With five nominations, it looks like Superbad will be the star of the 2008 MTV Movie Awards, and its three jubilant male leads -- Michael Cera, Jonah Hill, and Christopher Mintz-Plasse -- deserve the kudos. But one major talent behind the whole affair has stayed relatively anonymous while these young up-and-comers bathe in the spotlight: Director Greg Mottola. The erstwhile independent filmmaker, responsible for some of the best installments of Arrested Developed and Undeclared, launched his career a solid decade before the rise of Judd Apatow with a charming little low budget comedy called The Daytrippers. Starring Stanley Tucci, Hope Davis, Liev Schreiber, Parker Posey and a host of other fantastic character actors, the film follows a wildly dysfunctional family over the course of a single day, as Davis, playing a worrisome housewife, tries to track down her unfaithful husband (Tucci).

Mixing warm humanity with pitch-perfect screwball timing, Daytrippers marked the sort of debut that told you a filmmaker had a big career ahead of him. After a modest premiere at the Slamdance Film Festival, it landed at Cannes, barely got a theatrical release and promptly vanished thereafter. Mottola turned to TV work, and slipped out of the film scene for a good ten years. These days, it's no easy task to track down Daytrippers on DVD -- you can nab second-hand copies on Amazon for decent rates, but not a single retail outlet carries it. Aside from the occasionally airings on cable, the movie has vanished.

There are some actors who need to stick to playing supporting roles. Paul Rudd is not one of them -- he is good-looking and perfectly capable of being a lead -- but that doesn't mean I can't prefer him as the leading man's buddy, or as the romantic opposition, or as a member of an hilarious ensemble. But as goofy as the guy is, we have to remember that he was once just that love interest/step-brother for Alicia Silverstone in Clueless. Fortunately, as Rudd appears to grow in Hollywood status, starring in his own vehicles, he seems to be choosing movies that relate more to his work with Judd Apatow, Adam McKay and the Stella guys than to run of the mill romantic comedies.

His latest to be announced is called I Love You, Man, which makes one think of the joke in Wayne's World about platonic love between two grown men (" I LOVE you, man"). And, what do you know? I Love You, Man is in fact about platonic love between two grown men. According to Variety, the movie is about a guy (Rudd), who is about to get married, but who doesn't have a male friend who can serve as his best man. So, he seeks one out and eventually finds gangly Jason Segal of TV's How I Met Your Mother (and Knocked Up, which co-starred Rudd).

From the very beginning I was really behind this project: A comedy (from the man behind Freaks & Geeks and Undeclared) based on a rather amusing story called Babysitting (which you can still hear on This American Life) about a bunch of kids who get stuck in a snowed-in airport during Christmas Eve -- sounds pretty promising, right? And then I heard that folks like Paget Brewster, Jessica Walter, B.J. Novak, David Koechner, Tony Hale, Lewis Black and Rob Corddry were among the "grown-up" cast members, and my enthusiasm for the movie doubled in a heartbeat.

And then I watched this trailer. If you can watch this thing and not think "Home Alone Times Six," then you've probably never seen Home Alone three times like I have.

Now, maybe I'm just a victim of overzealous and misleading advertising ... but this movie looks like a 12-ton migraine of monumental proportions! And the jokes! How about a nice overlong belllllch or that reliable old "ouch that high-five secretly really hurt!" grimace? Some little brat punching Santa in the belly? A kid comically choking on an inflatable life-jacket? The air-duct ceiling-crash cribbed from The Breakfast Club? Silly dancing, slapstick security guards and a kid inside a suitcase being bashed around the room?? What the hell is going on here?

Of course this sort of simplistic physical schtick is by no means a surprise ... if we were talking about someone like Brian Levant or Don Rhymer or (dear lord) Steve Carr, but from Paul Feig? The guy who put so much heart and soul and warmth (AND comedy) into Freaks & Geeks AND Undeclared? And directed episodes of The Office and Arrested Development?? Ugh, how disappointing. I guess the Nielsen ratings on both of his babies taught Paul Feig an important lesson: Heart doesn't sell -- and fart does.

Anyway, here's where you can check out the trailer and one specific scene from the flick, and here's the official site for those who enjoy picking through character bios, photo galleries, video interviews and production notes. Of course I'm still quite interested in seeing the movie, and obviously I'll give the thing a perfectly fair shake, but based on this trailer ... I'm just pretty much stunned.

The apparently small group of us who watched and adored Judd Apatow's brilliant Freaks and Geeks and, to a lesser degree, Undeclared, his attempt at mainstreaming (you could tell because Charlie Hunnam was in it, and he's prettier than the entire cast of Freaks and Geeks put together -- minus James Franco, of course), would never argue with Apatow's clear belief that frequent supporting lunk Seth Rogen is a comedy genius. Despite his laconic, witty presence in films like The 40 Year Old Virgin and Anchorman, however, Rogen is yet to match the success achieved by many less talented actors and comedians.

Not content to rely on a starring role in the currently-filming Knocked Up to make the world wake up to Rogen's genius, Apatow is trying again (Erik may not be so happy about the news), this time with Super Bad, a "high school themed comedy." Rogen is currently writing the screenplay with Evan Goldberg and will also play a role in the film, which Apatow has agreed to produce. The film will be directed by frequent Undeclared director Greg Mottola, and "revolves around two co-dependent high school seniors who set out to score alcohol for a party, believing that girls will then hook up with them and they will be ready for college. But as the night grows more chaotic, overcoming their separation anxiety becomes a greater challenge than getting the girls." The boys will be played by Jonah Hill and Arrested Development's wonderful Michael Cera; Columbia hopes to have the film in production this fall.

I love this Zap2It headline: "Apatow Hopes Rogen Can Take Advantage of 'Virgin.'" I mean, who hasn't wanted to take advantage of a virgin? Anyway, the article refers, of course, to Judd Apatow, who worked on the wonderful but unfortunately short-lived series Freaks and Geeks, and director of The 40-Year-Old Virgin, which he co-produced with Seth Rogen, who you may recognize from his roles on Freaks and Undeclared, also an Apatow creation. Rogen, a high school drop out, also worked as a writer on Undeclared. I guess what we can all learn from this is that if you want to be a screenwriter, you need to drop out of high school, or become friends with Judd Apatow.