‘Vegas’ the Favorite Film With N.Y. Critics : Movies: The Critics’ Circle goes outside the mainstream for its top picks of 1995.

“Leaving Las Vegas,” the bleakly haunting film about a suicidal alcoholic and a prostitute who falls in love with him, was voted best film by the New York Film Critics’ Circle Thursday.

Most of the other films and performances chosen by the critics’ group were, like “Leaving Las Vegas,” outside of the mainstream and typified by very dark subject matter.

“We were definitely showing a preference for the dark side of film and human nature,” said Newsday film critic John Anderson, chairman of the New York critics’ group.

The critics chose “Leaving Las Vegas” as best picture, and for best actor, its star Nicolas Cage, for his role as a despairing alcoholic determined to drink himself to death. The film is in limited release nationally.

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The best actress nod was given to Jennifer Jason Leigh for her role in “Georgia”--also in limited release--in which she played a heroin-addicted aspiring singer who struggles with her relationship with her much more successful sister.

The group, which is made up of 25 New York-area print film critics, chose Kevin Spacey as best supporting actor for his “collected works” this year, which include roles in “Outbreak,” where he played one of the victims of a deadly epidemic; “Swimming With Sharks,” in which he starred as a megalomaniacal film studio executive; his mysterious but loquacious criminal in “The Usual Suspects”; and the vengeful serial killer in “Seven.”

Mira Sorvino was given the best supporting actress award for her role as a kitsch-loving prostitute who is also the birth mother of Woody Allen’s adopted son in “Mighty Aphrodite.”

Chinese director Ang Lee (“Eat Drink Man Woman”) was chosen best director for “Sense and Sensibility,” Emma Thompson’s adaptation of Jane Austen’s story of two sisters who struggle to find romantic fulfillment in a society obsessed with wealth and status. British actress Thompson’s debut script was voted best screenplay.

Best cinematography honors went to Lu Yue for his work on “Shanghai Triad.” And the best nonfiction film was “Crumb,” the story of an eccentric cartoonist and his oddball family.

A special award was given for best first feature to Australian director Chris Noonan, who directed “Babe,” the fanciful film about a pig who learns to tend sheep.

Best foreign film honors went to “Wild Reeds,” a story of teen angst in the early 1960s, directed by Andre Techine.

The critics’ group also gave a special award to Fabiano Canosa for his work on “Film at the Public,” part of Joseph Papp’s Public Theater in New York City, which was discontinued earlier this year after 17 years.

The Critics’ Circle awards dinner will be held Jan. 7. Meanwhile, the Los Angeles film critics will choose their favorites on Saturday and the National Society of Film Critics will name their winners on Jan. 3.