The Oscar best picture race has been dominated by tiny, often indie, films that not very many people see, i.e. The Reader. Widening the field could mean that they won't necessarily be the only ones competing for the top prize, and the studios and their big-budget "prestige" titles can finally play in the pool again. Ten nominees means more competition, which could net some eyeballs curious to see how the crazy It's a Mad Mad Mad Mad World-style race ends up.

For example, had their been ten Best Picture nominees last year, The Dark Knight would surely have been among them, which would likely have brought in some curious fanboys. And if the studios have doubled chances of doing a blitz awards-tie-in marketing, then that's even better. More money for everyone means nicer, bigger parties and then everyone wins!

We think it's a fine idea, as more competition is more fun. Though we'll have to suffer through twice as many set-up clips, it ought to make the long, long, long evening slog to the final dance all the more put-up-withable. Because now TEN enter and only one leaves. Lots more carnage.

[Oscars.org]

Which isn't to say that anyone has yet confirmed his or her role as the Sunday night's official Best Supporting Actor proxy. Maybe the mystery is just one component of the Condon/Mark Surprise Parade™, or, as seems increasingly likely, it reflects uncertainty among the Ledgers, Michelle Williams and Warner Bros. over just who should stand for the late actor upon his imminent Oscar victory Sunday night.

At the very least, we thought it was agreed that the Academy would hold the statuette for 3-year-old Matilda Ledger until she reached 18. But her grandfather was ambiguous on Thursday, noting to TMZ's tape-wielding hellhounds that he'll hold it for her "forever." As shrieked at the top of Tom O'Neil's lungs, that's not really how it works, but we've long sought an unprecedented Oscar custody battle, so may the best Ledger win. Or, should the Academy lose its nerve, may it simplify everything and just give the award to Robert Downey Jr.

• Ledger's Dad — Thinking About an Oscar Speech [TMZ]

• Heath Ledger's family plans to take his Oscar... [LAT]

The Ultimate Joker founder Fer Barbella never wants to see the Joker in the movies again. TV, fine. Animation, fine. But Heath Ledger was so good, he says, that the character deserves permanent retirement. And the only way to achieve that, apparently, is to gather 50,000 signatures in an impassioned plea for geek solidarity. More than 30,000 readers have contributed in two weeks; by the end of the month Barbella may fulfill his pledge to organize a march on Warner Bros.

But please — no hate mail. The organizers acknowledge their deficiencies:

Regarding some aggressive and radical comments here… to all of them… WHY SO SERIOUS? Just share your POV, but as well as we have the right to ask for this cause without being rude with you, you have the right to show some respect and class writing like a normal person. Please, do not overuse the f… word, for God's sake. And yes, we're morons, idiots and all that stuff… so what?

Oh, which reminds us: The Stop Uwe Boll petition is stalled well short of its million-signer goal. Don't let democracy pass you by.

• 'The Ultimate Joker' [via Carpetbagger]

According to Variety, Nolan is determined to make a non-Bat film his next project, though at least WB has kept him in the family:

Warner Bros. is tying up a big deal with its "Dark Knight" director Christopher Nolan for a big-scale spec script titled "Inception" that Nolan wrote and will direct as his likely next film.

WB is aiming for a summer 2010 release; production begins this summer.

Given the reported size of Inception, it's likely that post-production and a worldwide press tour could tie Nolan up until the fall of 2010; even if his brother Jonathan has a script for the Dark Knight sequel ready to go at that point, a winter 2011 feels like the earliest release possible (though summer 2012 seems like a far better bet). It's possible that WB could move ahead quickly with a different helmer, but Nolan would have to sign off on the decision since WB seems intent on retaining its cozy relationship with him. Will Batmania ebb over the next several years? Perhaps, but at least it'll give Christian Bale time to work out his lifetime supply of expletives on someone else's set.

