Idyllwild CinemaFest 2013 Chairman Phil Calderone announced festival selections on Dec. 17. A record 98 films — 22 features, 24 featurettes (lengths from 16 to 39 minutes), 29 shorts (up to 15 minutes), 17 documentary features, four documentary shorts (from 2 to 29 minutes) and two web series, including ICF 2013 Featured Filmmaker Ignatius Fischer’s “Freelancers” — will screen in four venues.

Calderone, whose hands-on management continues to grow this festival, noted some of his personal favorites:

• New York filmmaker David Spaltro’s feature “Things I Don’t Understand,” is his meditation on relationship, friendship, faith and afterlife. Spaltro is returning to the festival, having screened his first feature “Around” in 2010, the festival’s first year. “Things,” Spaltro’s second feature is already a multiple award winner on this season’s festival circuit.

• “Bound by Flesh,” a documentary from Leslie Zemekis, wife of famed director Robert Zemekis (“Forest Gump,” “Cast Away,” “Back to the Future”) chronicles the life of vaudeville performers Daisy and Violet Hilton. They sang, danced and played multiple instruments, were the highest paid act in vaudeville and America’s sweethearts in the 30s and 40s. And they were Siamese twins.

• “Bubblegum & Broken Fingers” the first feature from director Sean Jackson after he had produced and directed over 20 short films, is equal parts western, gangster and love story. The film follows the journey of a mysterious silver briefcase and the havoc it brings each new owner. “A lot of plot twists,”Calderone said.

• “The Unusual Calling of Charlie Christmas,” a vigilante tale from director Adam Hampton is, Calderone said, the “dark horse of the festival. Of all the movies I watched for the festival, accepted or not, this one left me with the greatest emotional resonance.”

• “Nailbiter,” is the first feature from director Patrick Rea who last year contributed the very well-received short “Get Off My Porch (you remember the Girl Scouts and their cookies?). Rea, who grew up in Nebraska, used an experience running from a tornado as a boy as inspiration for this gothic tale. “It’s a tense thriller that’s a lesson in how to build and sustain suspense,” Calderone said. “I think Hitchcock would approve.” An interview with Rea will appear in next week’s edition.

The full schedule will be available soon on the festival website, www.idyllwildcinemafest.com.