Bruce Beresford's Evelyn will open the 38th Chicago InternationalFilm Festival which will screen 95 films from 35 countries in its 15 days fromOct 4-18..Star and producer of Evelyn Pierce Brosnan will attend the screening and receive the Gold Hugo onstage beforehand. Julie Taymor's Frida will close the festival on Oct 17.

An international film juryconsisting of directors Ibolya Fekete, Amir Naderi, Sandra Nettlebeck andOrlando Rojas, Claudia M Landsberger of European Film Promotion and HollandFilm and critic/historian John Russell Taylor will award the Gold Hugo to oneof 19 films in competition. They are: All Or Nothing (Mike Leigh, director), Balzac And The LittleChinese Seamstress (Sijie Dai), TheBlessing Bell (Sabu), Chihwaseon (South Korea), Dark City (Fernando Sarinana), The Devils (Christophe Ruggia), Divine Intervention (Elia Suleiman), Dragonflies (Marius Holst), The Embalmer (Matteo Garrone), Grill Point (Andreas Dreseni), Hard Goodbyes: My Father (Penny Panayotopoulou), Madama Sata (Karim Ainouzi), Marooned In Iraq (Bahman Ghobadi), Morvern Callar (Lynne Ramsay), My Mother's Smile (Marco Bellochio), Pleasant Days (Kornel Mundruczo), Russian Ark (Alexander Sokurov), Springtime In A Small Town (Tian Zhuangzhuang) and Unknown Pleasures (Jia Zhangkei).

Filmsreceiving their world premiere screenings at Chicago are The Blessing Bell, John Watkin's Bond Girls Are Forever (UK/US), Michael Ojeda's Lana's Rain (US) and Amir Naderi's Marathon (US).

Theinternational film jury, FIPRESCI jury and DocuFest jury will announce thewinners of the Gold Hugo and FIPRESCI awards on Oct 13.

Among the other films onshow at Chicago include festival favourites Real Women Have Curves, TheDancer Upstairs, The Crime Of Father Amaro and City Of God, anddocumentary favourites Amandla! A Revolution In Four-Part Harmony, Lost InLa Mancha, Blind Spot: Hitler's Secretary and Only The Strong Survive. Other events include an awards tribute to Charles SDutton on Oct 11.