My First Friendly Dementia Cinema

Last Thursday started cloudy, but by the time my Daughter Evelyn and I got to town, the sun was breaking through the clouds.

We got there early so we sat on The Moor in the sunshine until it was time to go in.

We went in the building where the cinema was and I met my first challenge, the Escalator. It was running slowly but as I went to step on it, the escalator went faster, which was disorientating and then another escalator which did the same thing.

In the waiting area were a couple of friends from the Dementia Cafe’sand the DEEP UK group I go to, so we sat with them. The manager of the cinema came along and welcomed us all and he organised the tea, coffee, cakes and biscuits in a side area.

We moved to the side area and had a coffee, some biscuits and cakes, meanwhile a few more people joined us and when it was time we all moved into the cinema.

The screen was a decent size and the seats reclined, with a table between some of the seats. At the front there were flat seats, which could be moved and behind them were recliner seats that could be moved to accommodate wheelchairs, which was useful as some of the people there were in wheelchairs.

The film was Seven Brides for Seven Brothers, which was poignant as its comes around birthdays of and anniversaries of, the passing of my Grandmothers and my Parents, who all liked that film.

When the film started the lights weren’t turned off completely which meant you could see the steps if you needed the toilet but that didn’t interfere with the film.

Sadly, there were only 18 of us there, I only found out about it from friends, which is par for the course in Sheffield as elsewhere, where the signposting of what is available to the Dementia community is poor.

I enjoyed going, the only other downside was that they forgot to turn the sound down a bit, which is one of the selling points of Dementia Friendly Cinema, hopefully they will remember next month.

I would recommend giving it a go, if you can find one locally and hopefully it will continue in Sheffield. The tickets at £5 were reasonably priced and if you have a CEA Card it’s only £5 for the person with Dementia and 1 family member/carer.