Jim Sheridan's award-winning drama In America will open the 2004 Bermuda InternationalFilm Festival (BIFF) on Mar 19 while Michael Gondry's romantic comedy EternalSunshine Of The Spotless Mind and David Mackenzie's Young Adam will close the event on Mar 25.

Seventy-two pictures willscreen at the event, which includes competition feature and documentarycategories as well as a Bermuda Shorts competition for the best short film. Thewinners will each receive a trip to sit on the jury panel for the 2005festival.

Other programmes include a world cinema showcase, the CountrySidebar, which this year focuses on Modern Mexican cinema, a film-makertribute, Midnight Madness section and children's pictures.

"We are so very excited by thediverse line-up and award-garnering films that will comprise the festival thisyear," BIFF festival director Aideen Ratteray Pryse said in a statement.

"We feel that the opening and closing night films encapsulate thespirit of the festival, which is world cinema."

Among theline-up are: Siddiq Barmak's Taliban drama Osama; The Agronomist, Jonathan Demme's acclaimed documentaryabout Haitian activist Jean Dominique; Sylvain Chomet's surreal animation Oscarnominee The Triplets Of Belleville; Paul McGuigan's morality tale The Reckoning; and Cristoffer Boe's acclaimed romance Reconstruction.