On July 26, the accessible version and the regular version of the fantasy action film "Under the Alien" directed by Wuershan and adapted from the Chinese comic book will be released in theaters on the same day. The visually impaired group can buy tickets to watch the movie in 74 cinemas in Beijing, Shanghai, Ningbo, Suzhou, Chongqing, Chengdu and other cities.
On July 27, with the support and guidance of the Shanghai Federation of Disabled Persons and the Shanghai Film Bureau, more than 40 visually impaired audiences and their relatives and friends came to Shanghai Guotai Cinema to watch the barrier-free version of "Under the Alien". Through the configuration of barrier-free projection equipment, visually impaired friends wear headphone receivers to listen to the narration, while healthy people watch the movie the same as usual, thus achieving "integrated viewing" and watching the same movie smoothly in the same theater. Director Wuershan and starring Hu Xianxu also "appeared" on the scene through video, calling on more colleagues and producers to authorize the production of barrier-free versions of more film and television works, so that blind friends can enjoy the fun of watching movies equally.
Visually impaired fans "watch" the accessible version of the movie "Under the Alien"
The film "Under the Alien" is adapted from the popular Chinese comic "Under One Person" on the Tencent platform. The comic has been serialized for 8 years and has received over 30 billion hits, and is known as the "peak Chinese comic". Director Wuershan said that the film "Under the Alien" is the same as "The Investiture of the Gods Trilogy", inheriting Chinese traditional culture and making innovative expressions, which will bring the "Chinese style and supernatural" trend to the summer season.
In order to meet the needs of the visually impaired for simultaneous viewing, the production of barrier-free versions needs to be based on the film source in advance, and a series of processes such as narration script writing, narration recording, and mixing synthesis need to be completed. This requires the cooperation of film producers, producers, distributors, and theaters. Tencent and its subsidiary Yuewen Group, as the main producers of the film "Under the Alien", promoted the film copyright authorization and worked with all parties to open up the entire process from barrier-free version production to distribution and screening.
During the production process, the public welfare volunteers of Tencent Video's "Accessible Theater" repeatedly watched the original film and wrote a commentary script with appropriate length and accurate expression; visually impaired evaluators participated in the trial viewing and made suggestions for modifying the script in terms of language style, narrative logic, and detail portrayal; the oral description experts of the China Braille Library provided guidance throughout the process and worked with the volunteers to optimize and finalize the script. The "Favorite Cinema" project team of the Shanghai Film Distribution and Exhibition Industry Association recorded the commentary based on the script, edited the commentary audio track, and synthesized it with the original film to finally produce an accessible version.
During the on-site viewing experience, the reporter from The Paper felt that in addition to the wonderful explanation of the alien "war", the barrier-free version included popular science information about the entire story background from the beginning of the film. As Wuershan said, the production of the barrier-free version is also a "re-creation" of the film by the behind-the-scenes staff.
Liu Yina, director of the Shanghai Film Bureau, introduced that currently 51 cinemas in Shanghai have installed barrier-free viewing equipment, covering all 16 districts of Shanghai. The Shanghai Film Distribution and Screening Industry Association, together with Shanghai Film Technology Factory, various film distributors, producers and other industry organizations, has produced nearly 30 barrier-free films for simultaneous screening in theaters. Among them, 20 films were produced in Shanghai. It is worth mentioning that in order to allow more visually impaired people to enjoy the dazzling light and shadow of this summer vacation, in addition to "Under the Alien", barrier-free versions of films that are currently being screened or about to be screened, such as "Catching Dolls" and "White Snake: Floating Life", will also be added to the public screening industry for visually impaired people to watch without obstacles and zero time difference.
In June this year, during the Shanghai International Film Festival, Shanghai released the "Three-Year Action Plan for High-Quality Development of Shanghai Film to Promote the City Spirit and Build a City of Film (2024-2026)", proposing to further improve the quality of public cultural services and continuously optimize the "Five Benefits" screening activities that benefit the people, farmers, students, the elderly, and the special needs. The creation of Sunshine Love Cinema is a powerful measure to optimize screenings and better meet the multi-level and diversified needs of Shanghai's film viewing. "I hope that in the future, more film producers, distributors, producers, theaters and other industry institutions will work with us to promote the construction of barrier-free film industry, integrate barrier-free into film, and integrate film into the lives of every citizen." Liu Yina said.
After the release on July 13, the barrier-free version of "Catching Dolls" was also screened in a special show. The blind audience responded enthusiastically at the time, saying that the "zero time difference" viewing allowed them to finally watch the movie with their families, "watch the movie" together and laugh together, which was particularly important to them.
At the scene, the person in charge of Tencent also said that the barrier-free versions of films such as "Catch the Doll" and "Under the Alien" will be released online on Tencent Video's "Barrier-Free Theater" as soon as possible after the theaters are closed. In addition, a number of high-quality film and television series such as "Hot and Scorching" and "The Long Season" are already producing barrier-free versions, and plans to release more than 600 film and television works in batches, initially solving the actual pain point of visually impaired people's difficulty in watching movies online.
