Talking movies – the cinema bringing films to blind audiences

Vivid imaginations: Visually impaired people listening to the film narrator during a screening at a cinema in Beijing. — AFP

BEIJING: Every Saturday, Zhang Xinsheng travels two hours for a movie date with friends, navigating Beijing’s confusing subway system with his white cane and a speaking map that screams directions on his mobile phone.

Zhang lost his sight in his early twenties due to a degenerative condition, but since going blind has discovered a love for cinema at the “talking film” club, where volunteers give vivid narrations to an auditorium of blind or partially sighted cinemagoers.