Anyone who sees all four of the Flemish films on offer at the Flanders International Film Festival in Ghent cannot help but realise that, no matter how small it is, this region does not fit into any convenient marketing categories.

In fact, what the region's film industry has going for it is diversity, which fits in perfectly with the scope of the country's biggest film festival and its 100 movies from across the globe covering every genre imaginable.

The three women in Smoorverliefd (Madly in Love), the festival's opening film. It's the seventh time in 37 years that a Belgian film has opened the festival, which always gets the local media even more excited about the red-carpet event. (If you do not attend the opening, you can watch it all on Flemish television.)

If you do attend, you'll see all the stars of Smoorverliefd, which are many - Veerle Dobbelaere (pictured left), Marie Vinck, Wine Dierickx, Koen De Bouw, Koen De Graeve, Kevin Janssens, Jan Decleir. They will introduce the film, together with director Hilde Van Mieghem (Denis van Rita), who mixes up the love affairs of this huge ensemble cast to make an entertaining romantic comedy in the vein of Love Actually.

Romantic comedy is not often tackled in Flanders, and the other three Flemish films are reminders of what the region makes often and well: paranoid thrillers and surrealist fantasies. Koen Mortier follows up his first feature Ex-Drummer with 22 Mei (22nd of May), a film that starts with the tragedy that less creative movies would lead up to: a suicide bombing of a crowded shopping centre. The building's security guard, actor Sam Louwyck (Lost Persons Area) spends the rest of the film coming to grips with his guilt - and haunted by the victims.

Alex Stockman is also premiering his second film as director in Ghent. Pulsar stars Matthias Schoenaerts (My Queen Karo) as a guy whose computer is hacked, and the perpetrators appear to be purposely destroying his long-distance relationship. As we see how average lives are increasingly controlled by technology, Matthias gets more and more obsessed with his situation.

Finally, the film that has become the biggest surprise - not to mention has the best back-story - is En waar de sterre bleef stille staan (called in English Little Baby Jesus of Flandr) by Gust Van den Berghe. If you haven't heard of Van den Berghe, don't worry, this is his first film, and it's also his final student project at Brussels film school RITS. Rather than make the required short, Van den Berghe insisted on making a feature. In black and white. With mentally-handicapped actors.

His teachers abandoned him, and one can hardly blame them. But he made the film, which was accepted to screen at Cannes this year. It received a standing ovation and reviews that compared the young Flemish director to Bergman and Pasolini. The film, meanwhile, is the story of three beggars who go out singing on Christmas Eve to earn a little money. On their way home, they witness a birth in a forest and are convinced it is the baby Jesus.

Ladies and gentlemen, please welcome...
All the above films will open later this year in cinemas across Flanders, but the Flanders International Film Festival screens many that may not or that will certainly not have the director on hand to introduce it. In the past, the festival has always had a big-name guest: Kathleen Turner, Woody Harrelson, Andy Garcia. This year they have concentrated on bringing in more directors and composers, which audiences like to see in person, introducing a film or leading a concert.

You'll find all the Flemish directors with work in premiere on hand to talk about their films, but also many from overseas, who are often interviewed in English. Bent Hamer will be in the cinema to introduce his new film Home for Christmas on 15 October. The award-winning Norwegian director was a big hit at the festival two years ago when he came to present O'Horten to a sold-out cinema.

Hungarian director Agnes Kocsis, who serves on the festival's jury this year, will present her new film, Adrienn Pál, which won the FIPRESCI award in Cannes, on 13 October. The film follows the story of a nurse who suffers from chronic overeating and eventually runs away from the present by going on a journey to seek the past.

French might be the language François Ozon chooses to speak, but don't let that stop you from getting a glimpse of the world-famous director of 8 Women and Swimming Pool. He's in Ghent for the Belgian premiere of his new movie Potiche on 16 October, together with the star of the film, Catherine Deneuve. In pure Ozon form, it's a kitschy tale of a woman (Deneuve) taking over her jerk of a husband's business as he lies in the hospital after a heart attack from which no one hopes he will recover.

British director Paul Greengrass, meanwhile, will receive the Joseph Plateau Honorary Award this year for a lifetime of work, including The Theory of Flight, The Bourne Supremacy and The Bourne Ultimatum. The ceremony, unfortunately, is not open to the public.

Flanders International Film Festival
12-23 October Kinepolis and other Ghent cinemas
www.filmfestival.be

Sounding it out - The best film composers in the world descend on Ghent this month
Because the Flanders International Film Festival is also home to the World Soundtrack Awards, Ghent will be flooded with famous composers in October. John Barry will receive a Lifetime Achievement Award and be present for a concert of his music from such films as Dances with Wolves, Midnight Cowboy, Goldfinger and Out of Africa. The concert, by members of the Brussels Philharmonic, will be accompanied by film clips from Barry's work.

The World Soundtrack Awards themselves are on the final night of the festival, 23 October, in Ghent's Kuipke stadium. The Brussels Philharmonic will again play soundtracks from films in the presence of their composers, and the list is magnificent: Alberto Iglesias (Volver, The Kite Runner), Craig Armstrong (Moulin Rouge, Ray), Angelo Badalamenti (Blue Velvet and Twin Peaks, a haunting score still easy to recall) and Stephen Warbeck (Shakespeare in Love and Flemish film De zaak Alzheimer). And that's just four of the 11.

www.worldsoundtrackacademy.com