Dann Gire
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Redmayne, Vikander shine brilliantly in 'Danish Girl'Dec 10, 2015 5:00 am - Tom Hooper's visually sumptuous "The Danish Girl" follows the formula of James Marsh's 2014 visually arresting "The Theory of Everything." Both are dramatically tepid, f...
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Gire: 'Big Short' long on bold outrage-fueled comedyDec 10, 2015 4:00 am - If you don't understand subprime mortgages, a naked Margot Robbie in a bubble bath explains them while sipping a martini. Don't get those repackaged mortgages? Master ch...
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Gire: Heart-challenged 'Sea' a blubbering survival taleDec 10, 2015 4:00 am - The first shortcoming in Ron Howard's Moby-Dick-inspired maritime survival adventure "In the Heart of the Sea" is that we observe the great white whale way too early for...
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Suburban producer of 'The 33' makes the impossible possibleDec 07, 2015 10:00 pm - Once in a while, Hollywood producer Robert Katz returns to his alma mater, Northern Illinois University, to talk with students about the movie business. He always tells ...
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Reel life: Spike Lee offers no solutions, just a spotlight with 'Chi-Raq'Dec 03, 2015 4:00 am - 'Chi-Raq' attack! Spike Lee and other filmmakers behind the controversial new movie “Chi-Raq” came to Chicago's Waldorf Astoria Hotel recently to meet Chicago's art...
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Gire: Spike Lee's 'Chi-Raq' a powerful, poetic dramaDec 02, 2015 7:00 am - To find a movie this incendiary, volatile, messy, blunt and urgent, you'd have to go back to "Do the Right Thing," Spike Lee's 1989 seminal race drama that frightened a ...
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St. Viator grad's comedy leads to Conan, ColbertDec 01, 2015 4:20 am - While growing up in Palatine, Brian Stack never thought comedy came from regular people. "Show business was something done by aliens," he said. "I mean, nobody I knew co...
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Dann Gire's TWO holiday season movie listsNov 26, 2015 5:00 am - We need two film lists to properly predict the impact of the upcoming holiday movies. List No. 1: Anticipated Box Office Receipts. The blowout winner will be no surprise...
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Reel life: Oakton Pop-Up film fest earns a sequelNov 26, 2015 4:45 am - • Oakton Community College's first Pop-Up Film Festival last year proved to be popular enough to warrant a sequel. So, here comes the Second Annual Pop-Up Film Festival,...
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'Wonders' is a nearly real look at a beekeeping familyNov 26, 2015 4:30 am - Alice Rohrwacher's "The Wonders" doesn't conform to Hollywood's conventional plotted story. Parts of this hyper-realistic drama could pass for a documentary on the lives...