• Nolan tackles 'Inception' for WB [Variety]

But how gentle is "gentle"? David Carr asks and mostly answers that question in today's NYT, best characterizing Warner Bros.' strategy as some balance of print ads and ignoring press requests for comment. Which is no doubt working, as is the self-perpetuating momentum of critical and Globes plaudits. Yet oddly downplayed in the equation is the viability of a dead nominee — especially one of Ledger's stature, talent and now legend. Beyond the obvious boost for a film just theatrically re-released, why would Warner's spend any money pushing Ledger for an award his untimely death and ensuing mythology has bought and paid for already?

That's not to say Ledger's performance isn't excellent, awards-worthy, iconic, whatever, and Academy voters will reward it in accordance with its "competition" — a dude in blackface, the guy who killed Harvey Milk, Revolutionary Road's token nod and Philip Seymour Hoffman, who stole the 2005 acting Oscar that Ledger deserved in the first place for Brokeback Mountain. As Carr points out (and we recall from first-hand experience), Ledger was a lousy campaigner then.

His ghost, however, is not, which makes Warner's job much less complicated than today's survey implies. The studio's marketers are really the only ones who can get in his way, and it's mildly surprising they'd hazard the exploitation factor naturally accompanying Ledger's Oscar ads. We know that's "the way it's done" and everything, but it's not like it has to be. If the guy's grown wings, jumping on his back seems worse than ghoulish. It's just senseless.

• Delicately Campaigning for a Star Now Departed [NYT]

Apparently celebrating its 35th anniversary, the awards were based on tabulations from hoi polloi votes flooding this Web site. In recognition of this anonymous constituency, many of the winners, including Bale, Witherspoon, Ellen DeGeneres and Carrie Underwood, appeared live on the broadcast to accept bulky glass statuettes and offer thanks to whoever noticed whatever it was they did to earn the accolade. Bale also singled out his Dark Knight co-star Heath Ledger, with whom he shared the prize for "Favorite On-Screen Match Up" and who most certainly would have attended himself had he not had better things to do.

Other winners included:

· Favorite Comedy Movie: 27 Dresses

· Favorite Drama and Independent Movie The Secret Life of Bees

· Favorite Family Movie: WALL-E

· Favorite Male Movie Star: Will Smith

· Favorite Female Movie Star: Reese Witherspoon

· Favorite Leading Man: Brad Pitt

· Favorite TV Drama: House

· Favorite TV Comedy: Two and a Half Men

· Favorite TV Game Show: Deal or No Deal

· Favorite TV Drama Diva: Kyra Sedgwick, The Closer

· Favorite Male Singer: Chris Brown

· Favorite Female Singer: Carrie Underwood

And many, many more, viewable here. Congratulations (we think?) to the winners; may their Oscar/Emmy/Grammy campaigns steam forth from here.

• People's Choice Awards

First, the (mostly predictable) nominations:

The Dark Knight
Slumdog Millionaire
The Curious Case of Benjamin Button
Frost/Nixon
Milk

The PGA recognition positions Dark Knight well for the Oscars, though the organization historically misses one Best Picture-nominated film a year (last year, the Academy subbed in Atonement for the PGA-vetted The Diving Bell and the Butterfly, and in 2006, the PGA gave a slot to Dreamgirls, which went on to face a surprise Oscar snub in favor of Letters to Iwo Jima). That the Academy likes to sneak in a period drama should serve up some consolation for also-rans like Doubt, The Reader, and Revolutionary Road, but the latter two films are beginning to circle the Best Picture drain (without the sure-shot trifecta of acting nominations that will keep Doubt buzzy throughout its expansion). At least Scott Rudin and Harvey Weinstein can agree on one thing: someone needs to be so fired for this.

But who cares about those real people movies! The burning question is whether these nominations hurt the chances of Oscar dark horse Wall-E. Pixar's finest actually did score a PGA nom in the animated category (alongside Bolt and Kung Fu Panda), and we've heard that animated films may not be allowed to submit in any other PGA category besides the one set aside for them. Also encouraging: the Oscars weigh their nomination votes according to numerical ranking, and Wall-E fans, who may be among the Academy's most ardent, are likely to list the film as their number-one choice. Sure, it's still a long shot, but Disney: it may be time to send EVE out to those voter-rich Toluca Lake retirement homes!

