The 11th Brief Encountersfestival in Bristol has announced a line-up of more than 200 short filmsfor this year's event, which runs November 23-27 at the Watershed Media Centre.

The programme includes filmsfrom 25 countries during the five-day event. More than £10,000 will be awardedin prizes.

Film highlights include MartinMcDonagh's Six Shooter, Vaughan Pilikian's Hammer andFlame, Stefan Le Lay's Le Baiser (The Kiss), Filip Marczewski's Bieda-Ziemia (Poor Land), John Smith's ThrowingStones, Joe Tunmer's Mockingbird, Jay Holben'sDescent, Amy Neil's Can't Stop Breathing, Luke Morris andToby MacDonald's Heavy Metal Drummer,Laurence Coriat's BeingBad, and Marçal Fores'sYeah! Yeah! Yeah!

Guests expected to attendBrief Encounters include Stoned directorand longtime producer Stephen Woolley,Wallace and Gromitcreator Nick Park, and experimental filmmaker John Smith.

The event also includespanels, masterclasses, and other industry-orientedevents.

"This year's BriefEncounters programme is another wonderful array of creative filmmaking whichwe've whittled down from over 1000 entries," festival director Sue Lion said. "And I'm particularlypleased to see a huge increase in the number of films directed and produced bywomen - over a third of all films screened in the Festival in fact. Thiscompares favourably with national statistics which estimate women make up only7% of UK film directors."