NEW YORK -- Born out of the horror of the September 11 attacks, the Tribeca Film Festival co-founded by director Robert de Niro in 2002 opens for its seventh year Wednesday hailing its growing strength.

"Something happened. It was an immediate success in this district where you can see on one side the crater of Ground Zero and the Statue of Liberty on the other. It's just so symbolic," artistic director Peter Scarlet told AFP.

"The Tribeca and Sarajevo film festivals are the only ones born as a response to an act of war," he added.

From Wednesday until May 4, some 120 films, documentaries and animated films will screen in studios across Lower Manhattan, from East Village to Tribeca, the district once dominated by the twin towers of the World Trade Center.

De Niro, who founded the festival with the producer Jane Rosenthal, was due to attend the opening, the world premier of a comedy called "Baby Mama" by young film-maker Michael McCullers, who was also behind the last two "Austin Powers" hit movies.

Pakistani and Tunisian films will this year also feature among the entries.

And a highlight is set to be the documentary "Man on the Wire" by British director James Marsh about the French high-wire artist Philippe Petit who in 1974 illegally walked a tight rope between the twin towers.

The winners of each of the 13 sections will each receive a work of art donated to the festival by a contemporary artist. Scarlet said painter Julian Schnabel had donated a painting as among the prizes.

Organizers say that since the festival was launched in January 2002 more than two million people have attended its events and it has helped raise some $425 million in economic activity for New York City.