Although the real question keeping Hollywood awake in 2012 is “Does Winston Wolf clean up dead hookers on Yom Kippur?”, the fine folks over at HitFix have put forth a handful of queries of varying importance which filmmakers, studios and fans might have on their minds this year. It’s their 15 Questions Keeping Hollywood Awake in 2012. With concerns from Lindsay Lohan’s possible last chance to Joss Whedon’s first real shot with The Avengers, it’s an intriguing list that might prove 2012 to be both an endlessly fascinating and completely irrelevant year in the stories behind the movies. Will Smith, Found Footage, Hunger Games, Dark Knight Rises and more. HitFix has questions, and here are the answers:

As movie-goers, we are all familiar with that excruciating moment when you are watching a movie and the action is so horribly uncomfortable that you actually feel the need to cover your own face. It’s this nonsensically powerful moment when you actually feel embarrassed for a fictional character because of some terribly awkward scenario that you’d rather watch a murder than bare witness to. It’s like a horror movie almost – it’s that same turtle reaction where you just want to shrink away. And like horror, it’s either done really well or it’s abused, which is why I want to share with you the films I think did it the very best. Oh, and if you are wondering why I only picked 9 – it’s the most awkward number I could think of.

How do you score beach partying high school girls (played by 25-year-olds)? Pretend to love everything Twilight. These and other important life lessons are brought to us all by the new trailer for American Reunion. I was as surprised as anyone to see that their teaser trailer was, no joke, actually funny. It had a sense of humor and nostalgia about what made the comedy work, and proved that it could work even though we were all way past the awkward adolescence. At least numerical. The first full (bro-centric) trailer offers a look at getting the band back together, and it’s honestly kind of nice to see (most) everyone back in their old element. Writer/directors Jon Hurwitz and Hayden Schlossberg have clearly instilled some life into an otherwise empty cash grab, but there’s also something hauntingly desperate about going back to the well that’s mirrored by going back to your high school cafetorium to drink bad punch and get jiggy with people of the past.

The biggest question raised by American Reunion is whether a teen sex comedy can be translated to the world of adults. The second biggest is whether a tired franchise that’s been treated like a ten-cent prostitute can redeem itself. In the most surprising of ways, this teaser trailer proves that both have an odds on chance. It’s more of a set-up/punchline style short film delivered in a little over a minute, and it’s unclear if any of this will actually be in the movie, but the fact that Jon Hurwitz and Hayden Schlossberg have created something this funny with a sock is a great omen for the rest of the project. Check it out for yourself:

It’s a shame that Chris Weitz may call it quits on directing this early. While he says below that he may not be done yet, there was something sad about him saying directing just isn’t that “fun” for him anymore. As Weitz pointed out, the news of his possible retirement didn’t quite rank up there with all the crying old ladies Steven Soderbergh got when he announced his a few-years-off retirement, but after Twilight: New Moon, could you blame some people for not protesting? Had the news come out after his latest film was released, A Better Life, there would have been much more disappointment to the idea. If anything good came out of us having to sit through New Moon, Weitz got to make a modest character drama that we don’t see too often. After The Golden Compass (a film he’s publicly called a failure multiple times) and New Moon, it seemed like the director had turned to big-budgeted commerce driven projects, rather than continuing in making great dramas, like About a Boy. But, as he says below, unless you don’t carry enough clout from doing films like Twilight, getting a studio drama like this off the ground wouldn’t be easy. Here’s what director Chris Weitz had to say about leaving filmmaking behind, finding emotional authenticity, and whether or not making A Better Life gave him a brighter outlook on directing.

Although certain politicians and even scientists will suggest otherwise, most agree our basic human desire for sex remains pretty unchanged. Over the centuries we’ve acknowledged that ladies like it just as much as the men folk, both sexes can be completely uninterested, and there’s also the possibility that same sex lovers getting down and dirty isn’t, in fact, dirty. Every new generation accepts something as tame that the previous generation thinks taboo. My mother finds the practice of bondage troubling, but the idea is ordinary to me. Whereas I don’t quite understand her fascination with the word “slutpuppy” because that’s just ooky. I’m not saying one generation is better than the other, I’m more curious about how we got to the place we are. I am pretty in tune with the going-ons of Gwen, so I have no problem pinpointing a lot of my sexual identity development happening simultaneously with the films and TV that I watched in the 90s. Thinking back, the 90s stand out to me as a hodgepodge decade when it came to sex in film. We had the renewal of romantic melodramas as a reaction to the social commentary-filled erotic thrillers of the 80s, the depiction of realistic sex in comedies, and the rise in popularity of rape culture. Of course all these themes wouldn’t have been possible without the decades before them, but something happened in the 90s that made sex seem pleasurable through love, humor, and invasion.

