Critics’ Group Names ‘Babe’ Best Movie Of ‘95

“Babe,” the popular family film about a plucky little pig who rebels against his assigned role in barnyard society and insists on a being a sheep dog, was named the best film of 1995 by the National Society of Film Critics Wednesday.

Voting at the Algonquin Hotel, the 46-member group also gave three major awards to the harrowing drama “Leaving Las Vegas.” Mike Figgis, the film’s director, was chosen best director, and its stars, Nicolas Cage and Elisabeth Shue, were selected best actor and actress.

Cage plays a screenwriter who goes to Las Vegas to drink himself to death, and Shue is a troubled Las Vegas prostitute with whom he spends his final days.

Don Cheadle was named best supporting actor for “Devil in a Blue Dress” and Joan Allen best supporting actress for her portrayal of Pat Nixon in Oliver Stone’s “Nixon.”

The cinematography award went to Tak Fujimoto for his cool, hallucinatory vision of Los Angeles in the late 1940s in “Devil in a Blue Dress.” Amy Heckerling’s screenplay for “Clueless,” which she adapted from Jane Austen’s novel “Emma” and also directed, won the award for screenwriting.

“Crumb,” Terry Zwigoff’s intimate portrait of the cartoonist Robert Crumb and his dysfunctional family, was chosen best documentary.

The NSFC awards overlapped with those given by two other critics’ groups.

The National Board of Review voted “Sense and Sensibility” best film, and its maker, Ang Lee, best director. Cage took actor honors, while Emma Thompson was cited as best actress for “Sense and Sensibility” and “Carrington.” Mira Sorvino captured supporting-actress honors for “Mighty Aphrodite” and Kevin Spacey the supporting-actor prize for his work in “Outbreak,” “Seven,” “Swimming With Sharks” and “The Usual Suspects.”

The New York Film Critics Circle went with “Leaving Las Vegas,” Lee, Cage, Jennifer Jason Leigh (“Georgia”), Sorvino and Spacey.