1990

FLORESTA, Brazil - The little priest leans in, as though to make a confession. The subject is forbidden, but tonight he will talk. " A violencia ," he says. The violence of his account seems impossible. This small town, called Floresta, blooms in Brazil's sertao , a wild and arid land. On its surface, Floresta is all pinks and yellows and purples, its facades covered with thick layers of paint. The houses stand in rows around a tree-lined square, and in the center sits a church.

The remake is called "Total Recall,"but many moviegoers have zero memory of the 1990 film starring Arnold Schwarzenegger. And that, according to the filmmaking team behind Sony's $125 million reboot of the sci-fi action adventure, actually might be a good thing. "The majority of people under 35 don't even know about the original," said Neal Moritz, who produced the "Total Recall" update opening Friday. "It was so cheesy... the tone of it was so much different from what I wanted to do. " Set several decades in the future, the new film stars Colin Farrell, Jessica Biel and Kate Beckinsale and takes place on an Earth that has been rendered largely uninhabitable by chemical warfare.

It's difficult to tell if the Summerland Tour - which brings Everclear, Sugar Ray, Lit, the Gin Blossoms and Marcy Playground to the Greek Theatre on Friday night - represents the apex or the nadir of the current 1990s revival. None of these alternative-rock acts (with the possible exception of Everclear) managed to extend its initial run of hits into a career of continued relevance. So there's no denying the role nostalgia is playing here: Most fans will show up Friday to hear "Santa Monica" and "Every Morning" and "Sex and Candy," as opposed to anything from Everclear's new "Invisible Stars.

SACRAMENTO - The bitter welfare battles that gripped American politics two decades ago were replayed in Sacramento this week, where a dispute over how hard the government should push poor people to rejoin the workforce threatened to derail the state budget plan awaiting the governor's signature. The debate was as much about ideology as finances, and it carried particular weight in California, which has one-third of the country's welfare recipients but only one-eighth of its total population.

Never heard of the guy, and he's not a Laker or Dodger, so what do I care? Probably the same for you - you're going to read a headline or see a picture of him, and I'll be amazed if you get this far. Yet they tell me he was on the cover of Sports Illustrated as big shot of the year. He's also some kind of skater, so how can he really be a big shot? A friend asks if I will do him a favor and meet the skater. Yes, I have friends, but not many, so I cannot afford to blow him off. I sit down with Johann.

WASHINGTON - When Bob Fu's cellphone rang halfway through a congressional hearing concerning detained Chinese activist Chen Guangcheng, all the West Texas pastor had to do was gesture for the congressman in charge, Rep. Christopher H. Smith, to disappear with him into a nearby room. Soon after, Smith, a Republican from New Jersey, returned with a stunning announcement: "Bob Fu has made contact with Chen Guangcheng in his hospital room. " Smith invited Fu to the dais, where Fu knelt next to the congressman, put Chen on speakerphone from Beijing and translated.

A season that started so disappointingly for the Angels was quickly forgotten among the roaring crowd of 27,288 at Angel Stadium on Wednesday night watching Jered Weaver throw the first individual home no-hitter since Nolan Ryan in 1975. Backed by chants of "Weaver, Weaver, Weaver," the 29-year-old right-hander was surrounded by teammates near the mound after Alexi Casilla's deep fly ball to right field was caught by Torii Hunter, giving the Angels a 9-0 victory over the Minnesota Twins.

Question: I'm a disabled traveler who makes hotel reservations about half a dozen times a year. I always reserve an accessible room, but recently it seems as if front-desk staff doesn't know what that is. Two times in recent months, I've been put in rooms that didn't have grab bars. One hotel told me none of the toilets in its accessible rooms had grab bars. Another clerk sent someone to check the bathroom before we went up, and he said there was a grab bar in the shower but not by the toilet.

Three years after nearly collapsing into liquidation, a resurgentGeneral Motors Co.has posted its best annual profit, surpassing what it earned during its heyday in the mid-1990s. In earning $7.6 billion last year, the automaker demonstrated how it has capitalized on its 2009 bankruptcy reorganization and federal bailout to shed brands, slash debt, rewrite union contracts and close surplus factories. The record annual earnings represented "a remarkable turnaround from what appeared to be a hopeless situation," said Jesse Toprak, an analyst with automotive information company TrueCar.com.

Janice Voss, 55, a NASA astronaut who first worked for the space agency as a teenager and flew five shuttle missions in seven years, died Feb. 6 in Scottsdale, Ariz., where she was receiving treatment for breast cancer. Voss flew four missions in the 1990s before a flight to the International Space Station in 2000. Her final trip was part of a radar topography mission that mapped more than 47 million square miles of Earth's surface. NASA said Voss was one of six women to fly in space at least five times.