Greenwich youngsters win campaign victory on cinema access

I heard a nice little story last week about how a group of deaf young people in south London decided to do something useful over the holidays and take action on one of my personal bugbears – lack of access to the cinema at convenient times.

The young people from Shooters Hill College and one of my colleagues from NDCS got together with the manager of Greenwich Odeon cinema to say how fed up they were that subtitled films were only being shown at rubbish times. And the result? They managed to win an agreement to a trial of more weekend screenings with occasional later screenings too. The trial will kick off in the week beginning the 5th September and you’ll be able to see times by going to the Odeon website or Your Local Cinema.com.

A great result and well done to the young people involved. I’m looking forward to seeing the outcome of the review of the pilot in November. Hopefully a model for other groups of deaf children around the UK to folllow?

Cinema access website one step closer to winning top award

A few weeks ago, I mentioned that Your Local Cinema.com had been nominated as Best Arts Project for the National Lottery Awards. Well, they’ve gone one better and made it to the finals!

Wowzers. If you want them to go one step even further and win the thing, then you need to get voting. You can vote online (click on ‘Best Arts Project’) or you can vote over the phone. The number is 0844 686 8020, it costs only 5p from a BT line and it’s an automated line so you can hold the line for 15 seconds without saying anything and it’ll be fine. It would be fantastic if they win…

I wasn’t allowed to talk about it before but the reason I was doing a TV interview a while back was for a feature encouraging people to vote for Your Local Cinema.com. You can see the video here but be warned that there are no subtitles. It leaves me in the slightly odd position of not being entirely sure of what I’m saying. I’ve had words with them by email and hopefully it will be sorted soon. Fortunately, I’m too pleased that they’ve made it to the final to be absolutely furious about it.

Anyhow, get voting! Votes must be in by noon on the 14th August.

UPDATE (12/8/09): You can now see the video with subtitles here.

Facing the cameras on subtitled cinema

Yesterday, I did something I’ve never done before – a media interview to camera. I have now recovered enough to recount my experiences.

It wasn’t actually that bad in the end. It was for Your Local Cinema.com website and I was asked a few questions about how the website had helped me as a deaf person. I explained how as a deaf child I felt left out and excluded when my hearing friends would go to see films and I couldn’t because there would be no subtitles. I almost slipped in an anecdote about how I didn’t have a clue what had happened to Bambi’s Mum when I went to see Bambi as a six year old. And I spoke about how Your Local Cinema.com is a fantastic resource.

Before the interview, I also got to practice my acting skills when I was asked to be filmed in the cinema pretending to enjoy a film. I will expect nothing less than an Oscar after doing my best faces for ‘highly amused’ and ‘overwhelmed by the drama’.

All in all, an interesting experience and I picked up some media techniques. Inevitably, I thought of lots of things to say afterwards that I should have said. I also managed to stumble over my words at one point when I said “myself and other deaf children”. But, hopefully, it will all be positive effort in helping to promote Your Local Cinema.com and it’s importance for deaf children. And hopefully NDCS too, after I cheekily wore my purple NDCS t-shirt during the interview.

A production company is putting together the material and will be sending it out to various programmes – so I’m not sure sure when it will be screened or if my piece will make the final cut – but will let you know.

Cinema access website up for top award

Fresh from winning a People’s Choice award, Dean Rhodes-Brandon, the pioneer behind Your Local Cinema.com website are up for yet another award. This is one is a National Lottery Award for Best Arts Project.

It would be great if they win. So if you want to help make it happen, you can vote online and / or you can call 0844 686 8020. It costs around 5p from a BT phone line and it’s an automated phone line, so you can hang up after 10 seconds without saying anything.

Votes must be in by the 10th July. So get voting!

Are we too nice to cinemas?

There was an interesting comment (see, I do read them!) to my blog about subtitled spectacles suggest that we’re too nice to cinemas and that deaf people should be demanding the right to watch subtitles films at convenient times, not just at quiet times when hearing people don’t want to go.

On the one hand, cinemas say that the UK leads the world on accessible cinema and they provide more and more subtitled films – even though low attendance numbers mean they rarely make a profit out of it. It’s claimed that hearing people won’t see subtitled showings. Their line is that cinemas need to make a profit at the end of the day and they can’t do so if they show subtitled films at peak times.

On the other hand, if access means anything, it means being able to go and see a film at a reasonable time, maybe on a Friday or Saturday along with my hearing friends. There is very little meaningful choice. If I happen to be busy on the one Tuesday that a subtitled film is showing in central-ish location, I may find myself never getting an opportunity to see a film I really want to see. As Alison said, the policy of only showing subtitled films at twilight zone times rather feels like forcing a wheelchair to come in by the backdoor.

My conclusion is that if the cinema industry is serious about providing access, it needs to find ways to provide meaningful choice. If they feel they can’t do this without driving away hearing customers, then they have a responsibility to come up with innovative ways around this – like subtitles spectacles or rear view windows or whatever, anything that works for everyone.

What do you think? Are we too nice to cinemas? How do we respond to their justifications for not going further?

