FRIDAY –
An animated movie involving space and aliens opens this weekend, and the most famous movie with those themes – STAR WARS – is invading the Padres/Royals series this weekend. Tonight is BeerFest and the start of Star Wars weekend with lots of characters and fun activities. Instead of bringing your glove to the game, bring a lightsaber.
For fans of classical music, the MAINLY MOZART ALL-STAR ORCHESTRA is at Conrad Prebys Performing Arts Center in LA JOLLA. No yelling out for Freebird!
On the opposite end of the music spectrum, rap fans have two groups they can catch at the SAN DIEGO COUNTY FAIR – 2 CHAINZ and LIL JOHN.
You don’t have to wait “one week” for the BARENAKED LADIES and GUSTER. They will be performing at the Open Air Theatre at SDSU tonight. It’s a safe bet you’ll hear the Ladies do their song “Brian Wilson.”
SATURDAY –
Jazz fans are in luck. The SAN DIEGO SMOOTH JAZZ FESTIVAL is happening at the Rady Shell DOWNTOWN. It continues on Sunday.
The PADRES/ROYALS series and Star Wars theme play all weekend. Special Star Wars packages are available that come with goodies, including a bobblehead.
MAINLY MOZART ALL-STAR ORCHESTRA is going again Saturday, but this time at Epstein Family Amphitheater in LA JOLLA.
And if you love Mozart, and love rap – it will be hard to choose between Mozart and Method Man. But Method and his crew – WU-TANG CLAN – will be at Pechanga Arena. And throughout Saturday, their band member “U-God” will be at various places around town signing autographs to promote his new hard cider.
If you want some laughs, comedian GEORGE LOPEZ will be at the Civic Theatre DOWNTOWN.
If TRIBUTE BANDS are your thing, an Alice in Chains band is at Brick by Brick and a Pretenders tribute appears on the Ramona Soundstage.
SUNDAY –
It’s sundae on Sunday, with the SCOOP SAN DIEGO ICE CREAM FESTIVAL. It’s their 7th year, bringing 30 of the region’s top ice cream, gelato, and paleta vendors into NORTH PARK. A handful of celebrity judges (including Sam The Cooking Guy), will be judging the best flavor of the year. Better to go back to work on Monday dealing with brain freeze instead of a hangover.
The PADRES wrap up their series with the Royals, and the Star Wars weekend. It’s KidFest day, and the little ones are allowed to go on the field and run the bases, and take pictures with their favorite Star Wars characters.
In soccer, the SAN DIEGO WAVE FC take on the Washington Spirit at Snapdragon Stadium.
The San Diego County Fair has “The Evolution of Pop” doing a Michael Jackson show.
At the Movies –
28 YEARS LATER
Movie critics can’t be trusted (present company excluded). Before writing this review I checked what this movie was getting on Rotten Tomatoes and it’s 95% (one of many reasons that website can’t be trusted). I enjoy Danny Boyle movies (Trainspotting, Slumdog Millionaire, Yesterday, 127 Hours, to name a few). I’m not as big a fan of the writer of this movie, Alex Garland (Ex Machina was brilliant, all his other stuff disappointing). This zombie movie wastes a cast that includes Jodie Comer, Ralph Fiennes, and Aaron Taylor-Johnson. The story involves a quarantined island for people that have this zombie virus, and for reasons that don’t make sense, a man feels his 12-year-old son needs to cross this bridge to go hunt a few. Apparently that’s a tradition in this village, and of course, things go wrong. The boy is dealing with his mom dying, and the possibility that a doctor could help (who may be a crazy guy on the mainland, as his head is shaved and it makes you think of Brando in Apocalypse Now!). Remember how when you were a teenager and realized how dumb horror movies were? You’d wonder why the person went down into that dark basement after they heard a noise, or whatever it was? Well, decisions like this are made throughout the film. And it’s a shame, because it has a few really cool scenes. One involves an “Of Mice and Men” type of moment with Fiennes. One of the dumbest scenes in a movie, had people attacking the zombies that made me think of either the goofy gangs in “The Warriors” or “The Power Rangers.” I haven’t decided which. My wife hated it, too. Yet I still have to give it 2 stars out of 5, for a few cool scenes, and great cinematography. It would’ve had a few other cool scenes, had they not made it look like a heavy metal music video.
ELIO
I couldn’t see this latest animated film from Disney/Pixar, as I was at the screening for 28 Years Later! The two critics I know that went to it said it’s a great movie for the whole family. The premise deals with people calling out to the universe for answers, and the universe responding. It’s a cosmic misadventure that has a space nut named Elio, who is obsessed with aliens and has quite the imagination. He gets beamed up to the Communiverse, which is an interplanetary organization with folks from various galaxies. He ends up being thought of as Earth’s leader, and hijinks ensue!