Twenty-seven new features will screen over the extended five-day anniversary event and there will be tributes to Robert Redford, T-Bone Burnett, the Coen Brothers and Mohammad Rasoulof - and there has already been a US acquisition.

While observers do not expect much buyer activity at the festival, Zeitgeist announced it had made a preemptive US buy on Dan Geller and Dayna Goldfine’s The Galapagos Affair (see below).

The Sony Pictures Classics team, RADiUS-TWC, IFC, Fox Searchlight’s production head Claudia Lewis and president of Paramount Film Group Adam Goodman are among those expected to attend the Colorado event, which runs from Aug 29 through the additional day of programming on Sept 2.

The main programme features are:

  • All Is Lost, Robert Redford
  • Before The Winter Chill (France) Philippe Claudel
  • Bethlehem (Israel) Yuval Adler
  • Blue Is The Warmest Color (France) Abdellatif Kechiche
  • Burning Bush (Czech Republic) Agnieszka Holland
  • Death Row: Blaine Milam + Robert Fratta, Werner Herzog
  • Fifi Howls From Happiness, Mitra Farahani
  • The Galapagos Affair: Satan Came To Eden, Dan Geller and Dayna Goldfine
  • Gloria (Chile), Sebastián Lelio
  • Gravity (US-UK) Alfonso Cuarón
  • Ida (Poland) Pawel Pawlikowski
  • Inside Llewyn Davis, Joel and Ethan Coen
  • The Invisible Woman (UK) Ralph Fiennes
  • Labor Day, Jason Reitman
  • The Lunchbox (India) Ritesh Batra
  • La Maison De La Radio (France) Nicolas Philibert
  • Manuscripts Don’t Burn (Iran) Mohammad Rasoulof
  • The Missing Picture (Cambodia-France) Rithy Panh
  • Nebraska, Alexander Payne
  • Palo Alto, Gia Coppola
  • The Past (France-Italy) Asghar Farhadi
  • Slow Food Story (Italy) Stefano Sardo
  • Starred Up (UK) David Mackenzie
  • Tim’s Vermeer, Teller
  • Tracks (Australia) John Curran
  • Under The Skin (UK) Jonathan Glazer
  • The Unknown Known, Errol Morris

Punch Brothers, the Coen Brothers’ musical collaborators on Inside Llewyn Davis, will perform a concert on the night of Aug 28.

Festival organisers will open the previously announced Werner Herzog Theatre

“This year’s 40th anniversary is a celebration of what Telluride Film Festival has accomplished over the past four decades, as well as what we are doing now and 40 years from now” said Telluride Film Festival executive director Julie Huntsinger.

“We are committed to presenting groundbreaking films with the world’s most preeminent talent in technologically advanced, state-of the art facilities including the brand new Werner Herzog Theatre. We look forward to continuing to explore the future in cinema through current masters of the art form and breakthrough talents.” 

2013 Silver Medallion Awards and on-stage tributes and conversations go to T Bone Burnett and the Coen Brothers, as well as Rasoulof and Redford.

Six past guest directors return with new programmes: novlelist Don Delillo presents Victor Erice’s La Morte Rouge (Spain, 2006) and analyses the 26-second Zapruder film; filmmaker Buck Henry presents the director’s cut of Mike Hodge’s The Terminal Man (US, 1972); writer Phillip Lopate presents Maurice Pialat’s Naked Childhood (France, 1969) with Pialat’s short Love Exists (France, 1960); novellist Michael Ondaatje presents short films from Chris Marker (La Jetée, France, 1962) and Alan Clarke (Elephant, Alan Clarke, UK 1989); film scholar, curator and author B Ruby Rich presents Sara Gómez’s One Way Or Another (Cuba, 1974); and writer Salman Rushdie presents Satyajit Ray’s Mahanagar (India, 1963).

For details of surprise films, Telluride Film Festival’s Talking Heads conversations programme and other programming, visit the official website.

  • The Galapagos Affair: Satan Came To Eden is a murder mystery documentary involving a love triangle that intersperses footage shot more than 70 years ago with recollections of contemporary Galapagos pioneers. Zeitgeist co-presidents Nancy Gerstman and Emily Russo negotiated the preemptive US deal with Geller, Goldfine and executive producer Jonathan Dana.

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