Gire's film freebies to serve local church missionary work
Some people call them "freebies."
My wife Peggy calls them "junk that takes up room."
I prefer to call them "valuable motion picture keepsakes."
For more than 20 years, I have been collecting promotional movie memorabilia: T-shirts, toys, caps, action figures, carrying cases, posters, blankets, trinkets and all sorts of odds and ends that movie companies have sent me so that I might write kindly about their films.
Sorry, Hollywood, but "pay to praise" only works on some state government officials, not Chicagoland film critics.
For two decades, I have stuffed my movie loot in every nook and cranny on two floors of the Daily Herald office, plus my attic and garage.
No more!
Now, my stuff can now be your stuff come this Friday, because I've donated the whole kit & kaboodle (I don't really know what a kit & kaboodle is, but it sounds naughty) to a worthy cause.
Everything I'm donating will be sold starting at 7 p.m. Friday, Feb. 13, at Our Redeemers United Methodist Church, 1600 W. Schaumburg Rd., Schaumburg, at the intersection with Springinsguth Road.
The proceeds will go to support church member Richard Vales, who took a business trip to the Philippines and was so affected by the rampant poverty and hunger, he decided to do something that - pardon the cliché - Jesus would really do. Twelve years ago, Vales sold his business, his Hoffman Estates home and his earthly possessions. He returned to the Philippines where he has given food and supplies to the needy ever since.
Once in a while, Our Redeemers receives a video and photos showing how Vales is using their money to improve life in the Philippines. Vales has been known to buy food for strangers out of his own Social Security check.
"Richard's ministry is a reflection of Our Redeemer's commitment to Christ's call to feed the hungry," Rev. Bill Shaw, Our Redeemers pastor, told me. "As a church, we support local food pantries, work with the Society of St. Andrew, World Vision and Heifer Project International. We even help staff soup kitchens in Chicago."
So, if you buy something Friday, you will be an honorary missionary, because you will be supporting official missionary work.
I have a small collection of action figures of Iron Man, Spider-Man and his arch-nemesis Dr. Octopus, a toy carrier in the shape of a shark from "A Shark's Tale," the entire cast of "Tropic Thunder" as Bobbleheads (among them Oscar-nominated Robert Downey Jr. as white actor Kirk Lazarus playing a black soldier), a football and insulated tailgate bag from the upcoming animated comedy "Monsters vs. Aliens," a miniature gumball machine from "Nick and Nora's Infinite Playlist," a zillion posters and "Scarface" lobby cards.
I've even got - and please don't think me too nuts - a half-filled bottle of ridiculously expensive water used by James Bond 007 actor Daniel Craig when I interviewed him at Trump Towers in Chicago. Yes, he touched it! He drank from it! And you can buy it!
Contact Our Redeemers at (847) 882-6116 or go on line at orumc.org. Or email me at dgire@dailyherald.com.
Please be generous and bring cash. Credit and debit cards will not be accepted, and you wouldn't want to botch your one chance to own an "I Only Drum Naked" T-shirt from Rainn Wilson's comedy "The Rocker" now.
Would you?