Armond White's Better Than List 2008

I'm not really quite sure what's happened to New York Press film critic Armond White over the last year or so. Even though I've been on board with a lot of his contrarian opinions (hating The Dark Knight) and agree with him about many of the films he supports (Shotgun Stories), the man really seems to have gone off the deep end lately, to the point that the majority of his reviews test the limits of readability. Still, even though there is a lot of Armond-hate out there, I still have an odd respect for the guy, which brings us to his 2008 Better Than List. This is a piece he's been putting together for the past few years, where he gives you ten movies that mainstream critics have been praising and then explains why his choices are better. As usual, he borders on incoherency, but a few of his choices are interesting, like his recommending Steven Chow's CJ7 over Wall-E. I can't get behind his shameless Spielberg-promoting (Indiana Jones 4 is a terrible, terrible movie), but his praise for RocknRolla and Transporter 3 does make me a bit more excited to check those films out. Check out the list for yourself. The indignation of the commenters alone is worth the price of admission. As an added bonus, take a look at Jim Emerson's response to White's list, which is a pretty funny examination of Armond's often impenetrable prose.