IT'S A STRAUSS WALTZ TO 100 BEST FILMS; WITH THOUSANDS TO CHOOSE FROM, WHICH TO PICK?

Byline: Bob Strauss Daily News Film Critic

I really wasn't interested in choosing the 100 greatest American movies of all time.

The American Film Institute's centenary of cinema gimmick seemed, to me, a strange way to celebrate the exciting variety that thousands of movies have given us through the decades. It looked more like a misguided effort that would reduce incalculable artistry to a shallow, frivolous popularity list, like a box-office chart or election results.

And what a list. The AFI thoughtfully provided a roster of 400 candidates from which 1,500 shakers and tastemakers of the industry/art form/apparent-soccer-league-equivalent could choose their 100 favorites. I got a peak at the preliminary list they sent to the anointed actors, filmmakers, executives, critics with their own TV shows and those noted movie experts Bill Clinton and Al Gore.

It turned me into the most obnoxious guy in the newsroom.

``Ha!'' I'd exclaim to disinterested colleagues whenever the real work of reviewing ``Flubber'' grew taxing. ``Those dolts put `Ferris Bueller's Day Off' on the voting list, but not a single film by the late, great Sam Fuller?'' or ``Are they the last people on Earth to realize that `The Greatest Show on Earth' was the worst film that ever won a Best Picture Oscar''? (As long as we're being historical here, when the 1953 New York Academy Awards festivities otherwise fell silent at the announcement, one guy asked, ``Who decides these things, anyway?'').

Voting rights

Well, as it turned out, I get to do some of the deciding this time. My attitude adjusted to a startling degree when the AFI contest people sent me my very own 100 Years . . . 100 Movies jury ballot. All of a sudden, this selection process seemed a whole lot more serious than I initially suspected.

A closer perusal of the 400 candidates also revealed whoever chose them - presumably the same folks responsible for including me in the voting, even though my TV prospects are on indefinite hiatus - to be smarter than I originally gave them credit for.

As my participation indicates, though, we're still not talking genius here. For one thing, the AFI's compilers are unusually beholden to official - that is, politically compromised - tastes.

For the most obvious example, they included every Best Picture Oscar winner save one, Laurence Olivier's stark and chilling 1948 ``Hamlet.'' Why that was singled out, probably for being too English, when the far less worthwhile ``Chariots of Fire'' somehow passed immigration inspection, is typical of questions the list raises.

Ticket sales were evidently a consideration, too. Especially as the list lurches into the late '80s and '90s, things such as ``Lethal Weapon,'' ``Die Hard'' and ``Batman'' increasingly pop up.

Of course, that could also be because we ran short of decent, serious movies at about the same time. In my personal selection of 99 films out of the 400, the '80s and '90s contributed a paltry nine entries each.

Compare that to my top decade, the 1970s, with 21 all-time greats, followed closely by the '40s (19) and the '50s (18). The good news is, 1997, which is not eligible in the AFI vote, has so far contributed at least one decade's best picture, ``Boogie Nights,'' so we've already improved on the egregious '80s.

Picking the winners

Despite my 100 other grumpy cavils about the voting pool AFI provided, I must admit that I was surprised that it only took a few minutes to zip through the handy, decade-by-decade nominees handbook and mark off an astonishing 94 arguably great films. A pessimist would say that indicates how lame the other 306 are, but it was Thanksgiving, and I didn't have any screenings for a week, so I chose the optimistic viewpoint.

Most of the key films noir were there, even such relatively unknown greats as ``Gun Crazy'' and ``Force of Evil.'' The western offerings were decent if far from complete; only one of the great Anthony Mann-Jimmy Stewart collaborations (``Winchester '73'') and nothing from the almost-as-good Budd Boetticher-Randolph Scott cycle. Screwball comedies, a classic Hollywood specialty, got their due, and the high-style MGM musicals of the '50s almost got theirs as well.

Scorsese was recognized for the fearlessly personal artist he often is - and, quizzically, for ``Casino'' too. John Cassavetes was at least acknowledged for midwifing the independent spirit with his 1959 ``Shadows,'' if not for his later, stronger work. Still, that's one more entry than Andy Warhol and his band of merry revolutionaries could claim.

My votes included most of the usual suspects. ``Citizen Kane,'' inevitably (film-school types being just as prone to sanctioned tastes as, I guess, academy members are to theirs). Anything by Buster Keaton (but there was, alas, only ``The General'') and Charlie Chaplin (well, almost; I skipped ``The Kid'' but was, as ever, a sucker for ``The Gold Rush,'' ``City Lights'' and ``Modern Times'').

The best of Bogart and Nicholson's nastiest; John Ford's ``The Searchers;'' all '70s Coppola; ``Terminator 2'' (OK, so it was an overproduced '90s crowd-pleaser, but it was cool!); so much worthy Hawks, Hitchcock and Kubrick that I found myself doing ridiculous instant calculus over which masterpieces were more masterful than others.

No contest

That last process, of course, sums up the senselessness of trying to rank art; there's just too much that's too good in its own particular way. And no, I can't even begin to list my top 99 in order of preference, although the AFI plans to highlight the top 10 overall vote-getters on TV specials next spring.

But there is a charge in choosing, no doubt about it. It's revealing, too. For instance, although I in no way planned it, my favorites divided almost evenly between films released before 1960 (50) and after (49). The split occurs right around the the time that I began going to the movies. Which indicates that, most evidence to the contrary, the films of my generation aren't collectively any worse than those that came before it.

