Gus Van Sant's Palme d'or winner Elephant will have its North American premiere at the Montreal World Film Festival.

The festival announced a selection of titles from its various programmes including some Official Competition titles and some of those screening Out of Competition, including Italian filmmaker Gabriele Salvatore's Io Non Ho Paura (I'm Not Scared) and Iranian director Samira Makhmalbaf's Panj-E Asr, a story about life in post-Taliban Afghanistan. The festival will also screen Joy Of Madness, the documentary by Makhmalbaf's 13-year-old sister, Hana, which is also screening at Venice.

Competition titles include, from France, Le Coeur Des Hommes (French Men) by director Marc Esposito; from Canada, Gaz Bar Blues, directed by Post-Mortem filmmaker Louis Belanger; and, most intriguing, The Gun, from US-based Russian filmmaker Vladimir Alenikov, a film shot in real-time with fifteen single-take scenes that follows a moment in the 'life' of a gun.

Amongst titles announced from other programmes are Ma Vie En Rose director Alain Berliner's La Maison Du Canal (The House By The Canal), based on a thriller by French crime fiction icon Georges Simenon; the world premiere of Die Farbe Der Seele (The Colour Of Soul), from German filmmaker Helma Sanders-Brahms; and Australian Rolf De Heer's Alexandra Project, a psychological thriller about "the sexual politics of marriage".

The MWFF did not indicate if its competition titles were all world premieres, although the festival's lack of FIAPF accreditation may make such concerns meaningless.

As well, the festival will fete Quebecois producer Denise Robert whose production company Cinemaginaire has produced two of the biggest hits in Quebec this year - The Barbarian Invasions and Mambo Italiano. For Robert, it's an opportunity to have one's cake and eat it. Both films are premiering in English Canada at the Toronto International Film Festival.