Global film education is at a turning point. The issue of film education was discussed at the Film Education Summit, held on 26 and 27 November as part of the Doha Film Festival, which took place between 20 and 28 November in Qatar. The models which have dominated in Europe and the United States for decades are no longer keeping pace with technological change, with the hybrid career paths of young creators, or - as a result - with the needs of countries which are only now building their audiovisual ecosystems.

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Qatar finds itself at precisely such a moment. Determined not to repeat the mistakes of the West, it is investing in modern forms of education that are practical, modular, production-based and rooted in real creative processes rather than abstract classroom theory. The emerging system prioritises workshops, labs and hands-on learning over traditional university lectures.

Qatar has also redefined the role of the mentor: they’re no longer an authority who imposes solutions, but an equal partner in dialogue. In a region whose stories have long been told by Western filmmakers rather than by creators from the Middle East itself, this shift carries particular significance - especially in the context of the ongoing decolonisation of cinema.

As Antoine Le Bos of Le Groupe Ouest argues, decolonising cinema must begin with decolonising the creative process itself, not just its themes. “Decolonising the process is central - not just the content, but the way ideas are born. Development systems often reproduce the same Western frameworks. We must find ways for each culture to invent stories through its own rhythm, senses and cognitive pathways,” he emphasises.

Le Bos’s solution to breaking away from a colonial language of storytelling is to move beyond script development based solely on words. In his view, modern education should also promote non-verbal systems of creation. “We discovered that it was completely possible to develop stories without the act of writing, which for many countries is directly linked to colonising languages,” he explains. “Writing is not neutral - it carries systems, hierarchies and cognitive biases. So we started working physically, in space, mapping stories in volume like in a greenhouse. We moved objects, we multiplied possibilities. The idea was to liberate the creative act from the colonial weight of the written word.”

All the panellists agreed that film schools should reclaim their role as places of experimentation and discovery, and that young filmmakers should be freed from the constant obligation to deliver a “good” film. As Marcin Malatyński from the Łódź Film School put it: “There is enormous pressure on students: they must experiment, but at the same time they fear whether their films will get into festivals. It’s contradictory.”

Representatives of film schools emphasised that students need the freedom to fail, and the only way to create such conditions is to let them make as many films as possible. At France’s La Fémis, students produce nearly 300 films a year. “We don’t educate - we train. Students learn by experimenting, failing, and making 260 films a year,” notes Julie Tingaud.

Cécile Blondel of Les Gobelins reinforces this philosophy by emphasising the school’s hands-on approach: “Our pedagogy is project-based. Students make project after project. That’s how they learn.” She stresses that film school must remain a rare sanctuary for experimentation: “Film school is a protected environment where you can experiment and fail - very different from the professional world where obligations from broadcasters and producers limit what you can do.”

A similar view is expressed by Mark Prescott from the London Film School, where the sheer volume of practice defines the curriculum: “We are the school that perhaps makes the most films each year. Students make a film every term. You learn by practising.”

What unites these perspectives is the conviction that in an era of exploding audiovisual forms - from shorts and series to branded content, animation, XR and social-media storytelling - a film school cannot focus solely on teaching auteur cinema. Doing so would leave graduates unprepared for the realities of the contemporary job market.

This point was made most clearly by Claude Borna of the Sèmè City Development Agency in Benin, who warned of a systemic mismatch between education and industry: “We saw a huge problem happening with our young talents. They’re trained in areas that don’t lead to jobs. Learning either topics, or the way they learn the topics, doesn’t prepare them for the job market.” She went on to explain that her institution was created precisely to address this disconnect: “Our mandate was to rethink the education system - tertiary education, vocational training, continuing education - and ensure there’s a direct link to industry.”

Borna’s team approached the issue through pragmatic economic analysis: “We looked at what areas we should train people in, and we came at it from a purely economic perspective. Creative industries create jobs, create wealth, it’s soft power. And yet we had no formal training or capacity-building programmes.”

The solution, according to the panellists, is to move decisively away from the traditional university-based model of film education. What should replace it is a constellation of new approaches: labs and residencies, short and intensive training cycles, practice-first pedagogy (“learning by making”), global mobility, co-creation instead of hierarchical teaching, and education centred on distribution rather than solely on production.

As Yassine Lassar Randani of Côté Court / Kourtrajmé explains, the aim is to democratise and accelerate access to the craft: “The idea behind our school is to make the training as short as possible because you’ll spend your life learning. Our training programmes are 3 to 6 months long, very intensive, and aimed at underprivileged talent. My first short was made within nine months and was selected by festivals.”

In the same spirit, Sam Genet from Ouaga Film Lab describes labs as collaborative creative ecosystems rather than miniature academies: “Film labs are really about people learning together. Often the experts feel that, after a programme, they’re the ones who’ve benefited the most. We have to understand how good ideas come about by listening to the kinds of stories people want to tell and helping them find them.” In his mind, the shift is also driven by a global cultural transformation: “Audience taste has changed, and that’s exciting. The values associated with storytelling are shifting. We need stories that haven’t been seen.”

The urgency of reform becomes even clearer when viewed through the lens of the global distribution crisis. Dominic Davis from the Sundance Institute issued a warning at the summit: “Right now, in the United States, we’re seeing a real distribution crisis. Audiences haven’t returned to movie theatres. Very successful films, winning top prizes, are not being distributed. That’s the immediate challenge: helping artists through audience-building, release, distribution, impact.” Davis argues that distribution literacy must be placed at the core of any new educational model rather than treated as an optional supplement.

Educators also called for a sober and thoughtful approach to the rapid expansion of AI. They stressed that technology must be integrated into curricula not as a replacement for artistic labour but as a sophisticated tool in the hands of creators. As La Fémis emphasised: “We teach AI only at the very end of the four-year training programme, because it’s essential students first know all the fundamentals of dramaturgy, narrative, construction. AI is a tool, not a goal.”