Dimensions Autism friendly screenings presented with IMIS award

Our autism friendly screenings training project team attended The 88th Annual International Moving Image Society Awards yesterday, held at Regent Street Cinema – the birthplace of British film and the first cinema in the UK to feature motion picture.

Dimensions Campaigns Manager Sarah, Dimensions Autism Consultant Lauren and Dimensions Involvement and Engagement Co-Ordinator and Lauren’s mum Michelle, joined representatives from the UK Cinema Association and BFI Film Audience Network.

Dimensions were honoured to be at the event hosted by news presenter Vivien Creegor, and attended by special guests journalist and presenter Esther Rantzen and actress and presenter Floella Benjamin, and of course other winners who are all taking huge strides in cinema technology.

The Lady Doris and Sir Sydney Samuelson Award is a special award given to individuals or organisations who are making meaningful contributions to cinema presentation for people with disabilities, challenges and adverse conditions. Sarah accepted the award on behalf of Dimensions, and everybody else involved in making our autism friendly screenings a success. On accepting the award she said a few words:

“So far, we’ve provided over 400,000 of these opportunities and it’s incredibly humbling to accept this award on behalf of Dimensions, our partners, participating cinemas, their staff and our guests, including; the mum and son who have been going since they first began in 2011 and have only missed 3 screenings and the individual who hadn’t been to the cinema for 25 years but now enjoys it regularly. And, of course, our incredible project team who are our experts and my rock in running and developing autism friendly cinema screenings.”

We’d also like to take this opportunity to further thank our guests – thank you for enjoying the screenings and sharing your experiences with us. It’s because of you that these screenings are a success and have developed into a wonderful national initiative.