"They can't even kill Sean Bean right."

I'm simplifying my opinion a bit to play devils advocate, because agreeing with Dreww on anything is never fun, I do think White is a troll, but Dreww does have a point, he is a troll with some interesting perspectives to share, and I just wish I could hear such opinions from someone who isn't an insufferable asshole, people dislike White for that reason more than his opinions, if it wasn't for his Sheldon Cooper level snobbery and his complete lack of humility he probably wouldn't be accused of being a troll nearly as much, even if his opinions were the same.

I'm just saying, what's the point of sharing new perspectives if you do it in such an over the top obnoxious way that no one will ever take you seriously?

oh yeah here's his Star Wars review
http://www.nationalreview.com/article/4 ... id=1152026

btw, thought his Revenant review was kind of astonishing

Armond White was inspired to go into criticism because Pauline Kael said exactly what she wanted to exactly the way she wanted to. I think his approach is that if he just says exactly what he thinks all the time no matter what, it will be upsetting enough that people will always want to hire him for the controversy. So he just says exactly what he thinks all the time no matter what and if people agree with him they agree with him, and if they disagree with him--hey--he still gets to basically just be himself for a living. Makes sense to me.

I think it's true that he does decide what movies to like and not to like ahead of time, but that's true of almost everyone.

I think you should ask yourself why you are so missing the boat on how good The Empire Strikes Back really is.



The trailer for Zootopia had my audience in stitches. I was laughing so hard I had tears streaming down my face. The trailer for Captain America: Civil War has me excited, too.

question to all the people who love The Empire Strikes Back. What version of it do you watch? In my adult life I have only watched the harmy despecialized versions because I don't want to watch either the special editions or the non-anamorphic "DVD extra" versions.

I watch the original. I don't recall the special editions messing with it much, though, unlike A New Hope and Return of the Jedi.

Except I don't think he's that honest, there's some honesty in there I'm sure, but I'm also convinced that a lot of it is just because he feels obligated to be as contrarian as possible, almost as some sort of civic duty, from the reviews I've read I always get the impression that his opinions on movies are always based on circumstances outside the movies themselves, he always shoehorns politics into the review even when it makes absolutely no sense to do so and whether he loves or hates something ALWAYS depends on his political views.

I will see he's a very smart guy, unlike Confused Matthew who is borderline retarded.



Sure we all do that, but nobody takes it to the extremes this guy does, how many people love or hate everything a filmmaker does? How many people suck the dick of every fucking Spielberg movie? I mean Jesus Christ whenever this guy decides his opinion on a filmmaker his reviews of that filmmaker's work never changes, never a hicupp, he will either love or hate everything that person does, he loves the Coen Brothers so he will praise them no matter fucking what, even horseshit like The Ladykillers, same with Spielberg, meanwhile he hates Buambach and Cuarón so he will bash them no matter what, he hates everything Pixar does because he hates the very idea of Pixar as a company and that's that, also does this guy ever have a lukewarm opinion of anything? There's no middle ground with this guy at all, everything is either amazing or terrible, no room for nuance.

I don't sense any honesty whatsoever in that kind of black and white framing, it just seems like White is compelled by some sort of obligation to promote every filmmaker he loves by praising their entire body of work no matter what, and vice versa with every filmmaker he hates. I mean even I don't love every fucking Yes album for fuck's sake.

By the by, Star Wars sequel prediction for Supreme Leader Snoke:

Betcha he's really Yoda size.[/potential spoiler]

I'll second Drew's rec of The Good Dinosaur. On the same level of Inside Out. A step below their second golden age as Drew calls it, but that may be my nostalgia goggles. And fuck me if the animation wasn't incredible.

So the non-anamorphic, standard definition version on the official DVD? Maybe I will look at that just to be sure...


Armond bashed the fuck out of Lincoln. And Bridge of Spies. Which has the Coens on as co-writers.

I kind of suspect the reason he bashed Lincoln though is because the screenwriter is a gay icon, and one of Armond's things is that more gay critics such as himself should feel free to bash on gay iconography.


I know it's a cliche, but some of that animation looks almost photographic.

Yeah, it's the standard definition widescreen version of the original theatrical release. I bought an original trilogy box set that included both versions: special editions and original theatrical.

okay, what I've been watching is *supposed to be* an HD version of that, but maybe it's not. I'm willing to give Empire another shot with the officially released version.

this would be so funny. i would stand up and applaud a troll like that.

So just got back from Star Wars:

The Good

Thought the female lead was really good and it was enjoyable to see Han and Chewie. The micro-plot is cliche but it works. There were some cool visuals and enjoyable set pieces. There was some genuinely funny dialog that worked well.

The Bad

The acting outside of the female lead ranged from average to incredibly poor (Carrie Fisher in particular was awful). The macro story was both derivative of Star Wars and the new Star Treks and fucking ludicrous and poorly fitting for the universe it was in. There were too many moments where the camera paused as if to say "hey look at that thing that was in Star Wars before". The primary villain in the film was done in a pretty hackney way. The depiction of the force was dreadful