A New York Times report acknowledged over the weekend that, yes, those phenomena still glowing on the horizon in your rearview mirror are no less newsworthy than they were when they exploded months ago. The Dark Knight's $500 million-plus windfall indeed helped Warner Bros. handily earn a record box-office market share in 2008, and Twilight's $168 million take since Nov. 21 remains nothing short of a hormonally, follically fueled sensation.

But there's a terrible truth concealed beneath the money bags, and it involves the clown-shod ghost of Robin Williams (among others):

It was amazing. When all is said and done, maybe 24 million tickets will be sold to Twilight, based on current sales. That makes it almost as big as, what?

Patch Adams, the No. 10 movie of 1998. Or roughly the size of George of the Jungle, which placed No. 13 the year before. Or any number of films that are fondly remembered as midsize hits.

After adjusting for inflation, even Sex and the City fared about as well as 1989's Steel Magnolias and 1996's The First Wives Club, and The Dark Knight is only the 26th highest-grossing film of all time behind Grease and just $1.5 million ahead of Thunderball.

Still, while we can't deny some enlightenment and even surprise at the revised numbers, neither we nor you should be caught off-guard in 2009. We've helped you prepare: Have another read through our rosy Recession-Era Film Forecast, and spend these precious few remaining days of 2008 plotting your immunity to next year's hype flood and/or sizing your closets up for the stockpile of canned food and bottled water you'll accrue in the bleak months to come. Except for you, Warner Bros. — just redirect your shipment to Fox and cannibalize Harry Potter at will.

• Blockbuster Openings, Lackluster Box Office [NYT]

The earnest Dark Campaign to which we alerted you a few weeks back has inherited the role of Bat-freak Oscar Clearing House, gathering one fanmade for-your-consideration poster after another and today announcing the TDK community's plans to hit the trades with their grass-roots blitz:

Tomorrow… Dec. 17th we are sending Joker cards in the mail to Variety.

It is simple;
1. find a deck of cards
2. remove the joker card
3. with a red pen, somewhere on the card write:

“Why So Serious?”
For Your Consideration
Heath Ledger - Best Supporting Actor
The Dark Knight - Best Picture of 2008
http://DarkCampaign.com

We're all for these people ruining however many decks of cards they feel they need to trash to get a couple Oscar nods or whatever, but they're forgetting the key step: Address them to Peter Bart. The look of curiosity, whimsy and horror that the campaign's ad money is basically being spent on postage will virtually guarantee whatever the blog equivalent of a heart attack looks like. Cameras at the ready, tradesters.

• 
  Tomorrow, Dec. 17th, 'Dark Knight' fans... [Dark Campaign]

On both the front and back of the DVD, the words "A Christopher Nolan Film" were marked out. We initially brushed off the matter (assuming some posthumous Joker vandalism) until another tipster wrote in today about his own censored screener. "I just wonder what's the rationale - conspiracy to cockblock Nolan from Oscar consideration?" asked the tipster. "Secret WB plan to put Ratner in the running for Batman 3: Egghead Takes Gotham?"

We called Warner Bros. to find out, and a helpful publicist sighed. "You must be WGA," she said. "It's because the guild won't accept a possessory credit for a director." Thus, a poor awards season intern must censor every DVD with black pen. We eagerly await the day that the WGA not only retains the services of the "Unimportant Defacers Team" to enact web-wide cleanup, but sends Patric Verrone into every Suncoast Video in Southern California to scrawl over the terribly offensive possessory credits awarded to Space Chimps. Way to pick your battles, WGA!

The good news: Slumptastic Revolutionary Road finally got some awards season recognition! The bad news: It came at Milk's expense. And in the TV categories, In Treatment's five nods surpassed Mad Men, 30 Rock and Entourage, each with three nominations. A full list of nominees follows the jump. We'll have a closer read through the nominees later this morning after we properly suit up for another journey into Awards Hell, but for now we ask: James Franco as Best Actor for Pineapple Express? And: Between the four nominations apiece for Vicky Cristina Barcelona and The Reader, how about those Weinsteins?

