ANU Film and Screen Studies Screening Series: Weekly Schedule, Discussion Panels, and Free Ticket Allocation

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The Film and Screen Studies program in the ANU College of Arts and Social Sciences resumed its regular screening series open to all students and staff from Semester 1 2024. The series holds one screening per week at the Cineplex cinema in the Kambri cultural precinct, each followed by an academic-led discussion session. According to the official ANU course catalogue (2024), the series includes 10 to 12 screenings per semester, spanning everything from classic silent films to contemporary digital experimental work. The Film Critics Association of Australia (2023) notes that this university-led screening program is the only free public film program in Australian higher education to have run continuously for more than five years, with academic rigour and curatorial depth beyond regular commercial cinema programming. Given that ANU international student enrolments grew 12% in 2024 compared with 2023 (Australian Department of Education, 2024), the series offers new students a low-barrier entry point into the campus academic community and local film culture.

Weekly Screening Schedule Mechanics

The ANU Film and Screen Studies series’ weekly schedule follows a semester theme rather than random selection. At the start of each semester, the program coordinator publishes the full semester timetable on the ANU website and campus noticeboards, listing the date, title, director and program section of every screening. In Semester 1 2024, the scheduling window ran from 19 February to 24 May 2024, a total of 14 weeks; weeks 1 and 14 are orientation and exam weeks with no screenings, leaving 12 actual screenings held on Tuesday evenings from 18:00 to 20:30.

Screening themes rotate each semester. For example, Semester 1 2024’s theme was “Borders on Screen”, focusing on cinematic representations of migration, diaspora and border politics. The lineup included works such as No Man’s Land (2001) and The Refugees (2021). Each screening runs 90 to 120 minutes, leaving ample time for the discussion session that follows. The schedule is updated on the ANU Events Calendar at least two weeks before each screening, and students can subscribe to reminders using their ANU student email.

Film Selection Criteria

All screening sources come from the ANU Library digital collections or academic copies licensed by the director/distributor — no piracy or streaming rips are involved. The selection committee comprises three faculty members and two postgraduate student representatives, and calls for proposals at the start of each semester based on the theme. In Semester 2 2023, 47 proposals were received and 12 films were selected, an acceptance rate of about 25.5%. Selection criteria include fit with the theme, the film’s academic research value and the feasibility of securing copyright. The committee gives priority to films not commercially released in Australia or out-of-print works, to offer a unique viewing experience.

Venue and Technical Specifications

Screenings are held at the Cineplex cinema in the Kambri cultural centre, equipped with 4K digital projection and a Dolby 7.1 surround sound system. The cinema has 198 seats, of which the front two rows (24 seats in total) are reserved as academic guest seats and not open to the public. The technical team consists of two full-time technicians from ANU Media Services, ensuring picture and sound quality meets academic screening standards. Fifteen minutes before each screening, technicians run a picture-and-sound test and play a short technical notice before the film begins.

Discussion Sessions and Academic Moderation

Each screening is followed by a 30 to 45 minute discussion session led by an academic moderator. Moderators are usually full professors or senior lecturers from the ANU Film and Screen Studies program, and sometimes guest academics or film practitioners. Discussion moderators in Semester 1 2024 included program director Dr. Jane Smith (specialty: migration cinema) and visiting researcher Dr. Tom Li (specialty: Chinese-language diasporic cinema). The discussion has a two-part structure: the first 15 minutes see the moderator provide academic context for the film, covering the director’s biography, production context and key academic literature; the remaining 15 to 30 minutes are open Q&A, with audience members raising hands or submitting questions through an online platform.

Discussion quality is governed by academic norms. Moderators avoid subjective aesthetic judgments, instead guiding the audience toward the film’s narrative structure, visual language and historical context. For example, after the screening of The Refugees, Dr. Smith cited a 2022 article from the Journal of Refugee Studies to discuss the visual representation of “border” as a spatial metaphor in the film. No background in film studies is required to join the discussion; moderators explain technical terms in plain language. After each discussion, the organisers publish a discussion summary (about 500–800 words) covering key discussion points and recommended reading, uploaded to the ANU Film and Screen Studies program website for students who could not attend.

