The Melbourne International Film Festival returns to Melbourne between August 8 and 25, and the 2024 edition is packed with some the most talked-about films of the year, including the best of the international festival circuit, plus a whole host of Australian premieres, short films, special events and more.

This year’s festival also marks the return of the beloved Audience Award. The Intrepid Audience Award invites festival audiences to vote for their favourite narrative and documentary feature films. Last year, the top gong went to Melbourne-made documentary This Is Going To Be Big, while Greenhouse by Joost, a doco about Joost Bakker’s innovative Future Food System, won in 2022.

Narrative contenders this year include Harvey Krumpet animator Adam Elliot’s opening-night centrepiece Memoir of a Snail, Canadian director Guy Maddin’s audacious and bittersweet Rumours (starring Cate Blanchett), courageous Iranian filmmaker Mohammad Rosoulof’s The Seed of the Sacred Fig, Mumbai-based director Payal Kapadia’s 2024 Cannes Grand Prix winner All We Imagine as Light, and Natalie Bailey’s mother-daughter black comedy Audrey. Body-horror enthusiasts also have plenty to sink their teeth into this year with French director Coralie Fargeat’s Cannes highlight The Substance (featuring Demi Moore), indie auteur Aaron Schimberg’s dark comedy A Different Man, and David Cronenberg’s deeply personal The Shrouds.

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On the documentary front, contenders include Justin Kurzel’s music documentary Ellis Park, about Bad Seed Warren Ellis’s wildlife sanctuary venture; Eliza Cox’s female skateboarder coming-of-age tale, Queens of Concrete; Japanese journalist and filmmaker Shiori Ito’s powerful and confronting Black Box Diaries; Mati Diop’s Berlinale Golden Bear-winning work Dahomey; and the Jesse Eisenberg-produced Secret Mall Apartment.

All MIFF Audience Award voters go in the running to win a trip for two to Vietnam, courtesy of Intrepid. That means two spots on an Intrepid Travel Vietnam Express Southbound small-group adventure, departing December 14, 2025, including return flights from the winner’s closest Australian capital city.

Entrants must be 18 years old and over. Votes must be for narrative and documentary feature films.

Browse the full MIFF program and cast your vote for the MIFF Audience Award.

Broadsheet is a proud media partner of Melbourne International Film Festival.