FILM CATEGORIES

BEST PICTURE: DRAMA
· The Curious Case of Benjamin Button
· Frost/Nixon
· The Reader
· Revolutionary Road
· Slumdog Millionaire

BEST PICTURE: COMEDY OR MUSICAL
· Burn After Reading
· Happy-go-lucky
· In Bruges
· Mamma Mia
· Vicky Cristina Barcelona

BEST DIRECTOR
· Danny Boyle, Slumdog Millionaire
· Stephen Daldry, The Reader
· David Fincher, The Curious Case of Benjamin Button
· Ron Howard, Frost/Nixon
· Sam Mendes, Revolutionary Road

BEST ACTOR: DRAMA
· Leonardo DiCaprio, Revolutionary Road
· Frank Langella, Frost/Nixon
· Sean Penn, Milk
· Brad Pitt, The Curious Case of Benjamin Button
· Mickey Rourke, The Wrestler

BEST ACTRESS: DRAMA
· Anne Hathaway, Rachel Getting Married
· Angelina Jolie, Changeling
· Meryl Streep, Doubt
· Kristin Scott Thomas, I've Loved You So Long
· Kate Winslet, Revolutionary Road

BEST ACTRESS: COMEDY OR MUSICAL
· Rebecca Hall, Vicky Cristina Barcelona
· Sally Hawkins, Happy-go-lucky
· Frances McDormand, Burn After Reading
· Meryl Streep, Mamma Mia
· Emma Thompson, Last Chance Harvey

BEST ACTOR: COMEDY OR MUSICAL
· Javier Bardem, Vicky Cristina Barcelona
· Colin Farrell, In Bruges
· James Franco, Pineapple Express
· Brendan Gleeseon, In Bruges
· Dustin Hoffman, Last Chance Harvey

BEST SUPPORTING ACTRESS
· Amy Adams, Doubt
· Penelope Cruz, Vicky Cristina Barecelona
· Viola Davis, Doubt
· Marisa Tomei, The Wrestler
· Kate Winslet, The Reader

BEST SUPPORTING ACTOR
· Tom Cruise, Tropic Thunder
· Robert Downey Jr., Tropic Thunder
· Ralph Fiennes, The Duchess
· Philip Seymour Hoffman, Doubt
· Heath Ledger,The Dark Knight

BEST FOREIGN LANGUAGE FILM
· The Baader Meinhof Complex (Germany)
· Everlasting Moments (Sweden/Denmark)
· Gomorrah (Italy)
· I've Loved You So Long (France)
· Waltz With Bashir (Israel)

BEST ANIMATED FILM
· Bolt
· Kung Fu Panda
· Wall-E

BEST SCREENPLAY
· Simon Beaufoy, Slumdog Millionaire
· David Hare, The Reader
· Peter Morgan, Frost/Nixon
· Eric Roth, The Curious Case of Benjamin Button
· John Patrick Shanley, Doubt

BEST ORIGINAL SCORE
· Alexandre Desplat, The Curious Case of Benjamin Button
· Clint Eastwood, Changeling
· James Newton Howard, Defiance
· A.R. Rahman, Slumdog Millionaire
· Hans Zimmer, Frost/Nixon

TELEVISION CATEGORIES

BEST DRAMATIC TV SERIES
· Dexter
· House M.D.
· In Treatment
· Mad Men
· True Blood

BEST ACTOR, TV DRAMA
· Gabriel Byrne, In Treatment
· Michael C. Hall, Dexter
· Jon Hamm,Mad Men
· Hugh Laurie, House M.D.
· Jonathan Rhys Meyers, The Tudors

BEST ACTRESS, TV DRAMA
· Sally Field, Brothers & Sisters
· Mariska Hargitay, Law & Order: SVU
· January Jones, Mad Men
· Anna Paquin, True Blood
· Kyra Sedgwick, The Closer

BEST TV SERIES, MUSICAL OR COMEDY
· Californication
· Entourage
· The Office
· 30 Rock
· Weeds

BEST ACTOR, TV MUSICAL OR COMEDY
· Alec Baldwin, 30 Rock
· Steve Carell, The Office
· Kevin Connolly, Entourage
· David Duchovny, Californication
· Tony Shalhoub, Monk

