According to The Daily Telegraph, The Dark Knight has grossed $1 billion at the worldwide box office, which makes it the world’s best performing film in 2008 and Warner Brothers’ best performing film ever. (Harry Potter and the Philosopher’s Stone which brought in 976 million back in 2001 formerly held the record.)
Because normal people care a lot less about box office gold and more about gold statues, there’s more talk of whether Heath Ledger should win a posthumous Academy Award for his role as the Joker than how much money the film’s raking in. Apparently people winning Oscars from the Great Beyond is nothing novel, but from what we can tell, Ledger might stand a better chance if he was a film composer or going up in the Art Direction category. A Best Supporting Actor nominee has never posthumously won an Oscar and while nominated in consecutively for East of Eden and Giant, James Dean was passed over for a Best Actor award twice.
After the jump find a chronological list of the posthumous Academy Award winners; let us know if you think Ledger deserves a trophy for his work in the comments.
1939 – Sidney Howard, Best Writing, Gone with the Wind 1956 – Victor Young, Best Music, Around the World in Eighty Days 1958 – William A. Horning, Best Art Direction, Gigi 1959 – William A. Horning (again!), Best Art Direction, Ben Hur; Sam Zimbalist, Best Picture, Ben Hur 1960 – Eric Orborn, Best Art Direction, Spartacus 1968 – Walt Disney, Best Short Film (Animated), Winnie the Pooh and the Blustery Day 1972 – Larry Russell and Raymond Rasch, Best Music, Limelight 1976 – Peter Finch, Best Actor, Network 1980 – Geoffrey Unsworth, Best Cinematography, Tess 1991 – Howard Ashman, Best Music, Beauty and the Beast 1992 – Thomas C. Goodwin, Best Documentary, Educating Peter 2002 – Conrad Hall, Best Cinematography, Road to Perdition