‘Triage’, produced by Alan Moloney's Parallel Films, supported by the Irish Film Board, and starring Colin Farrell as a war photographer trying to overcome his recent experiences in Kurdistan, opens the festival and is included in the festival’s Official Selection competition. Triage is written and directed by acclaimed Bosnian filmmaker Danis Tanovic, and also stars Seville born actress Paz Vega alongside Sandra Ni Bhroin, Ian McElhinney and Eileen Walsh.

Also competing for the Offical Selection award is the Dutch / Irish feature Nothing Personal, which is directed by Urszula Antoniak and stars Lotte Verbeek as a rebellious Dutch youngster who moves to Connemara where she befriends a wise and ironic Stephen Rea.

Lance Daly's low-budget Dublin fable ‘Kisses’ is included in the European Film Academy Selection, alongside the latest offerings by such notables as Michael Haneke (The White Ribbon), Ken Loach (Looking for Eric) and Andrzej Wajda (Sweet Rush). Daly will be hoping to follow his ‘best director’ award at the 2009 Irish Film & Television Awards with another prize.

Irish director Ken Wardrop's short 'The Herd' is one of 13 films competing for the Best European Short Film of the Year award, presented by the European Film Academy, in the festival's Short Matters! '09 selection.

This year’s festival will also feature over 150 European films - including features, shorts and documentaries. Spanish director and producer Fernando Trueba will receive the Seville Festival’s Honorary Award, while other luminaries of Spanish and European cinema, including Ben Kingsley, John Hurt, Sören Staermose, Vittorio Storaro, John Hurt, Fernando Trueba, Maurizio Scaparro and Rafael Azcona will be attending to present awards or discuss their work. The nominations for the European Film Awards 2009 will also be announced during the festival.

As the United Kingdom is this year's guest country at the festival, leading members of the UK film industry will be in town. Respected producer Jeremy Thomas has compiled a season of classic British films, while British Film Institute director Amanda Nevill will present a 'Treasures of the BFI' programme. Emerging British directors Andrea Arnold, Paul King, Shane Meadows, Caroline Patterson, Armando Ianucci, Xialou Guo and Bruce Webb will also be presenting their films.

The festival will also feature a mix of other seasons and programmes including a Eurodoc documentary selection, the Junior Europe young film-makers presentation and an industry forum featuring seminars on distribution, digital cinema and international co-production.

Irish journalist Dermot Corrigan will be blogging about the festival from Seville from Friday, October 6th. To follow his regular festival updates visit www.filmandfestivals.com or www.dermotcorrigan.com. For more information about the European Film Festival visit www.festivaldesevilla.com/