The Fourth Beijing International Film Festival (BIFF) opens Wednesday, a week-long event that has previously seen top Hollywood names like Titanic director James Cameron and The Bourne Legacy star Jeremy Renner visit our fair city.

This year's event will feature appearances by Gravity director Alphonse Cuaron, along with Oliver Stone and John Woo. BIFF is as much an industry gathering as a series of public film screenings, and it's not necessarily an event that focuses on the latest and greatest films the way the Festival de Cannes is, but it's still fun for movie fans and makes numerous films accessible in local cinemas for a very limited period.

One local favorite appearing as an official selection in the Global View section is This Is Sanlitun, which will be showing on Wednesday evening at Megabox Sanlitun at 6.30pm. It will also be screened Thursday at 6.30pm at Poly Cinema in Huamao Mall, and Saturday, April 19 at 4.30pm at Broadway Cinema in MOMA. See our Events section for more information. Screenings for films take place around the city at Beijing's largest cinemas, check with the individual venue for details.

BIFF runs through April 23. See the full schedule of non-screening events here. The screening schedule for all films, in Chinese only, can be found here.

Photo: aceshowbiz