There’s a remarkable stat in Phil Hoad’s interesting Guardian reflection on the global box office in 2011, and it’s not a reassuring one. Looking down the list of the year’s top grossers internationally, you have to go all the way down to 21st place to find a film made outside the Hollywood system: and if you haven’t heard of “Intouchables,” that’d be because it grossed its impressive $133.2 million inside its home country of France. (That said, it has been snapped up by The Weinstein Company.) Hoad wonders what can be done to bring a little more diversity to the international box office charts, and doesn’t come up with many answers — though he does suggest the crossover marketing appeal of projects like China’s Christian Bale starrer “The Flowers of War” as one potential way forward. [The Guardian]
As a pre-Guild palate cleanser, Erik Childress sorts the certainties from the wannabes in the Best Picture race. [Movies.com]
Want to see what the Academy’s Best Picture ballot form looks like? Wonder no more. [Gold Derby]
Ebert correspondent Omer S. Mozaffer celebrates “Young Adult,” describing it as Diablo Cody’s answer to “A Woman Under the Influence.” [Chicago Sun-Times]
For those still in a reflective mood, I absolutely love this: Dan Kois’s Top 10 reasons to make Top 10 lists. [New York Times]
Paul Mazursky loses his heart to Meryl Streep in “The Iron Lady.” [Vanity Fair]
David Poland video-interviews Wim Wenders about his foreign-language and documentary Oscar contender, “Pina.” [Hot Blog]
Scott Feinberg tries to find precedents for the roles played by this year’s Oscar hopefuls. Felicity Huffman was a “woman who passes as a man” in “Transamerica?” News to me. [Hollywood Reporter]
With “Pariah” and “The Help” acting as rare exceptions, Allison Samuels mourns the lack of substantial roles for African-American actresses. [Daily Beast]
Ali Gray gives the posters of 2012’s upcoming trash treats a prestige-film makeover. For some reason, the “Titanic 3D” one makes me laugh out loud repeatedly. [The Shiznit]