Movies in Canadian theatres usually do not have subtitles on the screen. This is a cultural difference that I have noticed for a long time.

I can understand why. When I watch movies in my first language, if subtitles are there, I almost always read them, even when I do not need them. Sometimes it becomes a distraction.

But there are also times when I watch a movie in English and I can not fully follow everything. Last Saturday, I went to watch The Odyssey, and I borrowed a captioning device from the theatre. It really improved my understanding of the movie. I think if I did not have the device, I might have fallen asleep halfway through.

Because there were many people that day, I did not want to affect the people sitting next to me by taking photos during the movie. So I only took a photo outside the auditorium. The device was quite heavy, heavier than it looks.

This was my third time borrowing a captioning device. The first time was when I watched Barbie, and I still have a photo from that time.

I have two suggestions for this kind of device. I feel that, at least from the technical perspective, they should not be very hard to try.

1. Add multilingual support. This could help more non-English speakers watch movies in theatres, without forcing subtitles onto the main screen for everyone.
2. Make the device lighter. The current device already feels heavy to me, so I imagine it may not be very friendly to kids or older people. Maybe theatres could allow phones to act as captioning devices, and only provide a mount, something like a selfie stick, so the phone can be attached to it. I know theatres may worry about people using phones during movies, but maybe a dedicated app or locked mode could solve part of that problem.

Overall, I am glad that this option exists. It is not something I need every time, but for some movies, it can really change the experience.