The News: Critics Rediscover Voice for '07

He drinks your milkshake. (Illustration: Village Voice )

By S.T. VanAirsdale

Some of today's movie news of note from around New York:

--After a one-year hiatus, The Village Voice's critics poll is back. Shockingly(!), its results reveal a top three of There Will be Blood, No Country For Old Men and Zodiac, with -- I shit you not -- a 14-way tie for 153rd place. Hiiiilarious stuff, but quite up to the comic par of Nathan Lee's Top 10 list, featuring a wild pastiche of crit-culture darlings (I'm Not There, Eastern Promises), foreign toughies (Regular Lovers, Colossal Youth) and, writing about I Now Pronounce You Chuck and Larry, the best endorsement I've read for any film from 2007: "[T]hanks to the liberal, well-intentioned heterosexual film critics out there for, you know, being down with my peeps and everything, but wrong movie to gang up on: This shit is mad funny and will do more to normalize the idea of gay marriage than a hundred crap fag indies booked at the Quad." Oh, and Jim Hoberman liked some movies, too.

--Last weekend's PTA marathon at Reeler HQ caught the eyes of editors at Intense Guys, a newish blog that posts "great movie moments, one clip at a time." Of particular note at the site is the classic Philip Seymour Hoffman craps sequence from Hard Eight, which stood out memorably in my own eye-scorching odyssey. They've got a ton of other terrific scenes as well to help you start '08 on an appropriately procrastinating note.

--The New York Observer named Nikki Finke its Media Mensch of 2007 -- the first time the honor has been bestowed on a woman. Congrats, but what happened to unauthorized portrait she speaks of?

--Also in the voice: Nick Pinkerton previews the Otto Preminger retrospective opening tonight at Film Forum. Bonus: More good Preminger stuff from Dan Sallitt at Thanks For the Use of the Hall.

Posted at January 2, 2008 1:49 PM