"The director's visit was an opportunity to discuss ongoing cooperation on a number of issues," said the FBI official.

Kidman has said the film interested her for the way it covers the young actor's transition from film star to princess in 1962.

Neeson will play an aging hitman who, in order to protect his wife and son, must take on his former boss in a single night.

Serving behind the "Gremlins" lens was Joe Dante, while "Harry Potter" helmer Chris Columbus penned the script.

Earlier, the militants said that they were holding 40 foreign nationals, among them US, French, British, Japanese, and Malaysian citizens.

South Sudan's troop withdrawal is in line with a security agreement reached with Sudan in September.

Saif al-Islam is being held by former rebels, to face charges related to a visit by an International Criminal Court (ICC) lawyer last year.

A number of deals were inked, one of them stipulating for Iran funding the construction of a power plant in Syria.

The film focuses on private investigators who break into a missing student's abandoned house and find a collection of mysterious VHS tapes.