The second installment of the six week, 12 salon hair competition "Hair Wars" took place last Thursday with runway performances from Allure and Canvas Salon. Each week two Sacramento salons go head-to-head, showcasing their best in avant-garde hair styling. The runway, constructed specifically for the event, stood in the middle of the Park Ultra Lounge's outdoor patio. Approximately 200 people piled on top of benches and stood on chairs to get a glimpse of the action. Allure was one of the finalists in last year's Hair Wars. Owner Missy O'Daniel said the competition offers her stylists an outlet by which they can show not only their patrons, but also the community as a whole, what they a

The Crest Theatre transformed into a circus ring for the first weekend of the French Film Festival. The night began with a high-production fashion show, Cirque de la Mode, and the curtain came down after the showing of “Lola Montés,” which was the inspiration for the whole night. Audience members were greeted by a ringmistress wearing a futuristic can-can dancers’ outfit, whip in hand, strutting across the stage and warning the audience, “This show is not for the faint of heart!” And the show proved to be beyond vibrant. DJ Roger was spinning French electro tunes from the likes of Yelle and the Prototypes as the models took to the stage. There were can-can outfits, fishnet stockings, pl

"French trash" vacationers, a late-in-life marriage, a self-taught painter gone mad and Beauty and the Beast will take to the screen at the Crest Theatre this weekend. Usually occurring in July, the eighth Sacramento French Film festival has an early start this year with its opening reception tomorrow night. The festival is held annually at the Crest Theatre as a project of the Alliance Française de Sacramento; it will run Friday through Sunday this weekend and Saturday and Sunday next weekend. Cecile Downs, co-founder of the SFFF, said the festival's selection will include comedies, dramas and thrillers as well as "midnight movies" — one is the erotic film A l’Aventure by Jean-Claude Br