The Sundance Film Festival, the top US film festival for independent cinema, last week unveiled its line-up for 2013, with films centred on female characters dominating the American fiction film competition.

The 113 feature-length movies, including both narrative films and documentaries, cover a range of topics, but more than half of those chosen for the US dramatic competition focus on stories about women, including several about women exploring sexual relationships.

They include May in the Summer, director Cherien Dabis’s film about a bride-to-be forced to re-evaluate her life when she reunites with her family in Jordan. It is one of 16 films in the US dramatic competition.

The film will kick off Sundance on January 17 as one of four first-night screenings that will comprise of one feature and one documentary from each of the US films and world cinema sections – movies made outside the United States.

Overall, 4,044 feature films from around the world were submitted. This year’s festival will feature movies from 32 countries and 51 first-time film-makers. The festival begins on January 17, 2013, and runs through January 27.