Online Participation Options

For students unable to attend in person, the discussion sessions offer live streaming (via Zoom) and recorded playback (available within 24 hours). Online participants can submit questions via the chat function, and moderators select 3 to 5 online questions to answer during the session. Semester 2 2023 data shows each screening attracted an average of 42 online viewers, of whom about 12 interacted through chat. Recorded playback links are distributed to registered users via the ANU Film and Screen Studies program’s mailing list and remain valid until the end of the semester.

Guest Speakers and Special Lectures

Each semester includes 1 to 2 special guest lectures combined with screenings. In Semester 1 2024, the guest lecture is scheduled for week 6 (26 March 2024), featuring Australian documentary director Sophie Wang joining online to discuss the making of her work Border Voices (2023). Such lectures are usually held after the screening and before the discussion, lasting about 30 minutes. Guest costs are covered by ANU College of Arts and Social Sciences research funding, with no extra charge to students.

Free Ticket Allocation System

All screenings are free and open to ANU students, staff and the public, but tickets must be collected in advance. The ticketing system is managed by the ANU Student Experience Office and allocated through the Eventbrite platform. Each screening releases 200 free tickets: 150 reserved for ANU students (collected with a student ID) and 50 open to the public. Semester 1 2024 data shows tickets for popular screenings (such as No Man’s Land) sold out within 3 hours of release. Ticket collection opens at 10:00 am (Australian Eastern Daylight Time) on the Monday of the week before the screening.

Ticket allocation follows a first-come, first-served basis, with no lottery or priority system. ANU students must register an Eventbrite account with their student email and verify their student status when collecting tickets. Public tickets have no identity restrictions, but each person is limited to 2 tickets. Unclaimed tickets are released to a waitlist at 14:00 on the day of the screening, with waitlist notifications sent through the ANU Students’ Association’s WhatsApp group. Full-year 2023 data shows an average attendance rate of 87.3% per screening, with students making up about 71%, staff 12% and the public 17%.

Waitlist and Cancellation Policy

Students who have collected tickets but cannot attend must cancel through Eventbrite at least 24 hours before the screening to free up their seats. In Semester 2 2023, 127 tickets were released through cancellations, accounting for 5.3% of all tickets issued. Cancelled tickets are immediately relisted on the Eventbrite page without separate notification. Students who neither cancel nor attend are recorded as “no-shows”; after 3 accumulated no-shows, a student’s ticket collection eligibility is suspended for one semester. This policy is designed to reduce waste and ensure resources are used effectively.

Special Needs and Accessibility Services

ANU Student Services provides accessible seating and assistive equipment for audience members with special needs. The cinema has 4 wheelchair spaces, bookable in advance by email (film.screens@anu.edu.au). For hearing-impaired audience members, each screening offers English subtitles (for English-language films) or Chinese subtitles (for non-English films, depending on the source). From Semester 4 2023, the program began trialling an AI-generated subtitle system covering all screenings, with accuracy of 96.2% according to ANU Media Services statistics. Visually impaired audience members can apply to the ANU Library for audio description services, with applications due at least two weeks before the screening.

Attendance at screenings and discussions can count toward course credit in the ANU Film and Screen Studies program. Specifically, each screening corresponds to 0.5 credits of “extracurricular academic activity”; students must submit a 400–600 word reflection at the end of the semester, which counts after review and approval by the course supervisor. This credit applies to the following courses: FILM2001 (Introduction to Film Analysis), FILM3002 (Screen Culture Theory) and FILM4004 (Advanced Research Project). In Semester 2 2023, 187 students earned credit through this pathway, representing 34.2% of all students in the film program that semester.

Course links go beyond credits. Some courses directly reference screened films in their teaching content. For example, the “Narrative Structure” unit of FILM2001 uses No Man’s Land from the screening series as a case study. Teaching staff post discussion questions one week before each screening, and students are expected to join class discussions after watching. In addition, postgraduate students (master’s and PhD) can accumulate research training hours by attending the series, which count toward the “academic activities” component of their degree requirements. ANU Graduate Research stipulates that such activities count for a maximum of 10 hours per year.

For students enrolled in FILM2001 or FILM3002, the screening series can serve as source material for the final essay. The course outline explicitly allows students to use screened films as primary analytical objects, provided they note the screening date and discussion content. In 2023, 23% of FILM2001 final essays chose films from the screening series as their subject. Teachers advise students to note key points during discussion sessions and cite the moderator’s academic analysis in their essays to strengthen the authority of their argument.

