The festival runs March 22 through April 1.

Cleveland’s preparing for something it has been doing for 36 years now - the annual Cleveland International Film Festival. It all kicks off Thursday night at Tower City Cinemas.

There will be 165 feature films and 156 short films from 60 different countries here, most will be shown at Tower City, but several other locations around northeast Ohio will also show films from the festival.

"We try to play something for everybody,” said Bill Guentzler, Artistic Director of the film fest. “One thing we love about the festival is every film is everybody's favorite and least favorite but we do have a couple competitions, Our central and eastern European competition because of our immigrant base, documentary competition and standing up, which is all about activism and social justice."

Tickets to see each film cost $12 for non-members. You can also buy voucher packs if you want to see several movies. There's a special box office just for the festival at Tower City Cinemas.

The festival runs March 22 through April 1.