For those five films I chose after picking my initial 94, I dropped my rigorous artistic judgments and did the fun thing: I went for guilty pleasures. These included ``From Russia With Love,'' the least-formulaic of the James Bond movies and, mainly, something I saw 20 times as a kid; ``Fatal Attraction,'' kinda lousy but, boy, a film that really captured its era's attitudes; the last movie that made me cry, ``The Joy Luck Club''; ``The Wizard of Oz,'' which I somehow overlooked the first time around; and ``Intolerance,'' a big ol' pretentious mess, but even more groundbreaking than ``Birth of a Nation'' and nowhere near as racist.

Now, you ask, what about my 100th choice? The AFI stingily left room for one - just one! - write-in vote. This took me more time to decide than the rest of the voting put together.

After much emotional turmoil, I went for ``The Naked Kiss.'' It came out in 1964, therefore neatly balancing my post- and pre-1960 selections at 50 each. It's by the recently departed Sam Fuller, who got more raw impact into his B movies than any director in history.

And it opens with a bald-headed prostitute beating her pimp with a telephone. Somehow, I think, that image belongs in any collection that dares to claim it represents the greatest of anything.

Critic picks the movies

that matter

Here's Bob Strauss's top 100 American films. They are listed in chronological order, the same way it is on the AFI ballot. His write-in vote is listed last.

``Intolerance,'' 1916

``The Big Parade,'' 1925

``The Gold Rush,'' 1925

``The General,'' 1927

``Sunrise,'' 1927

``City Lights,'' 1931

``Trouble in Paradise,'' 1932

``Duck Soup,'' 1933

``The Scarlet Empress,'' 1934

``Modern Times,'' 1936

``Bringing Up Baby,'' 1938

``Ninotchka,'' 1939

``The Wizard of Oz,'' 1939

``Fantasia,'' 1940

``His Girl Friday,'' 1940

``The Philadelphia Story,'' 1940

``Citizen Kane,'' 1941

``The Maltese Falcon,'' 1941

``Sullivan's Travels,'' 1941

``Casablanca,'' 1942

``Cat People,'' 1942

``To Be or Not to Be,'' 1942

``Shadow of a Doubt,'' 1943

``Double Indemnity,'' 1944

``The Miracle of Morgan's Creek,'' 1944

``To Have and Have Not,'' 1944

``The Big Sleep,'' 1946

``It's A Wonderful Life,'' 1946

``Out of the Past,'' 1947

``Force of Evil,'' 1948

``The Treasure of the Sierra Madre,'' 1948

``Adam's Rib,'' 1949

``Gun Crazy,'' 1950

``Sunset Blvd.,'' 1950

``Winchester '73,'' 1950

``The African Queen,'' 1951

``Strangers on a Train,'' 1951

``A Streetcar Named Desire,'' 1951

``Singin' in the Rain,'' 1952

``The Band Wagon,'' 1953

``Gentlemen Prefer Blondes,'' 1953

``On the Waterfront,'' 1954

``Rear Window,'' 1954

``Rebel Without a Cause,'' 1955

``Invasion of the Body Snatchers,'' 1956

``The Searchers,'' 1956

``Touch of Evil,'' 1958

``Vertigo,'' 1958

``North by Northwest,'' 1959

``Some Like It Hot,'' 1959

``Psycho,'' 1960

``What Ever Happened to Baby Jane?'' 1962

``From Russia With Love,'' 1963

``Dr. Strangelove,'' 1964

``Bonnie and Clyde,'' 1967

``Cool Hand Luke,'' 1967

``The Graduate,'' 1967

``Night of the Living Dead,'' 1968

``2001: A Space Odyssey,'' 1968

``The Wild Bunch,'' 1969

``Little Big Man,'' 1970

``MASH,'' 1970

``Dirty Harry,'' 1971

``The Last Picture Show,'' 1971

``McCabe and Mrs. Miller,'' 1971

``Cabaret,'' 1972

``The Godfather,'' 1972

``Badlands,'' 1973

``Last Tango in Paris,'' 1973

``Mean Streets,'' 1973

``Chinatown,'' 1974

``The Conversation,'' 1974

``The Godfather Part II,'' 1974

``The Man Who Would Be King,'' 1975

``Nashville,'' 1975

``One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest,'' 1975

``Taxi Driver,'' 1976

``Annie Hall,'' 1977

``All That Jazz,'' 1979

``Apocalypse Now,'' 1979

``Manhattan,'' 1979

``Atlantic City,'' 1980

``Raging Bull,'' 1980

``E.T. The Extra-Terrestrial,'' 1982

``Tootsie,'' 1982

``Blue Velvet,'' 1986

``Hannah and Her Sisters,'' 1986

``Platoon,'' 1986

``Fatal Attraction,'' 1987

``Do the Right Thing,'' 1989

``Goodfellas,'' 1990

``Terminator 2: Judgment Day,'' 1991

``Thelma & Louise,'' 1991

``The Player,'' 1992

``Unforgiven,'' 1992

``The Joy Luck Club,'' 1993

``Forrest Gump,'' 1994

``Pulp Fiction,'' 1994

``Leaving Las Vegas,'' 1995

Bob's Write-in:

``The Naked Kiss,'' 1964

CAPTION(S):

5 Photos, Box

Photo: (1--Color) (Photo montage of classic films)

Cover illustration by Dionisio Munoz/Daily News

(2) Rick (Humphrey Bogart) and Ilsa's (Ingrid Bergman) airport parting in ``Casablanca,'' is included on just about everybody's list of favorites.

(3) Some critics say ``Citizen Kane'' is the best American movie ever made.

(4) Glinda (Billie Burke) and Dorothy (Judy Garland) continue to enchant in ``The Wizard of Oz.''

(5) ``Forrest Gump,'' starring Tom Hanks, is one of the '90s films to make Bob Strauss' list of the 100 greatest American movies of all time.

Box: Critic picks the movies that matter (See Text)