Cherien Dabis' Amreeka will open the New Directors/New Films 2009 programme presented by New York's Museum of Modern Art and the Film Society of Lincoln Center. Amreeka is about a single mother and her teenage son who move from Ramallah to middle America.

The series will have its first ever closing night film, Lee Daniels' Sundance Grand Jury Prize winner Push: Based On A Novel By Sapphire, about a lonely, pregnantteenage girlin Harlem.

The 39th ND/NF - which aims to discover and support emerging talents - runs March 25-April 5 and will present 25 features from 20 countries.

Bob Byington will present the world premiere of his 'slacker ex-love story' Harmony and Me and ND/NF also hosts the US premiere of A Chorus Line documentary Every Little Step, directed by Adam Del Deo and James D Stern.

Sundance selections slated for ND/NF include Sophie Barthes' Cold Souls, Louie Psihoyos' The Cove, Sterlin Harjo's Barking Water, Gustave de Kervern and Benoit Delephin's Louise-Michel, Sebastian Silva's The Maid, Laurel Nakadate's Stay the Same Never Change, Alexis Dos Santos' Unmade Beds, and Ondi Timoner's We Live in Public.

New Directors/New Films 2009
$9.99, dir. Tatia Rosenthal (Israel/Australia)
Amreeka, dir.Cherien Dabis (US/Canada/Kuwait) [opening night]
Autumn (Sonbahar), dir.Ozcan Alper (Germany/Turkey)
Barking Water, dir. Sterlin Harjo (US)
Birdwatchers (La terra degli uomini rossi), dir. Marco Bechis (Italy/Brazil)
Cold Souls, dir. Sophie Barthes (US/Russia)
The Cove, dir. Louie Psihoyos (US)
Every Little Step, dir. Adam Del Deo and James D. Stern (US)
The Fly (Mukha), dir. Vladimir Kott (Russia)
Give Me Your Hand (Donne-moi la main), dir. Pascal-Alex Vincent (France/Germany)
Harmony and Me, dir. Bob Byington (US)
Home, dir. Ursula Meier (Switzerland/France/Belgium)
Louise-Michel, dir. Gustave de Kervern and Benoit Delepine (France)
The Maid (La Nana), dir. Sebastian Silva (Chile)
Mid-August Lunch (Pranzo di ferragosto), dir. Gianni Di Gregorio (Italy)
The Milk of Sorrow (La teta assisted), dir. Claudia Llosa (Spain/Peru)
Ordinary Boys (Chicos normales), dir. Daniel Hernandez (Spain)
Paper Soldier (Bumaznyj soldat), dir. Aleksei German Jr. (Russia)
Parque Via, dir. Enrique Rivero (Mexico)
Push: Based on the Novel by Sapphire, dir.Lee Daniels (US) [closing night]
The Shaft (Dixia de tiankong), dir. Zhang Chi (China)
Stay the Same Never Change, dir. Laurel Nakadate (US)
Treeless Mountain, dir. So Yong Kim (US/South Korea)
Unmade Beds, dir. Alexis Dos Santos (UK)
We Live in Public, dir. Ondi Timoner (US)

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