Santa Barbara Fest to Debut ‘Sarah’s Key,’ 3D ‘Carmen’

Festival also includes tributes to John Hawkes, Hailee Steinfeld, Jacki Weaver and Lesley Manville

The Santa Barbara International Film Festival has announced a 2011 lineup that includes the U.S. premiere of the Kristin Scott Thomas film "Sarah's Key," a closing night presentation of the opera film "Carmen in 3D," and a gala world premiere of Mike Pavone's "That's What I Am," a drama starring Ed Harris, Chase Ellison and Molly Parker.

Sarah's KeySBIFF, which begins on January 27, also announced tributes to actors John Hawkes, Lesley Manville, Hailee Steinfeld and Jacki Weaver, and a special screening of "Toy Story 3" for 4,000 students.

The lineup includes 30 world premieres, among them documentaries about skateboarding ("Destination Orcas"), Olympic medalist Bill Johnson ("Downhill: The Bill Johnson Story" and singer-songwriters James Taylor and Carole King ("Troubadors").

The festival will also present the U.S. premieres of  an array of international films, including Patricio Guzman's "Nostalgia for the Light" and Park Soo-young's "No Doubt."

Eight different competition categories are titled Independent Features, International Features, Documentary Features, Spanish/Latin American Cinema, Eastern Bloc, East X West, and two shorts competitions.

Additiional sidebars include Focus on Quebec, Reel Nature, Real-Marketable Stories, World Cinema, To the Maxxx, Santa Barbara Filmmakers, Special Presentations, and the Apple Box selection of family films.

The sprawling lineup, said festival executive director Roger Durling in the press release announcing the selections, has taken its cue "from Christopher Nolan's 'Inception' — 'You musn't be afraid to dream a little bigger,' and so we have decisively and dynamically made our 26th festival grander in every way."

The festival previously announced tributes to Nolan, Annette Bening, James Franco, Geoffrey Rush and Nicole Kidman.

The full list of films is available at www.sbiff.org.  

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