Lights, Camera, Description!
(By Romeo Edmead of The Matilda Ziegler Magazine for the Blind, March 2006)

When I discovered that some theaters show motion pictures with descriptions, known as Descriptive Video Service, or DVS, I really anticipated going to the movies. Blind people now can wear a wireless headset that enables them to hear a prerecorded narrative track via infrared or FM listening systems. This track provides descriptions of on-screen activity during silent moments of the movie. The descriptions also give information about key visual elements, such as actions, settings and scene changes.

But as I called various theaters in New York City, I was startled by the lack of knowledge by workers and even managers about their theaters' accessibility. These people were not fully cognizant of the movies that were accessible, nor could they distinguish between accessibility for the blind and that for the hearing-impaired. When I finally received some accurate information, I made my way to the AMC theater located in the Co-op City section of the Bronx. Upon my arrival at the box office, I asked for one ticket to see Grandma's Boy, and specified that I needed headsets for the blind and not the hearing-impaired. When I received the headset after giving up my ID as collateral, I made my way to theater nine. As I sat comfortably with pizza and lemonade, the movie's beginning brought an abrupt end to my relaxation. Much to my chagrin, I realized that I had the wrong headset, so I had to leave the theater to make an exchange.

Once I returned, I was very impressed with the clarity of the female voice that provided the narration in my headset. She spoke quickly when there were short pauses in the dialogue, and took her time when the breaks were longer. Each earpiece had its own volume control, making it easy for me to devote one ear to the narrative track. Turning down the other enabled me to listen to the movie's dialogue through the theater's sound system.

Accessibility at cinemas dates back almost a decade, to Nov. 14, 1997, at the General Cinema Sherman Oaks theater in Sherman Oaks, CA. Blind and/or deaf visitors could see The Jackal, as it was the first movie ever to be equipped with captions and DVS. Today there are over 200 theaters nationwide that are deemed accessible, and some can be found in Canada as well. Descriptions for movies are provided by WGBH, the Massachusetts public television station that developed the technology.

According to Mary Watkins, outreach director for the Media Access Group at WGBH, it was television shows--not movies--that were initially made accessible. The TV debut of DVS came in 1990 with the series, "American Playhouse." But the folks at WGBH did not stop at the small screen. Two years later, they began working on a project called Motion Picture Access, or MoPix, the aim of which was to create accessibility in movie theaters for blind and/or hearing-impaired viewers. A $125,000 grant from the National Institute on Disability and Rehabilitation Research, part of the U.S. Department of Education, helped to complete the project. The end result, also fittingly called MoPix, brought DVS Theatrical and Rear-window Captioning technologies to movie-goers with vision and/or hearing loss.

Ms. Watkins said the notion of accessible films initially generated mixed reviews. "Some of the studios were very accommodating and very much wanted to participate in the system, and some of them were more reluctant at that point. Since we did not have many systems in theaters yet, they thought that it would be an expense that was going to be incurred for not having very many people be able to see the film," she explained. Due to the fact that studios finance the distribution of a film, their cooperation is imperative for the high price tag of DVS. In most cases, it costs studios several thousand dollars to have a two-hour movie described. A multi-step, time-consuming process creates the expense. According to Ms. Watkins, "Describers get a set of work tapes for a movie, then sit and listen and watch while they take notes about the places there is something happening visually on the screen, that you then need to try and work descriptions into." A software program allows describers to time pauses in the dialogue by counting out the seconds, so they can then write with precision to fill that time.

Although the method of describing a movie has not changed since 1997, this year could turn out to be extremely significant in the advancement of DVS. First, studios 20th Century Fox and Universal Pictures recently began to offer captioning and descriptions for all their major film releases. Second, improving technology may soon bring more described DVD's to market. According to Ms. Watkins, there is usually not enough room to fit a narrative DVS track onto a DVD meant for home viewing. Because studios are already aware of the space limitations of DVD's, she speculated that some are reluctant to pay for a movie to be described. However, two new DVD formats are on the horizon this spring, and whichever one is adopted will contain ample space to accommodate DVS.

Although movie studios pay for their films to be described, it is the theater owners who must pay to equip their theaters with DVS. Agreements recently reached between movie theater chains and the attorneys general for New York and New Jersey will soon result in increased accessibility in those two states. New York's Attorney General Elliot Spitzer announced in December 2005 that 38 theaters throughout New York state will offer captioned and/or narrated films. Also in 2005, New Jersey Attorney General Peter Harvey announced that the AMC, Clearview and National Amusements theater chains have formally agreed to install Mopix technology, which costs approximately $11,000 per theater. In addition to pressure from state governments, disability advocates have also led campaigns for accessibility that have been successful in some cases. Ms. Watkins said that consumer requests are one of the more effective ways of attaining accessibility in theaters. States such as Utah, Kansas, Florida and Ohio all have cities with accessible theaters, but accessibility can mean either DVS or Captioning.

In order to alleviate confusion, WGBH e-mails a weekly update of the latest accessible movie releases, and it specifies which ones have only Captioning, only DVS, or both. The Web site you can log onto for further information is www.mopix.org. It also shows the current accessible movies playing in theaters, and gives a list of the Web pages that major theater chains have devoted to accessible films. Chains that have at least some accessible theaters are AMC, CEC, Consolidated, Crown, Douglas, Carmike, Gateway, Clearview, Muvico, National Amusements, Loews Cineplex, and, in Canada, Empire Theaters and Cineplex Odeon.

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