The world premiere of Kirk Jones’ road movie Everybody’s Fine will screen as a gala at AFI FEST on November 3, while Israeli Oscar hopeful Ajami (pictured) plays in a new strand for first and second time film-makers.

Robert De Niro, Drew Barrymore and Kate Beckinsale star in Everybody’s Fine, a remake of Giuseppe Tornatore’s Stanno Tutti Bene that Miramax has scheduled for US release on December 4.

Festival top brass unveiled the inaugural New Lights competition for first and second time film-makers, which artistic director Rose Kuo said comprised “a selection of the year’s most essential work from the international film festival circuit.”

The New Lights roster includes the Israeli foreign language Oscar submission and Israel-Germany co-production Ajami from Yaron Shani and Scandar Copti, Andrea Arnold’s UK coming-of-age story Fish Tank, and Oren Moverman’s US wartime drama The Messenger.

Rigoberto Perezcano’s Mexican debut Northless will also compete for the prize, as will Maren Ade’s previously announced German drama Everyone Else, Corneliu Porumboiu’s Romanian Academy Awards submission and Cannes’ Un Certain Regard jury prize winner Police, Adjective, and Razvan Radulescu and Melissa de Raaf’s Romania-France-Belgium-Croatia co-production First Of All, Felicia (Felicia Inainte De Toate).

Rounding out the initial line-up are Xavier Dolan’s Canadian Oscar submission I Killed My Mother, Claudia Llosa’s Spain-Peru co-production The Milk Of Sorrow (La Teta Asustada), Javier Rebello’s Spain-France co-production Woman Without Piano (La Mujer Sin Piano), and Kyle Patrick Alvarez’ US entry Easier With Practice.

“This competition is a great example of what we hoped to achieve with the programming for this year’s festival,” AFI FEST director of programming Robert Koehler added. “To a film, they are accomplished and challenging works that strive to be memorably cinematic.”

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