Foreigners Strangely Cool to Judd Apatow's 'Cheap Cinema of the American Stoner Idiot Man-Child'

Judd Apatow's comedy-godfather status isn't quite translating overseas, The New York Times noted in a probing piece on Sunday. While the filmmaker-producer looks set for a late-summer spike in the States with the upcoming Step Brothers and Pineapple Express, his signature blend of pop-culture refraction and infantile male bonding has come to symbolize American cinema's rut in Europe and Asia. For disappointing starters, we hear France and South Korea have developed interests of their own outside our sex-and-drug romps, piling panic on top of panic as the dollar crashes and the world turns its back on Genius:

Over all, American studios depend on foreign markets for roughly half of total revenue. But Apatow-produced films like the Will Ferrell vehicles Anchorman: The Legend of Ron Burgundy and Talladega Nights: The Ballad of Ricky Bobby, did more than 90 percent of their theatrical business domestically. And the Apatow-directed 40-Year-Old Virgin and Knocked Up had more than 60 percent of sales at home.

Katherine Heigl Seeks Escape From Doomed 'Grey's' In Search Of Big-Screen Stardom

Newly Non-Sexist Judd Apatow Reaps Benefits of Wikipedia Whitewash

This year's Oscar nominations produced an equally noteworthy list of omissions who'll be quietly turned away at the Kodak Theater doors, should a ceremony ever materialize. (Tazering to follow if they get insistent.) Our analysis of the 2008 Snubees:

Angelina Jolie
Category: Best Actress, for A Mighty Heart's Mariane Pearl
Snub-O-Meter: 6 Nose-Thumbings (out of a possible 10)
Why They Deserved It: Jolie's widely heralded turn in the harrowing role of wife to real-life journalist Daniel Pearl had all the earmarks of an Oscar-worthy performance, including an accent and makeup-assisted physical transformation.
What Might Have Happened: Like the general public, voters dismissed Heart with the rest of this year's post-9-11 downer crop.
Unspoken Factor: Persisting Academy fears that she'd blow creepy kisses to her brother from the podium.

David Spade and Matthew McConaughey Probably Just Too Into Themselves To Wrap It Up

Katherine Heigl Loved Making 'Knocked Up,' She Just Didn't Love The Movie Itself, Or Something Like That

Unlike Judd Apatow's last movie, which was hailed by 40-year-old virgins the world over as being the first sensitive portrayal of their shared predicament ever committed to screen, Knocked Up was less embraced by potential knocked-uppees, who felt the female lead had greatly settled for a less-than-ideal lot in life. Star Katherine Heigl addressed her misgivings with some of her character's choices in a recent Vanity Fair, a statement that sparked much debate, and one that she now feels the need to qualify:

"It's important to me to take a minute and clarify the quote about Knocked Up in Vanity Fair," Heigl tells Usmagazine.com. "I was responding to previous reviews about the movie the interviewer brought to my attention.

Typical Man Judd Apatow Responds To Heigl's 'Knocked Up' Complaints With Selfish Pragmatism

A Vanity Fair quote in which Katherine Heigl dared to offer her honest, not-entirely-glowing assessment of the movie credited with graduating her to full-fledged stardom instantly became the source of much debate: One faction—let's just call them the "Apatow loyalists," cried, "Katherine Heigl can't say those things! Who does Katherine Heigl think she is? Doesn't Katherine Heigl know Knocked Up made her, and Knocked Up can just as easily destroy her?," while the other—let's just call them "women"—simply replied, "You go, girl behind the questionably motivated character written so as to service the whims of a very peniscentric screenplay!" New York magazine's Vulture blog approached the film's lauded writer-director for his own take:

"I think the characters are sexist at times," he told us, "but it's really about immature people who are afraid of women and relationships and learn to grow up."

Katherine Heigl Admits That If It Were Up To Her, She Would Probably Have Aborted Seth Rogen's Love Child

If you're one of those Knocked Up audience members whose bullshit-sensing adrenal glands went haywire watching Judd Apatow's blockbuster paean to chubby, jobless, weed-huffing types and the attractive, upwardly mobile women who drop everything to carry their accidentally conceived children to term, then you are not alone, as even the actress called upon to bring such an improbable scenario to life has expressed her own misgivings about taking the role in the current issue of Vanity Fair:

"It was hard for me to love [Apatow's] movie" because it's "a little sexist..."

Hollywood Women On Working In A Schlong-Obsessed Industry

In what is quickly escalating into a bitter, Riggs vs. King-esque volley played out on the cement courts of the media—first Deadline Hollywood Daily claimed Warner Bros. president of production Jeff Robinov was scrawling "DEEP TURNAROUND" in pink hi-liter on any project with a female lead, then Robinov fights back by listing every chick-flick he's ever made, will make, or hopes to remake for Variety—now Salon enters the fray, assembling an impressive panel of industry women to weigh in on the state of the Hollywood sexes. While the discussion takes several interesting turns, we join them in the midst of a lively debate over the feminist merits of beauty-and-the-schlub megahit Knocked Up:

Kimberly Peirce: I just love when she's having that mood swing. That is hilarious.

Margaret Nagle: I totally believed her having sex with him to begin with.

Disappointing Opening Means We May Never Get An 'Ocean's 14'

Now You Can Dress Like Your Favorite 'Knocked Up' Character!

Canadian Journalist Uncomfortable With How Closely Apatow Blockbuster Mirrors Own Knocking-Up

Michael Cera's Inability To Take Direction Is Seth Rogen's Career Windfall

'Knocked Up' May Restore Trust In Mainstream Comedy Stolen By Fat-Suited Eddie Murphy