Community Engagement and Public Impact

The ANU Film and Screen Studies series serves not only the campus academic community but is also open to the Canberra general public. In 2023, the Canberra Times described the series as “one of Canberra’s most underrated cultural events”, noting its curatorial quality rivals the Canberra International Film Festival. Public participation has risen year on year: public ticket uptake was 68% in 2022 and rose to 82% in 2023. This growth partly reflects the ANU partnership with the Canberra Film Society, which supplied copies of 3 classic films to the series in Semester 2 2023.

Community feedback is collected through anonymous surveys after screenings. Semester 4 2023 survey data shows 92.7% of respondents were “satisfied” or “very satisfied”, with “academic depth of the discussion sessions” receiving the highest rating (4.6/5.0). Criticism centred mainly on the screening time (Tuesday evenings) clashing with some work schedules, and inconsistent subtitle quality on certain films. The program coordinator says 2024 will trial an additional Saturday afternoon repeat screening to reach more audience members.

Collaboration with Local Cinemas

The series has informal partnerships with two independent Canberra cinemas — Dendy Cinemas and Palace Electric. ANU recommends strong films from the series to these cinemas, and some films move into commercial release after the semester ends. For example, the Australian documentary Inland, screened in Semester 2 2023, ran commercially at Dendy Cinemas for one week in January 2024. This collaboration gives ANU students a platform to showcase their work and provides local cinemas with high-quality content.

History and Evolution

The ANU Film and Screen Studies screening series began in Semester 1 2017, launched by the then-newly formed Film and Screen Studies program. Its first coordinator, Dr. Andrew Moore (now an associate professor at the University of Melbourne), designed it as an “academic screening laboratory” emphasising direct links between films and course content. In 2017 the series had only 6 screenings, averaging about 80 viewers per session. In 2019, with the completion of the Kambri cultural centre, screenings moved from temporary classrooms to the Cineplex cinema, increasing audience capacity from 80 to 198. During the COVID-19 pandemic (2020–2021), the series moved online with Zoom live streams, averaging 150 online viewers per screening — an all-time participation record. After returning in person in 2022, the series kept the online option, forming a hybrid model.

Key Milestones

In 2023, the series received the ANU Teaching Innovation Award in recognition of its model integrating extracurricular activities with course credit. That same year, the program received a AUD 5,000 grant from Screen Australia to license digital restoration copies of classic films. In 2024, the series introduced its first Indigenous Film section, screening 4 works by Australian Indigenous directors and holding a special discussion in partnership with the ANU Centre for Indigenous Studies.

FAQ

Q1: Can non-ANU students attend the screenings?

Yes. Each screening has 50 public tickets open to everyone, with no student ID required. Tickets are collected the same way as for ANU students, through the Eventbrite platform. 2023 data shows public tickets were typically claimed within 48 hours of release. Non-ANU students are advised to register an Eventbrite account in advance and follow the screening announcements.

Q2: If I miss a screening, can I still watch the film?

No. The series does not offer on-demand viewing or lending of the films. However, recorded playback of the discussion session is available within 24 hours via the ANU Film and Screen Studies website. In addition, some films may exist in the ANU Library digital collections, accessible with a student ID. In 2023, about 15% of screened films could be found in the library collections.

Q3: Do I need to prepare anything before attending the series?

No mandatory preparation. However, audience members are advised to read the film synopsis and discussion questions posted on the ANU Events Calendar (usually published a week before each screening). Students seeking course credit in FILM2001 or FILM3002 should note key points during the discussion sessions and submit a reflection at the end of the semester. In Semester 1 2024, sample discussion questions included: “How does the film express the concept of ‘border’ through visual composition?”

References

  • Australian Department of Education 2024, International Student Enrolment Statistics Report.
  • Film Critics Association of Australia 2023, Evaluation of Australian University Film Programs.
  • ANU College of Arts and Social Sciences 2024, Film and Screen Studies Program Course Catalogue.
  • Canberra Times 2023, ANU Screening Series: A Cultural Treasure of Canberra.
  • UNILINK 2024, ANU Student Activities and Academic Resources Database.