The San Francisco International Film Festival, which opens next Thursday (April 20) with Sofia Coppola's The Virgin Suicides, has unveiled its lineup of 190 feature and short films that will be showcased over a two week period. The closing night film on May 4 is Michael Almerayda's Hamlet.

Among the highlights in the programme is the North American premiere of One Day In The Life Of Andrei Arsenevich directed by Chris Marker (La Jetee), a screening of Philip Haas' Up At The Villa and the world premiere of Tom Verlaine: Music For Film featuring guitarist Verlaine playing live to classic experimental films by Man Ray, Carl Dreyer and others.

Films directed by women are numerous in the festival, with new pictures from Claire Denis (Le Beau Travail), Alison Maclean (Jesus' Son), Jana Bokova (Diary For A Story) and Daniele Huillet (Sicily! co-directed with Jean Marie-Straub)

48 countries are represented in the selection with some festival favourites including Takeshi Kitano's Kikijuro, Manoel de Oliveira's The Letter, Claude Chabrol's The Colour Of Lies, Andrzej Wajda's PanTadeusz, Voker Schloendorff's The Legends Of Rita, Nanni Moretti's Aprile, Raul Ruiz's Time Regained, Abbas Kiorastami's The Wind Will Carry Us and Arturo Ripstein's No One Writes To The Colonel.

Eligible for the $10,000 SKYY Prize for an emerging international film-maker whose film "displays a truly unique artistic sensibility or vision" but does not yet have US distribution are eleven films. They are:

- Around The Pink House (France/Canada/Lebanon) Joana Hadjithomas & Kahlil Joreige
- Chin Up! (France) Solveig Anspach
- The Closed Doors (Egypt) Atef Hetata
- Crane World (Argentina) Pablo Trapero
- Eeny Meeny (Czech Republic) Alice Nellis
- Hidden River (Argentina) Mercedes Garcia Guevara
- Mask Of Desire (Nepal/Japan) Tsering Rhitar Sherpa
- New Dawn (France) Emilie Deleuze
- No Coffee, No TV, No Sex (Switzerland) Romed Wyder
- Skin Of Man, Heart Of Beast (France) Helene Angel
- This Year's Love (UK) David Kane