One thing largely unremarked here about the new release of Aliens UHD blu-ray, is that it includes an
audio description track for people who are blind, low-vision, or just want to listen to a film while they're doing the dishes.
This is significant. Previously the film was undescribed, except (somewhat poorly) by a Canadian streaming service, and an unofficial fan version written by myself; both of these only last year.
I believe the new description was written and recorded by
Deluxe and narrated by Jedidiah Barton. Jedidiah has a great voice. On 'X' one user, a horror fan, described the script as "detailed and muscular".
Unfortunately, while it is a well written script, and faultlessly performed, it is not particularly detailed at all. I noticed many elements of the film are not described.
There are two especially egregious omissions: it lacks diversity information of the cast, and incredibly, largely fails to describe the alien creatures themselves (about the only adjectives given are "giant", "towering" and "beast", which are woefully inadequate to describe Stan Winston's interpretations of Giger's unsettling and disturbing designs).
In theatre, when you attend an audio described production, you are typically able to listen to an "Audio Introduction", also known as "Pre Show Audio Description". Audio introductions are supplemental accessibility material that typically describes the characters, settings, props and context in greater detail than could be achieved with interstitial audio description.
So I wrote one. For Aliens.
It describes the main characters, and all the marines, and includes clips of their voices, and other audio from the film. It describes the drop-ship, power-loader, smart-guns and motion tracker. And it describes the aliens.
The lines were recorded by US voice-over artist
Marisa F. Miller and I found myself having to give myself a crash course in audio production to assemble it. I added some fantastic creative-commons music, some audio clips from the film, and some supplemental visuals for low-vision folks.
My favourite bit is the seven step program of "How to Walk Like a Smart Gun Operator". Trying to put the visuals of the adult aliens into words was also a fun challenge.
While this may only really be of interest to blind and low-vision people, it still is a good example of how some of the films we love are still largely out of reach for some people.
A nice piece of feedback so far from Discord:
QuoteI still have a bit of memory of what the different creatures look like from when I had more sight, and I refreshed it a bit by reading the novelizations a while back. This is a much better solution than to have to read an entire novelation, so thanks for this.
I must thank
@SM of this parish for reading an early version of the script. They made some good suggestions, many of which I unfortunately did not have room to include, but what I found of greater value was the sense that I had made few, if any errors. It's essential to have someone invested and knowledgble review your work. Cheers SM!
