Connor, Nick, Sarah and Carina are like most teenagers navigating the growing pains of high school, but unlike their peers these four teens face another challenge – they’re blind. Do You Dream in Color? is an enlightening, poignant and award winning coming of age documentary by filmmakers Abi Fuller and Sarah Ivy that brilliantly captures the inspired journeys of four courageous US teenagers as they strive to achieve their goals: to be a sponsored skateboarder, to travel the world, to become a rock star and to be the first family member to graduate high school. Their extraordinary stories shine a provocative light on both the social and institutional obstacles faced by people who are blind in the sighted world and what it takes to surmount these barriers. More than often these barriers are imposed by normally sighted people who fall into the trap of ill-informed opinions often based on shutting their eyelids and imagining what they believe blindness is like, and what blind people must be capable of based on that limited personal ‘experience’. However, it’s much more complex than that.
One of the teenagers featured was Carina Orozco, who fell behind on her school work largely due to a combination of absences and the school’s failure to comply with their legal obligations under IDEA -Individuals with Disabilities Educational Act. Whilst Carina eventually gains the assistance of a legal advocate, it’s something she should have had access to years earlier. The emotional exchanges between teaching staff and her legal advocate form one of the most powerful and shocking moments of the film.
Conspexit recently had the pleasure of attending a film screening of this powerful documentary whilst at the 2017 NFB Convention in Orlando, followed by a Q & A session attended by Co-Producer/Director, Abi Fuller and Carina Orozco.
Conspexit is currently prototyping and designing an application that will personally assist people with a visual impairment to gain greater independent mobility, but we’ve also taken on another challenge; raising awareness around sight loss. We salute the filmmakers and the amazing teenagers who were featured, and we sincerely hope it achieves the global distribution it warrants.