The National Society of Film Critics is a 57-member group comprising critics from major newspapers and magazines across the U.S. Movies and DVD/videos in their first national release (some of which have yet to open in Chicago) are ranked by NSFC members for the poll on a scale of 100 possible points. The averaged ratings correspond to the following key: 100-81 = excellent; 80-61 = good; 60-41 = average; 40-21 = fair; 20-0 = poor.
The NSFC Web site, which contains more complete rankings of films and video past and present, as well as film descriptions, links to reviews by NSFC members, and the group’s history can be visited at http://nsfc.zap2it.com/nsfc/cda/index.jsp.
NSFC chairman: David Sterritt (Christian Science Monitor).
Poll editor: Michael Wilmington (Chicago Tribune).
New movies
75 `The Weather Man’: One of the brighter, less genre-bound recent big studio dramas, with one of Nicolas Cage’s deeper and more challenging recent performances, as Dave Spritz, Chicago TV weather star who’s also the disappointing son of a Pulitzer Prize-winning novelist (Michael Caine), a failed family man and a comic butt to malcontent viewers. It’s a slick-looking, technically spotless movie about the dangers and dissatisfactions of media slickness and success–well written by Steve Conrad and sharply directed by Gore Verbinski (“Pirates of the Caribbean”).
73 `Prime’
Ben Younger
73 `Ushpizin’
Gidi Dar
69 `Nine Lives’
Rodrigo Garcia
67 `Shopgirl’
Anand Tucker
65 `Three … Extremes’
Takashi Miike, Fruit Chan, Park Chan-Wook
64 `The Legend of Zorro’
Martin Campbell
60 `Saw II’
Darren Lynn Bousman
56 `Where the Truth Lies’
Atom Egoyan
Now playing
82 `The Squid and the Whale’
Noah Baumbach
80 `Wallace & Gromit:
The Curse of the Were-Rabbit’
Steve Box, Nick Park
80 `Good Night,
And Good Luck.’
George Clooney
74 `North Country’
Niki Caro
66 `Innocent Voices’
Luis Mandoki
64 `In Her Shoes’
Curtis Hanson
60 `Loggerheads’
Tim Kirkman
60 `Dreamer: Inspired
by a True Story’
John Gatins
56 `Elizabethtown’
Cameron Crowe
54 `Domino’
Tony Scott
New DVDs
91 `The Wizard of Oz’: Once again, Judy Garland’s full-throated, starry-eyed Dorothy opens up a cornucopia of wonders in the Merry Old Land of Oz–accompanied by those sterling companions Ray Bolger (the Scarecrow), Jack Haley (the Tin Woodman), Bert Lahr (the Cowardly Lion) and Toto the dog, in search of the elusive Wizard (Frank Morgan). In a special three-disc set is one of the great popular movies that almost everyone sees and knows, a classic Hollywood production that always chills our blood and warms our hearts.
90 `Le Samourai’
Criterion Collection
Jean-Pierre Melville
88 Looney Tunes–
Golden Collection (Vol. 1-3)
Chuck Jones, Friz Freleng, Bob Clampett, others.
87 `The Wages of Fear’
Criterion Collection
Henri-Georges Clouzot
87 `Samurai Rebellion’
Criterion Collection
Masaki Kobayashi
83 `The White Diamond’
Werner Herzog
82 `Some Came Running’
Vincente Minnelli
82 Tom and Jerry–
Spotlight Collection (Vol. 1-2)
William Hanna & Joseph Barbera
80 `Kill!’
Criterion Collection
Kihachi Okamoto
77 `The Strange Love
of Martha Ivers’
Lewis Milestone
76 `Save the Tiger’
John Avildsen
73 `Gus Van Sant’s Last Days’
Gus Van Sant
73 `Mysterious Skin’
Gregg Araki
70 `Darling Lili’
Blake Edwards
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Edited by Michael Wilmington, Tribune movie critic
