Carla Meyer

The mesmerizing "This Is It" pays tribute to Michael Jackson as a singer, dancer and, most strikingly, as the guy in charge.

Brian McKenna has spent half his life promoting rock shows, and that calls for a party.

During the 19 years the Sacramento International Gay and Lesbian Film Festival has existed, LBGT people have made tremendous political strides and increased their visibility by about a thousandfold.

The new movie "Whip It" gets a lot right about roller derby, local rollers say.

When the makers of the Japanese version of "Sideways" approached Napa Valley wineries about location shoots, the response wasn't always positive.

Two new movie houses and a pop-life hotbed update the venerable Japantown by the Bay.

Our critics had a tough time narrowing it down, but here are their recommendations for the best of the local pop music, theater, classical music and art events coming this fall.

On the road most of the past decade, Papa Roach singer Jacoby Shaddix and guitarist Jerry Horton try to make the moments count when they come home to the Sacramento area – whether that means family or philanthropy.

During a three-hour show that roused far more often than it lagged, guitarist and singer Billie Joe Armstrong proved himself one of the most fully present artists performing on a big scale today.

Woodstock, for all its muddy, revolutionary glory, was missing a few things. Like oysters on the half shell and wine seminars.

When Stan Lunetta retired last year as music contractor for the Music Circus, the perfect replacement was waiting in the wings. Or rather, in the pit.

An episodic TV series shot in the Sacramento area will make its national debut this weekend.

Three years ago, Cole Cuchna and Scott Simpson started writing songs together. A year later, they drafted other musicians and embarked on an exhaustive search for a lead singer for their fledgling band, the New Humans.

When Chris Webster first encountered trouble with her voice in early 2008, she figured she could sing her way through it.

On the road after a five-year hiatus but without new songs to push, No Doubt wowed a packed Sleep Train Amphitheater on Friday night with a straightforward greatest-hits set.

Filmmakers Palmer Taylor, 27, and Justin Coupe, 29, have redefined do-it-yourself filmmaking.

At the end of the drearily formulaic romantic comedy "The Ugly Truth," as our two leads are finally admitting they've fallen for each other (no spoilers here, folks), Katherine Heigl's character asks Gerard Butler's why he's in love with her.

The Sacramento Film & Music Festival, which starts tonight at the Crest Theatre, will showcase a psychological thriller with terrific production values, a documentary tribute to a time when Northern California rivers ran rich with salmon, and a modern noir about a group of fringe dwellers in San Francisco.

There's a secret subculture in the Sacramento area, one built on goggles, kickboards and especially on knowing those precious hours when public pools open for lap swimming.

The Heart show is one of more than 50 that Konocti Harbor Resort and Spa, a waterfront lodge and recreation area about 2½ hours northwest of Sacramento in Lake County, will hold this year at either its 5,000- capacity outdoor venue or 1,000-seat indoor show room.

Beyoncé showed at Arco Arena Thursday night that she not only is a star of the moment, but she also could be a popular stage presence for a long time.

In the world of horror and exploitation films, there's a fine line between trash (gross but fun) and garbage (gross, period).

As the legal battles, speculation and circus atmosphere follow Michael Jackson in death the way they did in life, the music icon's talent still trumps all among his fans.

All films will be shown at the Crest Theatre, 1013 K St., Sacramento.

With last year's record attendance cementing its status as the area's premier film event, the Sacramento French Film Festival probably shouldn't have stirred things up this year.

Derivative in most ways, "The Proposal" marks itself as original in one regard: It presents a 44-year-old woman as a potential romantic option for a 32-year-old man without branding her A) a cougar, B) a sugar mama or C) that acronym applied to friends' mothers who inspire slow-mo fantasies of summer wear, soap buckets and dirty Toyota Camrys.

Denzel Washington and John Travolta always have shown exorbitant amounts of charisma, even as movie stars go.

"The Girlfriend Experience," Steven Soderbergh's study of a high-priced Manhattan call girl through the prism of the economic crisis, is meta enough to intrigue yet too removed to truly engage.

"The Hangover," a blackout comedy about a derailed bachelor party, hits and misses with its gags. But it distinguishes itself from other what-happens-in-Vegas comedies (practically a subgenre at this point) by setting an especially vivid scene and telling an actual story instead of pasting together random shenanigans the way many modern comedies do.

Rarely allowing substance to interfere with style, filmmaker Rian Johnson occasionally amuses but mostly frustrates with his con-job fantasia "The Brothers Bloom."

With "Ratatouille," "WALL-E" and now "Up," Pixar Animation Studios has graduated from moviedom's finest animation house to its most consistent producer of great cinematic art, period.

"Night at the Museum: Battle of the Smithsonian" throws everything – history, high jinks, lots of famous faces in supporting roles – at the museum walls to see what sticks. Happily, much of it does.

Christian Bale should have taken a vacation instead.

There's something very special about the pairing of Gael García Bernal and Diego Luna, who starred together in the wonderful "Y Tu Mamá También" and reunite in "Rudo y Cursi."

When a group of folks from a local church decided to put on a Japanese film festival in 2005, they chose well-known titles: Akira Kurosawa's 1985 action epic "Ran" and the 1996 crowd-pleaser "Shall We Dance?" which just had been remade into a Hollywood film.

"Angels & Demons" might cause controversy among viewers who like their Tom Hanks films to be of some substance.

Paul Haggis' appearance Monday evening at the Mondavi Center no doubt will draw plenty of aspiring filmmakers from UC Davis.

For Eric Bana, playing the bald, tattoo-faced villain Nero in "Star Trek" meant shedding concerns about his leading-man looks.

Director JJ Abrams, in exploring the beginnings of the Starship Enterprise, blasts the "Star Trek" franchise back into relevance.

Blending an old-school look with a well-told story, the new "Star Trek" restores youth to the beloved franchise.

Keri Carr's voice, clear and ebullient, matches her demeanor as Rowdy Kate tears into "Honky Tonk Sin," a band original that examines the eternal struggle between piety and "whiskey drinkin'."

Hugh Jackman gets so fully into character in "X-Men Origins: Wolverine" that he risks bursting blood vessels when Wolverine shows the full force of his rage.

Each summer movie season brings its own go-to descriptive term. A few years ago, it was "re-imagining." Then it was "threequel." In 2009, it's "reboot."

Combining mental illness, homelessness, journalism, cello music and a directing style that veers toward the epic, "The Soloist" encounters some trouble in maintaining a tone.

While Robert McKeown is being interviewed about the film series that he and his wife, DeeAnn Little, present in West Sacramento, a first-time patron walks in and tells McKeown he just read about tonight's showing of the 1985 science-fiction film "The Quiet Earth" on MySpace.

A very southern modern Western, the Spanish-language "Sin Nombre" offers a treacherous frontier, a conflicted outlaw and fine performances by actors with whom the camera clearly is besotted.

Remember when every Russell Crowe movie was an event?

A familiar figure stood in front of the Park Ultra Lounge on 15th Street Wednesday night, waiting for transportation to arrive. Indeed, the figure was so familiar that even limo drivers who weren't his limo driver couldn't resist a shout-out.

"The Soloist," opening April 24, tells the story of Los Angeles Times columnist Steve Lopez's relationship to Nathaniel Ayers, a homeless, schizophrenic classical musician.