Category: Film

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Top Ten Movies of 2009 — Number Two

Dan Seeger

Jason Reitman’s third feature as a writer-director is perfectly positioned to tap into the dismal zeitgeist of economic hardship and jobs that are vanishing as fast as double scotches in a hotel bar. George Clooney doesn’t just play a businessman who spends most of his life jetting from city to city, entirely untethered from a settled life. He’s a hired hit man, taking up temporary residence in the conference rooms of failing firms to tell a morose parade of professionals that they are are loosing their livelihoods. It’s a bleakly comic reflection of the most downbeat pages of today’s newspaper. … Continue reading Top Ten Movies of 2009 — Number Two

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Gilbert, Psihoyos, Tarantino, Tyrnauer, West

Dan Seeger

Valentino: The Last Emperor (Matt Tyrnauer, 2009). This documentary tags along with the legendary designer as he prepares for a gala anniversary celebration, one that is rumored, correctly, as a precursor to retirement. Tyrnauer is given broad access to Valentino as he works, and the camera catches interactions that hint at his brilliance and volatility. The glimpse of the fashion industry at its most grand comes across as either rapturously glamorous or decadently wasteful, depending on the point of view that you tote into the viewing with you. I suppose predispositions will equally shape reactions to the understanding portrayal of … Continue reading Gilbert, Psihoyos, Tarantino, Tyrnauer, West

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Top Fifty Films of the 90s — Number Forty-Five

Dan Seeger

#45 — Groundhog Day (Harold Ramis, 1993) I started working on a movie news and review program at my college radio station in the fall of 1990. This was when Siskel & Ebert were still at the height of their popularity and influence, and my cohort and I decided that we needed some way to regularly close out of review segments, something that provided as clean and convenient of a button as the famed Chicago critics’ pronouncements of which way their respective thumbs were pointing. We settled on a star rating, using the four star scale that seemed most common … Continue reading Top Fifty Films of the 90s — Number Forty-Five