Deaf power at the cinema after another subtitles cock-up

I went along to see a subtitled showing of the new Star Trek film last night with my fellow deaf trekkie geek friend. As is so often the case, it was the only showing in central-ish London this week and not at a particularly convenient time of 5.30pm on a Monday. But I was so keen to see it that I arrived at work at 7.30am so that I could bunk off early from work.

Clearly, I wasn’t the only deaf trekkie in town and the showing was well attended with around 15 deaf people, all very excited.

And then all extremely mutinous and outraged when there was – once again – a five minute delay in the subtitles appearing on the screen. I half considered ripping my chair out and throwing it at the screen.

Instead, a large group of us went outside to berate the man in the projector booth and demand that they restart the film. Initially, he said it was impossible. But we stood our ground and continued to demand what we had paid for – a subtitled film. After around ten minutes, the manager appeared and agreed to restart the film. Clearly, not so impossible.

I was quite proud of the group for making a stand and refusing to give in easily. The error was inexcusable and there should have been no debate about restarting the film and making sure people got what they paid for. One guy remarked that he’d driven 2 hours to come to this cinema to see the film.

I’ve emailed the cinema to ask what happened. I’m fairly resigned to the fact that it will happen again and again. But at least we know what to do next time. My hope is that deaf children as well will feel equally emboldended to go on a riot in a cinema if something like this happens to them.

Deaf power! Rarrgh!

Subtitled spectacles

I was at a meeting a fortnight ago of a group that brings together cinema industry guys and representatives from the disability sector to talk about access to the cinema. It was a useful meeting and the highlight came right at end when the man from yourlocalcinema.com mentioned some new technology – subtitled spectacles.

The idea is that you wear some special glasses and that the subtitles to the film come up on the inside of the glasses. So only you can see the subtitles. Apparently, RAF fighters already use a similar technology.

The obvious benefit is that the subtitles would not be visible to other people in the cinema. Whilst the UK leads the world in accessible cinema, there is still a lack of choice of films at convenient times for deaf children and adults. Cinemas still tend to show films at ‘quiet’ times when hearing people are less likely to go for fear that they’ll lose too much business if they show such films at more popular times. Whatever the rights and wrongs of this, it makes me think that the existing model of delivering access will never deliver real choice. Hence my interest in technology that allows deaf people to see a film at any time of their choosing.

Has anyone else come across subtitled spectacles? Does it have any potential?

Big award for pioneering young deaf person

Saw a story today which warmed my cynical jaded heart from This is Local London news. The young deaf person, Dean Rhodes-Brandon, behind yourlocalcinema.com website – which is a lifeline to all those wanting to know where and when they can watch films with subtitles – has won an award for his efforts, which was presented by the Chancellor.

It’s great to see this achievement recognised. It proves that deaf young people can excel, just like all other children. And all the better that Dean has used his talents to widen access for all other deaf people. Although I have my occasional grumble about cinema access, I never had the option of going to the cinema as a child and now I do.

I’m going to have a chocolate easter egg to celebrate.

Update on Slumdog Subtitles

I mentioned in my last blog that I emailed the cinema chain responsible for showing a subtitled Slumdog Millionaire in Fulham… with no subtitles for the first five minutes to complain.

The cinema emailed back to apologise and say it took “customer care” seriously. It sent another email later to say this was being investigated internally by the cinema management.

They did also offer me two free cinema tickets as means of apology. Which is nice. I resisted the temptation to take a cheap shot at the lack of cinema showings at reasonable times, meaning that it would probably be a while before I could use the tickets.

Overall: the replies were sufficiently contrite and sounded as if it was being taken reasonably seriously. Sadly, I suspect it won’t be the last time a similiar experience happens…

Slumdog subtitles at the cinema for deaf people

I popped over to Fulham on Sunday afternoon to see a film I had been dying to see for ages – Slumdog Millionaire. Despite being one of the most popular films around at the moment, this was the first opportunity I’d had to go and see the film at a time which wouldn’t require me to bunk off from my job and that wasn’t so far out of London that I might risk entering… *shudder*… suburbia.

The only other opportunity came around a month ago when it was shown at Barbican for, apparently, one night only and which clashed with the night of my anniversary. I’m not sure my partner would have approved if I’d suggested popcorn for a romantic dinner – though given how few subtitled screenings there are, I did think about it…

Anyhow, finally got a chance to see Slumdog Millionaire. Bought some popcorn, met my friend, settled down, lights dimmed, film started. And then what happened? No subtitles.

I was furious. My Hearing Friend for a Deaf Person, Catherine, went out to make inquiries and was told that the projector wasn’t working. Catherine told me though that the distinct impression given was that someone had just forgotten to turn the subtitles on. After about 5 minutes, the subtitles finally came on.

It was only 5 minutes, and I did stay and enjoy the rest of the film. But it didn’t alleviate my fury. It’s just not good enough to show virtually no subtitled screenings of this film in central London at a sensible time and then screw up the subtitles. If the sound had been off, I’m sure all hell would have broken loose and people would have demanded the film be restarted. This film just carried on as if it was a minor whoops-a-daisy mistake.

I’ve written to the cinema to complain and will let you know how I get on. But deaf children and adults clearly have a lot longer to wait for genuine access and proper customer care.