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The American film I Origins will open the upcoming 49th Karlovy Vary International Film Festival organisers have announced. Top guests will include actor Michael Pitt, actress Astrid Berges-Frisbey, and director Mike Cahill. The science fiction film, awarded at Sundance this year, tells the story of a molecular biologist who makes a significant and unexpected discovery. Actor Michael Pitt returns to Karlovy Vary after nine years: he also attended back in 2005 when the Gus Van Sant film Last Days, inspired in part by the life and death of rock star Kurt Cobain, was screened.

A number of pictures from the former Eastern Bloc will be among the dozen in contention for the Crystal Globe for Best Film at the 49th Karlovy Vary International Film Festival next month, organisers said on Tuesday. They include Corn Island by Georgian director George Ovashvili, Welkome Home [sic] by Russia’s Angelina Nikonova and Free Fall by Hungarian helmer Gyorgy Palfi. There will be two Czech films in the main competition: Nowhere in Moravia, the directorial debut of actor Miroslav Krobot, and Fair Play by Andrea Sedláčková. The festival runs from July 4 to 12.

Closely Watched Trains, director Jiří Menzel’s masterwork which won the 1967 Best Foreign Language Oscar, will be digitally restored in time for the 49th Karlovy Vary International Film Festival next year. The decision was announced on Monday by festival organisers together with representatives of the National Film Archive. The film is one of the best-known to come out of the Czech New Wave in the 1960s. It was based on a book of same name by Bohumil Hrabal and starred a young Václav Neckář in the lead role.

The 48th Karlovy Vary International Film Festival ended with an award ceremony in Hotel Thermal on Saturday night. The festival’s main prize – the Crystal Globe for the best feature film - went to Le grand cahier, a German- Austrian-French coproduction directed by Hungarian film director Janos Szasz. An international jury, chaired by Polish director Agniezka Holland, gave the Special Jury Award to the British film A Field in England, directed by Ben Wheatley, while the Polish film Floating Skyscrapers by Tomasz Wasilewski received the main award in the East of the West section. The triple Oscar winning American director, scriptwriter and producer Oliver Stone received the Crystal Globe for Outstanding Artistic Contribution to World Cinema, as did American actor John Travolta, who was the biggest celebrity at the festival this year.

The world premiere of a new feature film called Revival by the Czech director Alice Nelis is scheduled at the Karlovy Vary International Film Festival on Friday. The movie, billed as a tragicomedy, follows former members of a fictional hard rock band Smoke and their efforts to come back. The film, which features several leading Czech film actors including Boleslav Polívka, Miroslav Krobot and Karel Heřmánek, will enter cinemas on July 11.

Oscar-winning American filmmaker Oliver Stone arrived on Tuesday for the Karlovy Vary International Film Festival underway since last week. Mr Stone, the director of acclaimed films like Wall Street and Platoon, is to receive a Crystal Globe for Outstanding Artistic Contribution to World Cinema. In addition to directing, Oliver Stone has written a number of acclaimed scripts including Midnight Express (for which he received his first Oscar) and True Romance (directed by the late Tony Scott).

American actor F. Murray Abraham – best-known in the Czech Republic for his Oscar-winning performance as composer Antonio Salieri in Amadeus (Miloš Forman, 1984), will head to Karlovy Vary on Thursday for the 48th Karlovy Vary International Film Festival. On Wednesday evening Mr Abraham is performing at the Prague Proms; organisers of both festivals were able to ensure he would attend Karlovy Vary as well. He and cinematographer Miroslav Ondřícek will present Czech costume designer Theodor Pištěk (who, like Mr Abraham, received an Oscar for Amadeus) with a Crystal Globe for Outstanding Artistic Contribution to World Cinema. F. Murray Abraham has starred in dozens of film productions throughout his career including Scarface and the sci-fi thriller Mimic. In 1990 he played the title role in a TV version of Václav Havel’s Largo Desolato.

The Karlovy Vary International Film Festival is now in full swing. This year’s KVIFF is, I believe, my 11th. And one thing I’ve realised over the years is that there are so many things happening over its nine days that it’s difficult to think of the festival as some kind of unified event.

The arrival of John Travolta at hotel Thermal for the opening ceremony of the Karlovy Vary International Film Festival on Friday evoked unusual excitement among Czech film fans and attracted record crowds, according to some new sources. More than 2,000 people came to the late-night screening of Grease on the same night. At the official opening gala evening, Travolta received the Crystal Globe award for lifetime contribution to world cinema and direct Michel Godry introduced his latest film Mood Indigo. One of the most awaited events on Saturday is the screening of the new film Killing Season, which stars John Travolta, who will be introducing it as well.

Czech director Vojtěch Jasný received the Festival President’s Prize at the screening of the digitally premastered version of his best-known film All My Compatriots. The 87-year-old film pro, who directed over fifty films, both in Czechoslovakia and abroad, actively took part in the digitalization process.

The 48th Karlovy Vary International Film Festival kicks off in west the Bohemian spa town on Friday evening. The main section of the festival will feature 14 titles competing for the Crystal Globe, among them six world premieres. The Oscar-winning filmmaker Michel Gondry will personally present his latest picture Mood Indigo and the biggest star to attend the festival this year –John Travolta - will attend the premiere of his new movie Killing Season. Mr. Travolta is to receive the festival’s Crystal Globe lifetime achievement award.