BERLIN 2013: Steven Soderbergh's 'Side Effects,' Shia LaBeouf Action Comedy in Competition

BERLIN 2013: Steven Soderbergh's 'Side Effects,' Shia LaBeouf Action Comedy in Competition

Side Effects Screen Grab - H 2012

New films by Jafar Panahi, Bruno Dumont and Danis Tanovic also in running for Berlin Golden Bear.

COLOGNE, Germany -- Steven Soderbergh's Side Effects, a thriller starring Jude LawRooney MaraCatherine Zeta-Jones and Channing Tatum and the action comedy The Necessary Death of Charlie Countryman from commercials director Fredrik Bond will compete this year for the Golden Bear at the Berlin International Film Festival.

Side Effects is Soderberg's fourth film to screen in competition in Berlin -- following The Good German (2006), Solaris (2002) andTraffic (2001). The Oscar-winning director made the trip to the German capital last year with the actioner Haywire, which had an out-of-competition screening. In Side Effects Mara plays a woman who turns to prescription drugs to fight anxiety after her husband (Tatum) is released from prison.

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In The Necessary Death of Charlie CountrymanShia LaBeoufplays the eponymous Countryman, an ordinary guy who falls in love with Gabi Banyai (Evan Rachel Wood), the girlfriend of a violent crime boss. Bond's feature debut has an all-star cast including Oscar-winner Melissa LeoHarry Potter alumnus Rupert Grint,Parks and Recreation actress Aubrey PlazaMads Mikkelsen and Germany's Til Schweiger. Voltage Pictures is handling sales of the film and will be shilling it to buyers at Berlin's European Film Market.

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Berlin announced nine more competition titles today, filling out the official line up for the 63rd Berlinale. In addition to the U.S. titles, Berlin's 2013 competition includes new films by Oscar winnerDanis Tanovic, French auteur Bruno Dumont and, perhaps most astoundingly, a new work from imprisoned Iranian filmmaker Jafar Panahi. Panahi's Closed Curtain, co-directed with Cafe Transithelmer Kambozia Partovi, will have its world premiere in Berlin, as will Tanovic's An Episode in the Life of an Iron Picker and Dumont's biopic Camille Claudel 1915, which stars Juliette Binoche as the famed French sculptor with Jean-Luc Vincent playing her brother, the poet and diplomat Paul Claudel.

Emmanuelle Bercot's On my Way, which stars Catherine Deneuve as a Breton widow who goes on a soul-searching road trip across France with a 10-year-old boy, also made the competition cut, as did Gold, a period drama from German director Thomas Arslan set among German emigrants during the Klondike gold rush which stars Nina HossLars RudolphMarko Mandic and Uwe Bohm.

Another French title in competition this year is The Nun from director Guillaume Nicloux (A Private Affair). A loose adaptation of the 18th century novel by Denis Diderot, which purports to be the memoirs of a nun who has escaped from her convent, it stars Isabelle HuppertPauline EtienneMartina Gedeck and Louise Bourgoin.

South African-born, German-based director Pia Marais, whose first feature, The Unpolished (2007) won the Rotterdam Film Festival's Tiger Award, will make her Berlinale competition debut with Layla Fourie, an English-language drama starring Rayna Campbell and August Diehl. Match Factory is selling the film.

Other high-profile titles in Berlin's competition line-up this year include Gus van Sant's Promised Land, which stars Matt Damon and Frances McDormand; the drama Paradise: Hope from Austrian filmmaker Ulrich Seidl and Nobody's Daughter Haewon, the latest from prolific Korean helmer Hong Sang-Soo (In Another Country).

DreamWorks' 3D animated feature The Croods, from How to Train Your Dragon director Chris Sanders and Space Chimps' helmer Kirk De Micco and featuring voice work from Nicolas Cage,Ryan Reynolds and Emma Stone, will have its world premiere out of competition in Berlin.

Wong Kar-Wai's martial arts epic The Grandmasters, starring Tony LeungChang Chen and Ziyi Zhang, will open the 63rd Berlin International Film Festival on Feb. 7, 2013.

The film, inspired by the life of the legendary martial artist the Ip Man, mentor to Bruce Lee, will also screen out of competition as director Wong will judge this year's Berlin Golden and Silver Bear contenders as President of the International Jury.

The 63rd Berlinale runs Feb.7-17.

Here is the full list of latest competition titles:

Camille Claudel 1915 
- World Premiere

Director: Bruno Dumont

Starring: Juliette Binoche, Jean-Luc Vincent 


Elle s'en va (On my Way)
 (France) - World Premiere

Director: Emmanuelle Bercot

Starring: Catherine Deneuve


Epizoda u životu berača željeza (An Episode in the Life of an Iron Picker)
 - World Premiere

Director: Danis Tanovic

Starring: Senada Alimanovic, Nazif Mujic, Sandra Mujic, Semsa Mujic
World Premiere

Gold
  - World Premiere

Director: Thomas Arslan

Starring: Nina Hoss, Marko Mandic, Uwe Bohm, Lars Rudolph

La Religieuse (The Nun)
 - World Premiere

Director: Guillaume Nicloux

Starring: Pauline Etienne, Isabelle Huppert, Louise Bourgoin, Martina Gedeck

Layla Fourie - 
World Premiere

Director: Pia Marais

Starring: Rayna Campbell, August Diehl, Rapule Hendricks

The Necessary Death of Charlie Countryman
 - International Premiere

Director: Fredrik Bond

Starring: Shia LaBeouf, Evan Rachel Wood, Melissa Leo, Rupert Grint Mads Mikkelsen


International Premiere

Parde (Closed Curtain)
 - World Premiere

Directors: Jafar Panahi and Kambozia Partovi

Starring: Kambozia Partovi, Maryam Moghadam,Jafar Panahi, Hadi Saeedi

Side Effects
 - International Premiere

Director: Steven Soderbergh

Starring: Jude Law, Rooney Mara, Catherine Zeta-Jones, Channing Tatum