BEST ACTRESS, TV MUSICAL OR COMEDY
· Christina Applegate, Samantha Who?
· America Ferrera, Ugly Betty
· Tina Fey, 30 Rock
· Debra Messing, The Starter Wife
· Mary-Louise Parker, Weeds

BEST MINI-SERIES OR MOTION PICTURE MADE FOR TELEVISION
· Cranford
· Bernard & Doris
· John Adams
· A Raisin in the Sun
· Recount

BEST PERFORMANCE BY AN ACTRESS IN A MINISERIES OR A MOTION PICTURE MADE FOR TELEVISION
· Judi Dench, Cranford
· Laura Linney, John Adams
· Catherine Keener, An American Crime
· Shirley MacLaine, Coco Chanel
· Susan Sarandon, Bernard & Doris

BEST PERFORMANCE BY AN ACTOR IN A MINISERIES OR A MOTION PICTURE MADE FOR TELEVISION
· Ralph Fiennes, Bernard and Doris
· Paul Giammatti, John Adams
· Kevin Spacey, Recount
· Kiefer Sutherland, 24: Redemption
· Tom Wilkinson, Recount

BEST SUPPORTING ACTRESS: SERIES, MINISERIES OR MOTION PICTURE MADE FOR TV
· Eileen Atkins, Cranford
· Laura Dern, Recount
· Melissa George, In Treatment
· Rachel Griffiths, Brothers & Sisters
· Dianne Wiest, In Treatment

BEST SUPPORTING ACTOR: SERIES, MINISERIES OR MOTION PICTURE MADE FOR TV
· Neil Patrick Harris, How I Met Your Mother
· Denis Leary, Recount
· Jeremy Piven, Entourage
· Blair Underwood, In Treatment
· Tom Wilkinson, John Adams

The comics site Superhero Hype noted this morning that Warners had backed out of its tentative plan to push TDK back in to theaters in January 2009 — something about not wanting to go up against Fox's rumored X-Files 2 re-release, we think, though no official reason was given. A more realistic suspicion is that if TDK isn't getting the awards love that many critics and industry observers once foresaw for it, then Warners will let the DVD ride this month and save its theatrical resources for Watchmen (and/or fighting Fox in court for the film's rights).

But one devotee is carrying its Oscar water either way at the site The Dark Campaign, featuring a fan-made TV spot rich with easy-to-read blurbs and a mission statement urging Academy revolution:

There are so many comic books done badly by studios that don’t understand. They all made plenty of money for their studios, but what makes Dark Knight different and special? What about all those qualities that make it a great film? The studios should understand the power of a great comic book storytelling translation and the pointlessness of a bad one. I’m hoping an effort to get a Best Picture nomination makes that clear to them. It’s rewarding the studio and filmmakers that did it right.

Not to mention that profound Obama boost they'd forsake by diverting The Dark Knight solely to video. Please, Warners — listen to reason.

• The Dark Campaign [Dark Campaign]

• WB Drops 'The Dark Knight' Re-release Plans [Superhero Hype]

In short, says Frank Spotnitz: It was The Dark Knight's fault. Warners' blockbuster, with all its brooding and scares simply claimed too much of the market on gothic fanboy melancholy for X-Files to compete a week after TDK first hijacked the box office. One one hand, it's not the most outlandish claim; few films escaped the Batman Revolution without at least a flesh wound (even Mamma Mia!, which Spotnitz cites among the season's most resilient counter-programming). Yet on the other, we can't help but feel a little embarrassed for a guy this delusional about his 15-year-old pop-cult franchise:

According to Spotnitz, I Want to Believe should have been a hit, based on its quality and on its genre as a scary movie. "Blockbusters, comedies, horror, scary films, these are always going to have a place in the theatre," Spotnitz tells Sun Media.

"Our theatrical performance this past summer notwithstanding, I think The X-Files is still a natural for theatrical release. We just opened the wrong week. The week after The Dark Knight, I think, was just not the right week for us. [...] We were a little dark scary movie coming in the fumes, in the exhaust, of this mammoth machine that was The Dark Knight. And I don't think we had a chance!"

