The curtains were raised at the Dubai International Film Festival last night by the second world premiere of a Hollywood film financed by the UAE.

The movie, The Way Back, is going to be considered as a nominee for the Oscars even before its general release date in January, and has been co-produced by Imagination Abu Dhabi, which is the film production arm of Abu Dhabi Media Company, which also issues The National.

For the screening of the film, Colin Farrell, Ed Harris, Jim Sturgess and Peter Weir walked down the red carpet at the film festival.

The fans that had been waiting eagerly for a long time greeted the two young male stars, Farrell and Sturgess, with loud screams for them to sign autographs and take pictures with them.

Harris, who has been tipped by a popular online magazine as an extremely strong supporting actor contender for the Oscars next year, had the chairman of the film festival, Abdulhamid Juma accompanying him on the red carpet.

Also accompanied them were Arabic stars Rima Khcheich, a Lebanese singer, and Sherine Adel, who had acted in the Egyptian film 678.