Next Gen – An initiative of the Melbourne International Film Festival

The Next Gen film program was created in 2007 to provide opportunities for students to access MIFF screening program.

At MIFF, we believe films provide pleasure and enrich life. Learning to interpret, appreciate and evaluate them provides invaluable keys for young people to become successful learners, confident and creative individuals, and active, informed citizens. 

Next Gen education objectives:

• See intelligent, challenging, provocative, eye-opening films that are not available in mainstream cinemas and can only be seen at MIFF.

• Explore significant representations of the world

• Make connections between people across social, cultural, temporal and geographic divides and arrive at a greater understanding of the human condition.

• Enrich their lives and scope of experience.

• Develop and understand their own values and perspectives, and the values and perspectives of others.

• Meet with guests of the festival.

• Value the power of the imagination.

A program of intelligent and stimulating cinema for students.

Next Gen is a program of the latest world-class cinema catering to students from upper primary to upper secondary year levels.

It comprises daytime sessions during the two weeks of the festival to accommodate groups of students with teachers and some weekend sessions catered for families, community groups and ethnic schools. 

Next Gen is programmed for different year levels of student, and we have grouped our program into three broad year level groups to help teachers identify the films that are most applicable to their classes. The titles selected are culturally diverse and relevant to contemporary young people's concerns.

These films are a great resource to support the teaching of English and Literacy, LOTE, the Humanities, the Arts, Ethics, Philosophy, Study of Society and Environment, Media and Communication, and Civics and Citizenship. They can be used to achieve learning outcomes across these disciplines.

Languages include English, French, German, Hebrew, Japanese, Mandarin and more. All films screen in their original language with English subtitles. 

Study Guides

All films are accompanied by free study guides written by ATOM’s (Australian Teachers Of Media Inc.) professional writers, ensuring curriculum relevance and the usefulness of the study guides to teachers.

The study guides feature activities for students before and after the actual screening and provide film content analysis for teachers and students. These activities encourage discussions around different cultures, language and historical, social, philosophical and political issues, depending on the content of the film. 

Past Next Gen programs

For more information about Next Gen, you can download a PDF of the past programs here:

Next Gen 2007