Cinema Audio Description Review

MAA's Chief Executive, Alex Varley, reviews his AD experience in the UK.

Session: A Scanner Darkly, Vue Fulham Broadway Wed 30 August 2006 7pm (Description by ITFC)

The United Kingdom now boasts nearly 200 cinemas with audio description (AD) facilities and in most locations there is at least one movie screening with AD available on every session. So the level of access is fantastic, but what is the experience like?

The starting point was the excellent website, www.yourlocalcinema.com. This is a special website solely aimed at providing consumer information on accessible cinema. On entry you have to choose between “subtitled cinema” and “audio described cinema”. The AD section has no graphics and is designed to work with screen readers.

I deliberately chose a suburban screen, rather than the showcase West End cinema, which I was visiting later for a technical demonstration of the equipment. Checking the listing, the Vue cinema at Fulham Broadway shopping centre was screening the new Keanu Reeves movie A Scanner Darkly with all sessions AD. I rang the cinema to double-check that the session was AD. Reassured, and after declining the offer to pre-book over the phone (I didn’t want them pre-warned), I ventured out in search of the AD experience.

Cinemas these days are light on staff. You are encouraged to buy tickets from an automatic booth in the foyer. I avoided this as I wanted to see how much the staff knew about AD. Also the booth didn’t provide the headphones needed for AD.

Sh unning the main ticket counter that also doubled as the Candy Bar, I approached a staff member controlling entry into the cinema screen area. When I asked him about the AD session he was confused. At first he told me that those sessions were only on Sundays. I explained that I wanted the AD, not subtitles (captions) and that the AD was on all sessions of the movie. Half-heartedly he tried again to sell me the caption session, but I made it clear what I wanted. He used the walkie-talkie to speak to the supervisor. Again there was a bit of confusion, and then clarification that I didn’t want subtitles.

After 5 minutes the supervisor appeared, carrying two sets of headphones. He looked at me as if to say “hey your not blind, why do you want these?”. To his credit, he did ask if I had used the system before and when I said that it was all new to me he explained how it all worked.

With 20 minutes until the start of the movie I ventured into the cinema. I tried the headphones, nothing happened. I sat down and watched the commercials, alone. Wednesday nights at the cinema are quiet in suburban London, but an audience gradually appeared. In the end ten of us watched the movie.

A couple of minutes before the movie started the headphones hissed loudly. A couple of people turned around to see what was going on. “Who was the weird guy with the headphones on?” I could hear them think. I turned the sound down.

The description was brilliant and worked seamlessly with the soundtrack. It was quite a visual movie, with lots of dialogue, but the description still managed to convey what was going on without interrupting the soundtrack. A fantastic experience and full credit to the describers. As a sighted person I found it interesting and not at all annoying.

The movie ended and the description stopped. The headphones went completely silent (somebody must have turned the system off). I walked out into the foyer and there was a different person controlling the crowd. W hen I handed my headphones to him he looked at me like I was giving him my MP3 player. I gently explained that they were for the AD system and informed him that he should return them to his supervisor.

What needs to be done to improve the service?

• Educate the staff so that they know what AD is and how it works.
• Have some basic information in the foyer about AD and which sessions are AD.
• Warn the user that nothing will happen with the headphones until the session is about to start – they are not broken!
• Have a system for collecting the headphones at the end – I could have walked away with the headphones, although I have heard that some cinemas ask for some form of security (like a deposit) to ensure that you give them back.
• When the person returns the headphones let them know what the next movie will be with AD – how to build an audience.
• I am not blind and therefore had no problem finding my way around. I would hope that any blind person turning up alone would get some assistance from staff in finding the right cinema and sitting down.


MAA is working with both Vision Australia and Blind Citizens Australia to introduce AD into Australian cinemas.