DIFF to end with Cameron's Avatar

Avatar, the latest film by the director of Titanic, will close the Dubai International Film Festival.

The hotly anticipated science fiction film Avatar will close the Dubai International Film Festival (DIFF), organisers announced today. The film, directed by James Cameron, who made Titanic and Terminator 2, stars the Australian actor Sam Worthington as a soldier who is sent on a mission to an alien planet. Its showing in Dubai on December 16 will come six days after its world premiere in London. The festival will open with a screening of Nine, the musical starring Daniel Day Lewis, Penelope Cruz and Nicole Kidman, on December 9. The festival's artistic director, Masoud Amralla al Ali, said: "These screenings define DIFF - in terms of the power of film content, diversity of films with an international outlook and the sheer enthusiasm of the audience." Other films to screen at the festival include The Fantastic Mr Fox and the British SF thriller Moon. The Indian actor Amitabh Bachchan will receive a lifetime achievement award. * The National Staff