Last week I explored how emotionally and physically painful losing one’s virginity is for the ladies. The women discussed all held on to their v-cards like prized pies at a county fair, and when they gave it up disaster often struck. Be it mass suicide, unwanted pregnancy, abortion, or (worse yet) feelings, each movie addressed this entirely relatable coming-of-age experience. While many of us look back at our first time through rose-colored glasses, it was watching movies growing up that helped us come to terms with what happens to our bodies, feelings, and sexual futures. Thank god, for every female virginity tale, there are female sex positive films, family friendly fantasies, and Golden Years send-offs. But what about the boys? Unlike women centric virginity films, the boy’s story is often considered awkward, comical, and down-right head slap inducing. Why are boys never given as much respect in sexual awakening stories as the girls, who consequentially are considered fragile glass eggs. I could sit here and list off all the hilarious comedies where a terribly geeky boy not only kisses but fucks the girl of his dream, but I think there is something deeper to explore in these movies.  Losing our virginity is a push into adulthood, an emotional journey for some and anticlimactic for others. But no matter what sex for the first time only makes us want it more.

The American Pie franchise has been ridden hard and put away wet. The brand name has been slapped on no fewer than four atrociously average teen sex comedies that took low-budget laughs and tacked on a semi-emotional ending. There’s nothing wrong with those movies, but they’re a dozen rungs down the ladder from what American Pie was. Now that there’s an American Reunion in the works for the entire main cast, there’s now a rumored (spoilery) plot and character synopsis out there. It would be easy to call it moronic. Instead, it’s more interesting to notice how the nostalgia of the first film has been swapped out for pop culture references.

Jason Biggs, Seann William Scott, Eugene Levy, Thomas Ian Nicholas, Tara Reid, Chris Klein, Mena Suvari, Jennifer Coolidge. That list of names is eerie. The adults have their own long, strange comedy trips, but the rest of it sounds like a Where Are They Now roster. Not one young actor made it out of the American Pie movies alive? Seann William Scott comes the closest to surviving, but everyone else is relegated to middling indie work or complete obscurity. Hell, I’m not even sure tabloids will run topless pictures of Tara Reid anymore. That’s how bad it’s gotten. Context aside, all of those names will most likely come together for another installment in the American Pie franchise – a franchise that seems to have 3 movies in it, but really has 7 counting all the direct-to-video content with the brand’s name on it. All of this to point out the obvious: that bringing these characters back is tired. According to The Hollywood Reporter, American Reunion has got Paul and Chris Weitz in producer jobs, and sees Harold and Kumar Escape from Guantanamo Bay team Jon Hurwitz and Hayden Schlossberg writing and directing. That’s all solid talent, so it’ll be interesting if they can take meat that’s been sitting out for a week and make a meal out of it. Hopefully it hasn’t turned rancid before it hits the pan. It also might be an oversight, but I can’t help but notice Alyson Hannigan and Shannon Elizabeth’s names missing from the [Due to Content Scraping and Theft, we have been forced to try abbreviated feeds. We apologize for any inconvenience this may cause and woud very much appreciate you clicking through to view the full article on FilmSchoolRejects.com]

“I don’t understand the concept of bad masturbation,” is how Rob Hunter responded to me pitching this list, and he’s right. No one should understand that concept unless they have the tragic disease known as Sandpaper Hands. However, there is a certain challenge in filming someone masturbating that separates the men from the boys, and the women from the girls. Thus, while bad masturbation may be unfathomable, a bad masturbation scene is easy to imagine. “It is not enough to be abstinent with other people, you also have to be be abstinent alone. The Bible says that lust in your heart is committing adultery, so you can’t masturbate without lust,” is how Senate-seat-seeker Christine O’Donnell responded to an interviewer discussing pro-abstinence groups and their mission not going far enough. These cultural phenomena are colliding in an explosive way. So, in honor of Ms. O’Donnell, we’d like to share the lust in our hearts and a few great masturbation scenes on film.

Is it possible to write a full article about the portrayal of bathrooms in cinema? Yes. Yes it is.

No more straight to DVD let-downs promising unrated bacchanalia but delivering nothing but boobs and bodily fluids. No more casts featuring nothing but unknowns and a lonely Eugene Levy. Nope… the American Pie gang is heading back to theaters.

It is the week of Christmas, and we’re gathering up gift recommendations (for ourselves, of course) in This Week in Blu-ray. If any of you need to get something for your favorite Blu-ray columnist on the web, there are two great titles below in the ‘Buy’ category that I would love to receive.

How do you organize your DVD collection?

Don’t let the obvious title fool you–Landon actually enjoyed Judd Apatow’s latest, and this week’s Culture Warrior explores the virtues of an unfunny movie about funny people.

Dr. Cole Abaius does an in-depth study of some of the worst threequels in order to divine some fantastic filmmaking lessons. What elements of filmmaking should be avoided at all cost and which are only mildly toxic? Find out inside. But bring a barf bag.

Much like they did with the Western last year (the epic and excellent The Good The Bad The Weird), South Korea has ventured into other traditionally American genres with great success. This includes copying the teen sex formula highlighting America’s love of fornicating teenagers, physical comedy, and baby batter.

Getting sentimental and sloppy over our moms once a year is fine for well-adjusted kids but rebellious FSR chooses instead to honor filmdom’s 10 most demonic, diabolical, villainous mothers, the ones we love to hate.

The Rocker starring Rainn Wilson opened in theaters Wednesday. We decided this warranted a list, but instead of just hashing out a list about 10 movies about rockers that rocked, we wanted to give you ten rockers who rocked in movies that may or may not have even been about rocking.

Throughout the history of cinema, actors, writers and directors have brought us very different views of what it’s like to be in high school. But how accurate is the portrayal of high school in movies? What if high school really was how Hollywood made it out to be?