Star-studded Lone Star Film fest starts Wednesday

The Lone Star International Film Festival kicks off its fourth installment Wednesday, and this year the star wattage gets turned up high: This year's Best Actor Oscar winner, Jeff Bridges, will be feted by the festival, which also plans to screen three of his best-known pictures, The Last Picture Show, The Big Lebowski and Crazy Heart.

After a star-studded first year when the likes of Martin Sheen, Robert Rodriguez and Bill Paxton came through town, the festival has struggled to attract big Hollywood names in recent years -- so this is very welcome news indeed.

Bridges is also scheduled to attend the festival's first gala fundraiser, Friday night at the McDavid Studio, where he'll perform with his Crazy Heart collaborators, Fort Worth's T Bone Burnett, who won an Oscar for their song The Weary Kind from that film. Director Peter Bogdanovich is also slated to present Bridges with his Lifetime Achievement award and intro the screening of The Last Picture Show.

If you couldn't snag a ticket to the sold-out, $500-per-plate fundraiser, worry not: You can catch an encore performance from Bridges and company Saturday night at 8.0 for a mere $20.

Nor are those the only Oscar winners who will be in town this week: Callie Khouri, who won the Best Original Screenplay prize for Thelma and Louise, will join John Lee Hancock, who wrote and directed The Blind Side, for a conversation at the Fort Worth Library (2 p.m. Saturday)

Another library conversation will feature Crazy Heart director Scott Cooper and Dan Rush, director of the upcoming Will Ferrell drama, Everything Must Go, both discussing how they made their debut features, with former WFAA/Channel 8 film critic Gary Cogill moderating. (3:30 p.m. Saturday)

With such an impressive list of filmmakers and special events, there's always the danger that the films themselves might be overshadowed -- though, at least at first blush, the organizers seemed to have gathered a solid lineup. Perhaps the most critically acclaimed title is Another Year (7:30 p.m. Friday, AMC Palace). It's the latest drama from British filmmaker Mike Leigh ( Secrets and Lies, Happy-Go-Lucky); it premiered this year to raves at Cannes, where Lesley Manville's performance as an alcoholic middle-age single woman was immediately identified as a likely Oscar nominee.

Of the films already previewed, I can recommend Night Catches Us (1 p.m. Sunday, AMC Palace), one of the most intriguing (if least appreciated) films from this year's Sundance Film Festival. Anthony Mackie and Kerry Washington are both excellent in a romantic drama that also deftly explores the rise of the Black Panther movement.

Cameraman (7 p.m. Thursday, AMC Palace) is an affectionate documentary that traces the career of cinematographer Jack Cardiff, who has worked with dozens of legendary directors (Alexander Korda, Michael Powell) and actors (Marlene Dietrich, whom Cardiff helped to light to soften the size of her nose) during eight decades in the industry.

You'll also want to mark your calendar for the Secret Screening (7:30 p.m. Saturday, AMC Palace). Mum's the word on the title, though we've been assured it was one of the highest-profile premieres at the Toronto Film Festival in September.

For complete coverage of the festival, go to dfw.com beginning Wednesday.