They also didn't have the late Heath Ledger, IMAX, three years between films (as opposed to 10 years, with the previous X-Files film earning $80 million), virtually unanimous critical praise or a Momzo the Clown scandal. As Spotnitz almost certainly knows, it takes a village to make a hit. Literally — just ask the leaders of Batman, Turkey. Come to think of it, we hear they might be looking for co-plaintiffs against Warner Bros. if you think a class-action suit is worth a shot. Think it over.

• Spotnitz believes Dark Knight to blame [Toronto Sun via MCN]

Add it to the Dark Knight curse, we suppose: The same scenario torpedoed Batman Begins' Best Original Score hopes in 2005, when Zimmer and Howard were last DQ'd. Yet the duo once again leaned too heavily on collaborations for the Academy's taste, bringing on a third composer, the film's music editor and an "ambient music designer" whose achievement in melodifying Heath Ledger's scenery-gobbling will likely go forever unrecognized beyond the controversial five-person credit list — a/k/a the "cue sheet":

Zimmer said, in an interview with Variety prior to this week's Acad action, that listing multiple names on the cue sheet was a way of financially rewarding parts of the music team who helped make the overall work successful. (Performing-rights societies like ASCAP and BMI use the cue sheet to distribute royalties to composers.) [...]

Some members sided with Zimmer and Howard; citing the originality and cutting-edge nature of the music, they urged others to keep the Dark Knight score eligible despite the cue-sheet issue.

And that's not even counting the protests of Hüseyin Kalkan, the embittered mayor of Batman, Turkey, who is expected to argue that his city was singly responsible for the folk tune that inspired the soundtrack's hit instrumental, "Like a Dog Chasing Cars."

• Academy disqualifies 'Dark' score [Variety]

Frustrated over the superhero's incursion into his centuries-old city's cultural turf, mayor Hüseyin Kalkan's proposed lawsuit would nevertheless omit Batman creator Bob Kane, publisher DC Comics and film franchisee Warner Bros. as Nolan's co-defendants. Instead, it would hold the filmmaker himself singly responsible for the region's growing international reputation as a brooding, froggy-voiced world capital of mayhem — none of it in glorious IMAX:

“The royalty of the name ‘Batman’ belongs to us … There is only one Batman in the world. The American producers used the name of our city without informing us,” Kalkan told to the Doğan news agency.

Mayor Kalkan, speaking to the Hürriyet Daily News and the Economic Review, said last year foreign media picked up on Batman and the city’s increasing suicide rates among women. He said a columnist asked why Batman’s mayor did not sue the movie Batman for royalties while struggling with economic problems. “We found this criticism right and started to look for legal possibilities of a case like that,” he said.

Naturally, we sympathize with the mayor's social crisis, not to mention the bind in which Batman natives have found themselves outside the country; one Turk in Germany told reporters that Warner Bros. issued a cease-and-desist from naming his two restaurants after his hometown. To be fair, however, Batman Grill, The Dark Bite™ and a spectrum of other eatery variations are in fact the fiercely protected province of Six Flags, and a lawyer in Istanbul noted that the Batman Municipality has already missed the periodduring which it could file an objection to Batman's trademark as a superhero.

Still, we think this is far from over, with the whole scenario prompting noted Oscar diplomacy expert Dave Karger to reconsider his controversial theory on "How Obama Helps Batman." This is NATO's jurisdiction all the way.

• Real life Batman faces super test [Hürriyet Daily News via Hollywood Newsroom]

I thought the sequence involving the two ferries (in which a group of commuters and a group of convicts have the power to blow up each others' boats but don't) was a bit too reality-show-ish for my taste. But I know most viewers loved it. Either way, that part of the film speaks to the innate goodness of human behavior. And let's remember that Oscar ballots are due next January 12, just a week before Barack Obama is inaugurated. It's safe to say most Hollywood types will also see that event as an example of innate human goodness. All of this only helps The Dark Knight's chances, don't you think?

No.

• How Obama helps Batman [EW]