The 13th annual Hollywood Film Festival (HFF) will open on October 23 with Greg W Swartz’s drama Another Harvest Moon starring Ernest Borgnine, Piper Laurie and Cybill Shepherd.

HFF founder and executive director Carlos de Abreu also announced the inaugural Hollywood Comedy Film Festival and the first Human Rights Symposium, as well as nominees for the Hollywood Movie Awards to be decided by the public.

The festival line-up include Steve Morris’ The Assistants starring Joe Mantegna and Jane Seymour, South Korea’s 2009 foreign language Oscar submission Crossing by Kim Tae-kyun, Adam Kane’s Formosa Betrayed, Jeff Stephenson’s Not Since You; and Last Day Of Summer by Vlad Yudin starring Nikki Reed and DJ Qualls.

The documentary programme includes Garbage Dreams by Mai Iskander, Neshoba by Micki Dickoff and Tony Pagano, No Subtitles Necessary: Laszlo And Vilmos by James Chressanthis, and War Dance Returns by Sean Fine.

Hollywood Comedy Film Festival titles include John Ennis’ Wild Girls Gone starring Amy Poehler, as well as Little Fish, Strange Pond with Matthew Modine and Zach Galifianakis, and Chris Kattan’s Scout’s Honor with Fred Willard. Q&As with talent from Wild Girls Gone and Scout’s Honor will follow each respective screening.

The festival will launch its first Human Rights Symposium on October 24, which features the screening of a documentary highlighting the situation in the Democratic Republic Of Congo, a symposium on ending violence against women in the Congo, and the presentation of an award to the winner of the Come Clean 4 Congo contest.

The nominees for this year’s Hollywood Movie Awards are: 500 Days Of Summer, District 9, G.I Joe: The Rise Of Cobra, The Hangover, Harry Potter And The Half-Blood Prince (pictured), The Hurt Locker, Inglorious Basterds, Star Trek, Transformers: Revenge Of The Fallen, and Up.

The winner will be decided by public voting at the Yahoo! Movies website and will be announced at the Hollywood Awards Gala Ceremony on October 26. The festival will close on October 25 with the presentation of the Hollywood Discovery Awards honouring best feature, documentary, comedy, short subject and music video.

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