“If it’s the right chair, it doesn’t take too long to get comfortable in it.” – Robert De Niro

I love to watch movies.  I am not star-struck, I couldn’t care less what actors are doing in their personal lives.  I don’t care what their opinion is on anything, least of all politics.  It makes no difference to me what they stand for, whether they are good parents or bad, if they abuse drugs or alcohol, what products they endorse, or how they choose to live their lives.  I just love to watch movies.  I’m not sure where I got this adoration.  One of my earliest memories is going to a drive-in movie with my parents to see Disney’s Cinderella.  (It must have been a re-release in the early 1970’s because even my mother is not old enough for the original release date in 1950.)  Maybe that is where it began.  Growing up in a large family, meant there wasn’t money for a lot of extra things and going to the movies was an extra thing.  However, I remember going to the old theater on Main Street in American Fork, Utah when I would spend a week or two each summer visiting my extended family in Lehi.  I remember going there more than once, but I only remember one of the movies I saw there.  It was Mary Poppins.  (Again, not the original release.  1964 was also before my time.)  It was when I was between nine and eleven years old that watching movies at home became a reality with movie rentals of giant plastic-encased laser discs and players followed quickly by VHS tapes and VCR’s.  Then, we could bring the big screen to the little screen.  The technology quickly evolved and now we have home theater systems, enormous televisions, and digital movies we can carry in our pockets.  I still love watching movies so much that we have a weekly family movie night at our house.

As much as I adore being able to watch movies within my own home, I still love to go to the movies.  I am thrilled to sit in the auditorium and be drawn into the giant screen and the stories being played out there.  The Man of My Dreams says that movies are a lame date because we don’t get to talk.  I disagree.  I think movies are great dates because they give us something new to talk about.  We don’t go often because we are too busy, our schedules and show times don’t coordinate, or more often than not, nothing in theaters looks like it would be worth giving away two hours of my life to see.  I am extremely particular about what I will see in a theater.  I won’t spend money on trash or gore.  I don’t want to be scared – life can be frightening enough, I don’t need to spend money to feel frightened or be kept up at night.  I am not fond of intense action or suspense movies either, although, for the sake of My Warrior and The Man of My Dreams, I have been known to see an action movie now and then.  I want to see things that will leave me feeling good for several hours after I leave the theater. 

As finicky as I am about what I will see at the theater, I am frequently pickier about where I will go to a movie.  My anxiety has gotten to the point where I cannot enjoy a movie at a dollar theater any more.  (I was not disappointed when the last dollar theater near us closed.)  In my experience in dollar theaters, the aroma of years of spilled soda and popcorn coalescing on the floor is reminiscent of a diaper pail. The unclean appearance of everything from the seats to the floors renders visions of parasitic micro-organisms inhabiting every seat and leaves me unable to sit back and relax for fear of what may crawl into my hair.  In addition, I leave wondering if the glue-like biohazard my feet have been languishing in for the past two hours will eat through my shoes or the floorboards of my car first.  In essence, I cannot enjoy any movie at such theaters anymore.  I relish a cinematic experience in any clean, pleasantly-scented theater, but I am a huge fan of the Megaplex.   It is my theater of choice, and I have yet to go to a Megaplex theater that I didn’t like.

This weekend I had a movie-going experience that was so amazing that I may never be able to go to the movies any other way again.  The Man of My Dreams and I went to the Megaplex Luxury Theater in Holladay/Cottonwood area of the Salt Lake valley.  Every seat in this theater is a heated, leather, luxury, power recliner.  Two seats are together with the option to have arm rests in the middle or put them up and have more of a love seat.  They were super comfortable, clean, and spacious.  There was even enough room for my purse.  That’s a rare occurrence in the theater.  Each chair has its own little table that swings to be positioned over your lap or out of your way with a cupholder recessed in it.  The staff was friendly and treated us like royalty.  The menu for concessions was all the regular movie fare and included crepes and gelato.  Of course, all of this luxury comes at a price.  At least that’s the gist of what several reviewers said about this theater.  They are right.  Our tickets each cost two dollars and fifty cents more at this theater than at a regular Megaplex.  It was so worth the extra money.  I felt spoiled and pampered and I loved every second of it.  I hear they have showings at this same theater classified as “VIP Luxury” seating that include everything that the luxury seating does and have waiter services, so you don’t even have to go to the concession stand.  Hmmm, I may have to give this a try.

When I was growing up, one of my dad’s favorite music groups was The Statler Brothers.  We listened to them a lot, and I grew to love them.  They sang a song called “The Movies”.  A line in the chorus of that song says, “The movies are great medicine.  Thank you, Thomas Edison . . .”  I whole-heartedly concur.  Thank you, Mr. Edison.  You are one of my heroes.