Category: Everything Else

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Laughing Matters: “Shining”

Dan Seeger

Sometimes comedy illuminates hard truths with a pointed urgency that other means can’t quite achieve. Sometimes comedy is just funny. This series of posts is mostly about the former instances, but the latter is valuable, too. It’s been some time since I taught a film class, and the likelihood of that task ever again falling to me dwindles by the day. Even so, I have a little mental tally of the material I’d like to use to illustrate the possibilities and parameters of cinema to a roomful of students. My fictional lecture supplements aren’t loaded with full films so much … Continue reading Laughing Matters: “Shining”

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Beers I Have Known: Toppling Goliath pseudoSue

Dan Seeger

This series of posts is dedicated to the many, many six packs, pony kegs and pints that have sauntered into my life at one point or another. This is how it began. When we lived in North Caroline and visited Wisconsin, we would occasionally stop at a Dairyland liquor store before exiting across the the state line on our homeward trip, securing a few brews we couldn’t easily acquire in the south. On one such shopping excursion, one of the proprietors of the liquor store in question spied us amassing quite a hefty stack of bottles and cans, seemingly with … Continue reading Beers I Have Known: Toppling Goliath pseudoSue

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From the Archive: All I Want for Christmas

Dan Seeger

As I felt compelled to note when I dropped my old review of the dreadful film Dutch in this space, the actor named Ethan Randall noted here eventually adopted the stage name Ethan Embry instead. This was review on a mid-November edition of The Reel Thing, the movie review radio show I co-produced and co-hosted in the early nineteen-nineties. While we were reading about the amazing, artful films that were opening on the coasts to make a run at the Academy Awards, this was the kind of glop that we had to sit in front of and generate a reaction to … Continue reading From the Archive: All I Want for Christmas

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The Art of the Sell: Christmas Catalogs

Dan Seeger

These posts celebrate the movie trailers, movie posters, commercials, print ads, and other promotional material that stand as their own works of art.  When I was a kid, I needed one thing and one thing only at this time of year: a Christmas catalog from one of the big department store chains. I tend to think of it as a Sears catalog, but realistically any of them would do. As long as the square bound publication was as thick as a big city phonebook and one-quarter to one-third of it was devoted to toys. I spent countless hours lying on … Continue reading The Art of the Sell: Christmas Catalogs

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Beers I Have Known: Leinenkugel’s

Dan Seeger

This series of posts is dedicated to the many, many six packs, pony kegs and pints that have sauntered into my life at one point or another. When I was in college, “craft beer” wasn’t a term I or any of my peers knew. We had only three categories of that particular potable: cheap beer, slightly-less-cheap beer, and imports. Luckily, I lived in a state where the culture of local breweries endured nicely, even toughing it out through prohibition. This meant that even my cheap beer options were pretty good. Stevens Point Brewery was right down the road from my … Continue reading Beers I Have Known: Leinenkugel’s

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The Art of the Sell: Wes Anderson, “My Life, My Card”

Dan Seeger

These posts celebrate the movie trailers, movie posters, commercials, print ads, and other promotional material that stand as their own works of art.  Wes Anderson is rightly earning a fleet of social media raves for his new Christmas-themed ad for H&M. Thankfully, it’s far better than what he came up with the last time he pointed his camera at Adrien Brody on a train. It also got me thinking about other commercial spots Anderson has directed, including his contribution to the American Express “My Life, My Card” campaign. The meticulous detailing that can swerve towards preciousness can get wearying across … Continue reading The Art of the Sell: Wes Anderson, “My Life, My Card”

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From the Archive: Hear No Evil

Dan Seeger

This was written in late March of 1993, putting it near the end of my five years as an undergraduate college student and my three years as a film critic on radio station WWSP-FM. As for the latter experience, the weariness was clearly starting to show, at least when it came to sitting through the steady procession of drab thrillers that followed the runaway success of The Silence of the Lambs.  Since I use the Academy Awards as an entryway into the review, it’s worth noting that the four freshly-named acting winners at this point were Al Pacino, Emma Thompson, … Continue reading From the Archive: Hear No Evil

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The Chicago National League Ball Club

Dan Seeger

To Ernie Banks, who I never saw play but who I knew was Mr. Cub… To Billy Williams and Ron Santo… To Ferguson Jenkins, who I did see pitch, and who improbably hit a triple in a game I watched in 1983, his last season. I remember that extra base knock being cited in a WGN package as proof that anything could happen, maybe even the Cubs making the postseason… To every last member of that 1984 team, who provided happiness and heartache like I’d never know when they did actually make the postseason… To Ryne Sandberg, still my favorite player… To Jack Brickhouse, who I’m … Continue reading The Chicago National League Ball Club