ZAMEK Culture Centre

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Explore ReelAbilities International’s 18-year journey advancing accessibility and disability inclusion through film and the arts. This session will highlight real-world strategies, lessons learned, and meaningful successes, offering actionable insights to inspire your own projects. Celebrate the transformative power of storytelling to drive social impact and further inclusion both on and off the screen.

The project Film for Everyone (Film svima) for the last 10 years aims to ensure inclusive access to audiovisual culture for deaf, hard of hearing, blind or visually impaired audience. Initiated by the organizationa Filmaktiv and Culture for everyone everywhere in Rijeka, Croatia, in cooperation with the Association of the Deaf and Hard of Hearing of Primorje-Gorski Kotar County and the Association of the Blind of PGŽ, the project provides film screenings, festivals, and a media library of films adapted with subtitles, Croatian Sign Language interpretation and audio description.
The presentation outlines the project’s development since 2016, the scope of implemented activities (inclusive screenings, educational programs, accessible media library), and its community impact. The model demonstrates how collaboration between cultural institutions, PWD associations and schools can generate sustainable inclusion in culture. The project’s extension, Film for Everyone Everywhere, expands accessibility to schools and kindergartens, promoting inclusive audiovisual literacy among children and educators.
The project represents a systemic approach to cultural accessibility through the continuous adaptation and distribution of films, building an archive of inclusive titles.
It stands as a replicable model for integrating accessibility in creative sectors.

A CINEMA AS A SAFE SPACE • A LONG-TERM ON-GOING PROCESS

At Café des images, we see this as a fundamental responsibility grounded in everyday, tangible gestures — the kind that allow anyone stepping into a cultural venue to feel welcome, recognised and at ease, regardless of their background or identity. For several years now, the cinema has been engaged in a process of social and cultural transformation inspired by the principles of cultural rights. This approach draws on the concept of the “third place” as a strategic framework, enabling the cinema to renew and deepen its social commitment while fostering forms of social innovation that strengthen accessibility, participation and collective ownership of culture.

Graphic. On a grey background, right in the centre, there is a photograph showing a man who is using the induction loop. The cinema screen and the audience can be seen in the background. Above the photograph is the logo of Forum Without Barriers and a caption which reads: Presentations. Below is the title of the event: Accessibility for Social Change.