U.S. film "Restless" of director Gus Van Sant opens the 15. Skopje Film Festival (SFF) in cinema "Millennium" on Thursday. The story focuses on a terminally ill teenage girl who falls for a boy who likes to attend funerals and their encounters with the ghost of a Japanese kamikaze pilot from WWII.

Up to April 27, SFF will present the most impressive films of 2011, selected at festivals in Cannes, Venice, Karlovy Vary, Toronto. They will be placed in the main programme, author programme, gala screenings and documentary programme.

The event will close with the Macedonian premiere of Teona Strugar-Mitevska’s film "The Woman Who Brushed Off Her Tears", with the film’s leading actress, Spanish star Victoria Abril in the audience.

Titles include "Jane Eyre" of Cary Fukunaga, "J.Edgar" of Clint Eastwood, "Hara-Kiri: Death of a Samurai" of Takashi Miike, "The Ides of March" of George Clooney, "The Raid: Redemption" of Gareth Evans, "Trishna" of Michael Winterbottom, "The Rum Diary" of Bruce Robinson etc.

The retrospective programme include films by legendary Russian director Andrey Tarkovskiy, as well as cycles of Japanese films and modern documentaries from the Netherlands.

Moreover, winning films from the Human Rights Film Festival in Barcelona will be screened.