'mulholland Dr.' On Map As N.y. Critics' Top Pick

Universal Pictures' "Mulholland Drive," David Lynch's weird, puzzling tour through contemporary Hollywood, is the New York Film Critics Circle choice as best picture of the year.

Divvying up its awards, the Critics Circle handed its top acting honors to Tom Wilkinson and Sissy Spacek, who play a long-married couple in Miramax's "In the Bedroom," and bestowed its director honors on Robert Altman for USA Films' "Gosford Park," an upstairs/downstairs tale of a weekend in an English countryside home that boasts an all-star British cast.

Eschewing the year's bigger studio films, the Critics Circle announced a slate of award winners top-heavy with independents -- albeit some well-financed ones.

"There's not a strictly studio movie in the bunch," said John Anderson, Critics Circle president and Newsday film critic. "I think that pretty much says what kind of a year it was for studio pictures."

In possibly the most surprising indie-studio upset, the animated film award went to Richard Linklater's "Waking Life," from Fox Searchlight, which beat out PDI/
DreamWorks' "Shrek" by only two votes, according to Anderson.

"There were multiple ballots for every category," Anderson said. "I'm surprised we got it done in just a few hours."

USA Films walked off with the largest number of awards, a total of five, distributed among two of its films: "Gosford Park," which opens in select engagements in New York and Los Angeles on Dec. 26, and Kar-wai Wong's romance "In the Mood for Love," which opened in February.

"I'm absolutely thrilled and absolutely surprised," veteran filmmaker Altman said when he heard the news of his director victory. "We had basically written this one off since they were announcing winners before the film was even released."

Altman, 76, who has yet to walk off with an Oscar, has been named best director by the Critics Circle twice before -- in 1975 for "Nashville" and in 1992 for "The Player." Both "Nashville" and "The Player" were Critics Circle choices for best picture as well.

Spacek, named best actress, is another Critics Circle favorite. She has received its award three previous times -- for 1977's "3 Women," 1980's "Coal Miner's Daughter" and 1986's "Crimes of the Heart."

In addition to the honors for Spacek and Wilkinson, "In the Bedroom," directed by actor-turned-helmsman Todd Field, was named best first film.

Reached by phone in London, Wilkinson expressed "astonishment" at the honor. "Sometimes you put a tremendous effort into your work and feel like it is really good, but you don't know until you see how it looks in the end," Wilkinson said. "The miracle that Todd (Field) pulled off was that he made all the right choices every step of the way."

Said Spacek: "This is certainly a triumph for all of us and certainly for an independent film such as this. To think that we didn't even have dressing rooms the first day."

Steve Buscemi, who plays a shy, lonely jazz fan in United Artists' "Ghost World," was named best supporting actor, while Helen Mirren was chosen best supporting actress for her performance as the housekeeper in "Gosford Park."

"Gosford Park" also snagged best screenplay for writer Julian Fellowes, who wrote the script based on an idea by Altman and actor Bob Balaban.

"I feel like I was in an extremely privileged position working with Altman," Fellowes said. "What I saw in the way he works is something I will strive to emulate. I felt that I was with a very positive force from Day 1. Everyone had told me that, for Altman, the script is only the starting point. But looking at the film, there are only two points where he didn't really stick to the script."

"In the Mood for Love" earned its two citations for foreign film and cinematography by Christopher Doyle and Pin Bing Lee. Agnes Varda's meditative documentary "The Gleaners and I," from Zeitgeist Films, was singled out as best nonfiction film.

A special award was given to restorations of two films by Jacques Demy, "Lola" and "Bay of Angels."