Visually impaired children attend barrier-free film screening
A special barrier-free screening of the drama film "Born to Fly" was hosted for visually impaired children at the Hongqiao Art Center on Friday.
Around 100 students from the Shanghai Deaf-mute School, and 40 volunteers from Anshun Road Primary School attended the screening, and were amazed by the rapid development of China's aviation industry.
Students were also touched by the generations of test pilots, and their perseverance and effort in testing and flying fighter jets.
Qiu Yuening, a student from the Shanghai Deaf-mute School, said that the special screening enabled him to feel the rich emotional world of the characters.
"The accessible audio commentary tracks in the headphones helped me better understand the plot and the characters' relationships," Qiu added. "I look forward to more screenings of movies with barrier-free version."
In the opinion of Gu Jie, another student from the school, this barrier-free screening allowed him to deeply experience the charm and emotion of film for the first time.
Volunteers from Anshun Road Primary School assisted visually impaired children in obtaining the film viewing equipment and guided them to their seats.
Zhang Hanyue, a volunteer said that the visually impaired children had impressed her with their optimistic, happy, and positive attitude toward life.
"I really hope to become friends with them," Zhang added. "I also hope that more cinemas in Shanghai can install accessible viewing equipment to integrate those children into the cultural life of the city."
Ever since 2019, the Shanghai Film Distribution and Exhibition Association launched the barrier-free film project, adopting cutting-edge technology to create a narration audio track based on the content of the movie during the film production process. Accessible projection equipment has also been installed at 55 cinemas in the city.
So far 23 films have been produced with narration audio tracks, including "Hidden Blade," "Godspeed" and "Five Hundred Miles."
In the future, the association will accelerate the launch of an integrated viewing mode of barrier-free films, encourage the production of more barrier-free films, and improve the accessible viewing facilities and equipment of local cinemas.