This is an archived article that was published on sltrib.com in 2015, and information in the article may be outdated. It is provided only for personal research purposes and may not be reprinted.

Good thing The Cricket is up in Park City for the 2015 Sundance Film Festival — because the movies opening in mainstream theaters this weekend are pretty bad.

Two of them weren't even screened for Utah critics, but have abysmally low scores on Rotten Tomatoes: The R-rated comedy "Mortdecai," starring Johnny Depp as a foppish art dealer; and the George Lucas-produced animated "Strange Magic."

"The Boy Next Door" was screened, for reasons known only to its distributor. It's an idiotic thriller starring Jennifer Lopez as a high-school teacher who has a one-night stand with a hunky 19-year-old student (Ryan Guzman), who becomes obsessed when she tries to break it off. The only selling point is how Lopez demonstrates that she's still got it going on.

At a few theaters in town, there's also "Cake," the movie Jennifer Aniston attempted to ride to Oscar glory. (She didn't get an Oscar nomination, but she did get nods from the Golden Globes and the Screen Actors Guild.) Aniston plays an acerbic chronic-pain sufferer who is, for emotional reasons revealed late in the game, mean to everyone around her. The script is cloying and manipulative, but Aniston's sharp performance is better than the material.