Concerts & Events in San Diego

The 10th annual San Diego Film Festival showcases a packed schedule of more than 70 full-length and short-film offerings, giving celluloid connoisseurs an advance peek at upcoming fiction and documentary movies. On Saturday at 5:30 p.m., HBO Documentary Films will screen Superheroes, a nonfiction meditation on real-life crime-fighters who take to the streets in costume. Catch TV stalwarts Michael C. Hall (Dexter) and Lucy Liu (Ally McBeal) in East Fifth Bliss, a dramedy centering around a mid-thirties slacker who dates the daughter of an old high-school classmate while struggling to overcome his addiction to drinking orange juice straight from the carton (Saturday, October 1 at 7 p.m.; Sunday, October 2 at 1 p.m.). Many showings boast the film's cast and crew in attendance, allowing guests the opportunity to get up-close glimpses of acclaimed actors and Oscar-winning dolly grips.

Tim Bluhm and Greg Loiacono, founding members of The Mother Hips, began playing together as an acoustical duo in a Chico State University dormitory. Twenty years and eight studio albums later, the pair continues to serve as the backbone of a four-piece rock band that Pitchfork has praised for its "70s rock and power pop" and that the New Yorker has applauded for "know[ing] how to sing it sweet and play it dirty." Last year, The Mother Hips celebrated two decades of soulful, Californian rock melodies with a four-CD set entitled Days of Sun & Grass. The collection hallmarks their tight songwriting and focused harmonies that, when performed live, carry enough confidence to playfully jam and stretch out into boisterous, sprawling sets.