkheart has a friendlier PG rating in Ontario. The first Underworld film earned US$51 million in North America in 2003, bested three years later by Underworld: Evolution with $62 million.

Astra Taylor’s philosophical doc Examined Life, from distributor FilmsWeLike, opens at Toronto’s The Royal Friday, as does the doc Vampiro: Angel, Devil, Hero, from Zed Filmworks, about Canadian-born Mexican wrestling star Ian Richard Hodgkinson.

Meanwhile, E1 Films bows France’s box-office hit Welcome to the Sticks (Bienvenue chez les Ch’tis) on one screen each in Toronto and Vancouver.

Coming up, Maple Pictures will open the Renée Zellweger romantic comedy New in Town next week, while Mongrel Media has the acclaimed drama Wendy and Lucy.