Organisers of the prestigious Park City, Utah event announced on Wednesday (30Nov16) the films in the running.

Stand-out entries in the U.S. Dramatic Competition category are I Don't Feel at Home in This World Anymore, which stars Heavenly Creatures actress Melanie Lynskey and Elijah Wood as neighbours who attempt to hunt down a gang of thieves, and To the Bone, which stars Keanu as an unconventional doctor attempting to cure the anorexia of a young woman, played by Lily Collins.

Other U.S. dramas being shown in the category include Ingrid Goes West, a film where Aubrey Plaza plays a woman who becomes obsessed with a social media star, and The Yellow Birds, an Iraq war drama starring Alden Ehrenreich and Jennifer Aniston.

Sundance director John Cooper told Variety magazine that a running theme among the films being shown this year was their intimate portrayal of characters.

"While that was going on in the outside world, we were watching films showing the other side - an intimate, more personal side of people's lives," he explained. "In the end, it gives me great encouragement and optimism, even with everything happening out there. The work we're seeing this year adds so much dimension. It's really the human side. Giving the whole story of who we are is really important to the world."

The U.S. Documentary Competition section contains a number of intriguing entries, with Casting JonBenet, a film exploring the 1996 death of six-year-old beauty queen JonBenet Ramsey, among the movies competing.

Icarus, an exploration of drug doping in sport, and City of Ghosts, a film shot by citizen journalists living under so-called Islamic State occupation, are other early contenders.

As well as American made films, Sundance, which was co-founded by the actor and director Robert Redford in 1978, will celebrate films from around the globe, with prizes also on offer in the World Cinema Dramatic and Documentary categories.

Next year's event will take place from 19 to 29 January (17).