I'm hard of hearing and I have trouble hearing the dialogue in many films so I often, though not always, need subtitles or to turn on the closed-captioning. Just 'going the pictures' and seeing whatever's playing means risking a wad of dough cos chances are I will not be able to understand the dialogue, I will lose the plot (haha) and experience ninety minutes of frustration and feelings of exclusion. Most of the time, this hearing-related, movie-going thing is not much of an issue for me as I prefer my own comfy sofa and a DVD (with the captions on) over going out. Though, once in a while I do crave the big screen.
Even with that occassional personal craving and the knowledge that other people who are hard of hearing or who are deaf/Deaf also would like to see a flic on the big screen, I have to be honest... I have struggled with the idea of campaigning for cineplexes, movies theatres, cinemas to be legislated into providing captioning.
One reason is that I believe that I have personally benefited from having a limited access to all the crap that comes out of the Hollywood machine and similar ilk. I have seen very many subtitled foreign films, saved a lot of cash that would have otherwise lined a megatroncinematicmegacomplex owner's pocket and I've developed other interests away from audio-visual media. And isn't it just enough that the movie houses are not providing a functional product (for me) so I've decided that they aren't going to get any of my money? Aren't there more subversive options available here than accepting that megatroncinematicmegacomplexes have such a grip on our entertainment needs?
I was mentioning this is a friend and she responded simply with: you snob.
Hmm... upsinged!
After I mulled that one over. I have to admit that she is right. Who the fuck am I to decide how other people entertain themselves? And how did I become so arrogant? Still, I think I do have a point, even if many people do not understand what I mean. ;-)
Back to captioning campaigns, I'm still not completely sure where I stand on this, so comments would be appreciated.
Anyways, while reading up on captioning, I came across this post on Sarah's blog (Speak Up Librarian). It's about Bill Creswell - a hearing man who is is "captioning the Internet one video at a time". Good man.
And I found this on YouTube.... :-D
