The 40th international film festival Fest, under the slogan "XL - Among the Greats," will open Friday with a screening of the Cannes winner The Tree of Life by Terrence Malick at the Sava Center in Belgrade.

The Serbian film Doctor Ray and the Devils directed by Dinko Tucakovic will close the festival on March 4.

The popular festival will offer "lots of good films and no fake glamor," according to selector Ivan Karl.

Around 70 films have been grouped into the usual program sections - Main Program, Hollywood, the competitive Europe outside of Europe, Europe in Europe, World Film Panorama, Brittanica, Canada, Selected Documentaries and Fest Presents.

More than half of the films have been acquired by the festival itself, while the rest have been purchased for regular theater distribution.

Fest will also hold retrospectives of works by Hollywood director of Serbian descent Peter Bogdanovich, Oscar-winning Czech director Jiri Menzel and Israeli director and producer Menahem Golan.

Bogdanovich will officially open the festival, and all three veterans will hold master classes for film students in Belgrade.

The guest roster for this year's festival is short, but almost all the films in the only competitive program will be represented. Between February 26 and March 3, the program include showings of Local Vampire (Montenegro), Spots (Croatia), Restoration (Israel), Salt White (Georgia), Maya (Albania), Future Lasts Forever (Turkey) and Bedouin (Russia).