What’s your dream for the future? This short film centres on the iconic end-of-school signed shirt

It’s always easy to tell when schools have finished for summer in the UK – for some, forever – by the hordes of young people walking home with their shirts covered in felt tip pen. Signatures, well-wishing messages, and the odd crude drawing (of course), are scrawled by friends and teachers on the last day, in this enduring tradition. It’s a unique emblem of the transition from youth to young adulthood that the director Peter Franklyn Banks has focused on in a recent short film, A Dream for the Future, which sees six school leavers interviewed on a midsummer’s day, musing on the state of the world they’re entering, and the hopes, visions and dreams they have for what may follow.

Since we last caught up with Peter, back in 2018, there’s been one particularly significant development in his life – he’s become a father. “This has massively changed my perspective on life,” he says, “my work has turned even more towards focusing on human stories and the individual hunt for meaning, whatever that may be.” While Peter had the idea written down for a while, it was becoming a dad that drove A Dream for the Future, the desire to consider what sort of world older generations are leaving behind for young people, and, importantly, to give those young people a voice. Living in a politically unstable world, with rising conflicts and financial pressures, as well as being an age group whose schooling was seriously impacted by Covid, Peter wanted to understand how they viewed the world that lay before them.

It was when the recent UK general election was called that Peter thought it would be a “meaningful” time to talk to kids about their future. “16-year-olds aren’t able to vote yet, and I wanted to give them a voice in an election week where they have none, to get their perspective on life as a way of transporting the audience into the next generation’s point of view.” Peter’s production company, Kode, loved the idea and backed the project. They worked alongside the casting director Alexandra Cowburn at Jinjo to find school leavers from across state schools in London to feature in the film, shooting at the end of June before putting it out to the world on 2 July, two days before the general election.

The five-minute film weaves the interviews of each young person together, with topics jumping from friendships and family to fears, war, conflict, social media, finances and even moments of profound philosophy and poisonous spiders. The range of topics highlights how much young people have to consider, and steadfastly debunks the idea of a disengaged youth, instead showing just how switched on they really are. “If these kids are anything to go by, the future is bright,” Peter says.

Shot in various green spaces across London, some vast and some nestled within an estate of houses, the film is bathed in a warm glow, dialling up the sweet nostalgia of the scene, a feeling that is only enhanced by the motif of the signed white shirts they all don. On the shirt as a motif, Peter says, “I wondered if focusing on the shirt might help us attach ourselves more deeply within the narrative, help us place ourselves and remember our own lives at that time. What were our own hopes and dreams, did they come true?” He continues: “It’s also a visually stunning item, each completely individual and tells its own story, full of love, warmth and nostalgia; it’s iconic in British culture.”

During filming it transpired that Layla, one of the cast, was interested in becoming a cinematographer and Ed, the director of photography, showed her how to shoot his 16mm camera. In a particularly poignant and heartwarming touch, Layla experimenting with the camera, followed by the footage she took of a rose bush, appears at the end of the film. “It’s always great to meet young people interested in filmmaking and photography and wanting to break into the industry,” says Peter. “I owe my career to someone taking a chance on me, so it’s great if I can be helpful in the same way now.” Peter has plans to keep in touch with Layla, and offer her some proper work experience in the near future.

The film is also accompanied by a series of stunning film images – not too dissimilar from a school portrait – which solidify the moments of the film in time; each a memento of a person on the cusp of change, in an uncertain world.