James Franco released the trailer for his possible web series, Undergrads, cryptically and with little fanfare on JamesFrancoTV, so it’s a little hard to tell yet just how much and how deeply we’re being dicknosed. What we do know is that there’s a trailer, which Franco introduced by saying “My new show #UNDERGRADS.”

The trailer says it plays Thursdays at 8pm (on the web, presumably), and it shows college kids drinking and getting laid, and talking about drinking and getting laid, set to montage editing and pop music. Basically, every show on MTV. But knowing James Franco, it will probably also be a proto-meta, hyper-autobiographical pseudo-meditation on the very nature of self-referentiality, invoking interrelational aestheticism and an inclusion of the viewer vis a vis the viewed in a Nicolas Bourriaudian cross examination of patriarchal subjectivity. But I mean, that’s just a guess.

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Students and teachers at Bilgi University in Constantinople Istanbul are protesting the firing of three film professors after it was discovered that they allowed a student to film a porno as his thesis. The student, Deniz Ozgun, told his professors that his intention was to show that pornographic films “are also professional productions which simulate the look of an amateur, individual and/or homemade movies” and his professors agreed under the stipulation that he provide a “stronger intellectual point.” And he failed.

Ozgun eventually received a passing grade for the semester and he graduated, but he has now gone into hiding because of the scandal. Meanwhile, the professors’ peers are fighting for their reinstatement under the anthem of educational freedom. I think the dudes should get their jobs back just because they sound pretty cool. But to each his own.

Hey hey, ho ho, this penis party has got to stay, AOL News…

“Our main issue for the moment is problem of the academic freedom and civilized ways of dealing with abuses,” Nesin said. “Academic freedom is not about being allowed to drink coffee in one’s office. It is about being able to do research and to work on controversial issues. Academic freedom encompasses also possible judgment errors and mistakes.”

And academic freedom is also about letting a student showcase his ability to prove that the reverse-cowgirl-to-London-Bridge-to-piledriver can be featured in a professional manner.

But I think it’s clear that this film lacked maturity and the very professional nature that Deniz promised his professors because it only had two people. I’m sorry, but if my college professors gave me permission to make a porn, that thing is going to have at least six girls, some fireworks, an old man yelling obscenities, two Amish teenagers building a house around them, an oversized mouse trap with an autographed copy of Disorderlies in the middle, a piñata filled with scorpions and a velvet portrait of Don Swayze. A-f*cking-plus, son.

Five minutes, one huge tracking shot, a cast of God knows how many. Impressive. And from the looks of it, these kids went to that mythical college you see on TV and in movies where everyone is friends and everybody’s super excited and happy all the time, and you’re never more than a twist-off or a Slim Jim away from the whole town turning into one giant slip-and-slide gangbang party.  I was hoping to go to that college, but instead I ended up at the one where you get drunk in your dorm room and play that Tony Hawk game on Playstation.  But I guess it was all worth it now that I’m a wealthy Korean businessman.

Anyway, I don’t know whether to be super impressed that this many people were involved in this, and they shot the whole thing in one shot, or super pissed that they got this many people to help out, and shot it all in one shot… and it was all for an effing Black Eyed Peas song. From what I’ve gathered in my intense three minutes of research, these kids are students at “UQAM”.  Which stands for… *Googles* Université du Québec à Montréal.  Aw, son of a bitch, really?!  Damned showboatin’ French Canadians. They probably get their VD treatments paid for by the government too. That’s it, I’m suing my parents.

[via TBT - thanks to Nik for the tip]

So Lindsay Lohan is back, sorta, and she’s starring in a movie called Labor Pains.  Feel free to watch the trailer, and if you can think of anything remotely interesting about it, you’re better than I.

You might also notice that kid from College is in this too.  His name’s Kevin Covais.  Apparently, he was once an American Idol finalist and they nicknamed him “Chicken Little”.  He’s basically the next Steve McQueen.

A loyal FilmDrunkard who claims to have been dragged to College the movie this weekend posted his review on Wikipedia (screencap at left). I don’t know what he has against Arby’s, but his assessment of the movie was in line with both critics and audiences. College debuted at number 15, earning only $2 million.

Meanwhile, Disaster Movie and Babylon A.D. also opened this weekend, and the three movies combined are tracking 18% on RottenTomatoes. That was mostly a result of College‘s 14% recommended rating (Babylon A.D. was 4%, Disaster Movie 0%), which came from two positive reviews out of 14. Of those two, here’s what the one who also saw Disaster Movie had to say about it:

For the first time, the mere thought of imminent death seemed like a sweet, luxurious respite in comparison to the untold-in-number miseries being endured in that theater. Suddenly I was transformed, no longer afraid of my ultimate fate. For that (and only that), “Disaster Movie” deserves my gratitude.

And the business it did wasn’t any better, earning $5.7 million for seventh place. At this rate, it may not earn back its $20 million dollar budget, so perhaps this will be the last time the world has to suffer an Aaron Seltzer-Jason Friedberg movie. The ball’s in your court now, God.

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