VERONICA MARS Movie to Premiere at South by Southwest

VERONICA MARS is headed to Austin, Texas.

Rob Thomas' film, a project which broke records with its Kickstarter campaign last year, will premiere at this year's South by Southwest Festival, ahead of its limited theatrical release on March 14, it was announced today.

Directed by Thomas and written by both him and Diane Ruggiero, 'MARS' stars Kristen Bell, Jason Dohring, Chris Lowell, Ryan Hansen, Krysten Ritter, Percy Daggs III, Tina Majorino, Francis Capra, Ken Marino and Enrico Colantoni.

In the film, Veronica has put Neptune and her amateur sleuthing days behind her on the eve of graduating law school. While interviewing at high-end law firms, Veronica gets a call from her ex-boyfriend Logan who has been accused of murder. Veronica heads back to Neptune just to help Logan find an attorney, but when things don't seem right with how Logan's case is perceived and handled, Veronica finds herself being pulled back into a life she thought she had left behind.

Amazon also announced today they'd obtained the rights to exclusively stream all three seasons of the show prior to the film's premiere. Per the announcement, "the Kickstarter campaign unleashed an unprecedented level of fan enthusiasm and support, reaching the project goal of $2 million in just 10 hours. At the end of the 31-day campaign, fans contributed $5.7 million, making Veronica Mars the number one funded project in the film category and the third-highest funded project in Kickstarter history. It is the most widely supported Kickstarter campaign ever with more than 91,000 backers, who have remained engaged throughout production with frequent behind-the-scenes updates from Thomas and the film's cast and crew. Amazon Payments handles all the payment processing for funds raised on all Kickstarter projects in the United States.

SXSW runs March 7-16 in Austin, TX.