'Rebirth' and more films to light up Sundance

From the look of things, when the Sundance Film Festival opens Thursday, it will be offering the usual raft of American indies, with a dash of foreign fare and a bunch of celebrities getting their feet wet. The following stand out as films to watch, and as a representative sampling of what's up, up in the mountains of Utah.

'REBIRTH'

Playing in the festival's new Documentary Premiere section, Jim Whitaker's 10-years-in-the-making movie follows five people whose lives were transformed by the attacks on the World Trade Center, incorporating footage recorded by the 35-mm, time-lapse cameras Whitaker first set up on March 11, 2002 - the six-month anniversary of the attacks.

'MY IDIOT BROTHER'

Director Jesse Peretz's character-driven comedy stars Paul Rudd, Zooey Deschanel and Steve Coogan. The word "heartwarming" has been bandied about this story of dysfunction and family, which was written by Peretz's journalist sister, Evgenia, and her husband, producer David Schisgall.

'THE DETAILS'

It's terror in suburbia when Jeff (Tobey Maguire) decides to plant a perfect lawn. Enter the raccoons. When Jeff launches a counteroffensive, it means (according to the festival) "a bewildering chain reaction involving a crazy cat lady, multiple infidelities, extortion, an organ donation and somebody on the wrong end of a bow and arrow." Elizabeth Banks, Laura Linney and comeback kid Ray Liotta (who has two films in Park City) co-star in this comedy by Jacob Estes.

'HELL AND BACK AGAIN'

Award-winning war photographer Danfung Dennis made his own camera to capture what he was seeing on the front lines in Afghanistan, and turned his footage into a nonfiction "Platoon."