Love for movies gets passed from parent to child

I took my 3-year-old son, Braden, to see his first movie in a theater Saturday. It was both an exhilarating and joyous experience for both of us.
We went to see “Kung Fu Panda," a movie I hyped all week to him in order to get him excited for it. By the time we arrived for the matinee show, he was running wild with “Kung Fu Panda” mania, which was further energized when he saw a large cardboard cutout of Po, the panda hero in the movie, in the theater’s lobby.
Braden’s excitement reached a near-explosion point when he saw the one thing any good movie experience needs – popcorn, which also happens to be one of his favorite treats. But even popcorn couldn’t contain him when he saw a poster for “Wall-E,” another movie I’ve been hyping because I plan on taking him the weekend of June 27. “Wall-E” he screamed, running from me to give the poster a hug as I was in line getting popcorn.
I didn’t want him to take any more surprise sojourns, especially in a place with a lot of people, so I gave him a warning: “Braden, you need to stay by me and listen to everything I tell you, or we will go home.”
My wife and I have given him this warning several times before and we followed through on it if he misbehaved, so he knew he needed to take me seriously or his fun day was going to come to an abrupt end.
In the theater Braden asked me about the “wall” everybody was facing. I told him it was the movie screen and it’s like a giant television, except a projector from the back of the theater would put the movie on the screen. I pointed out the projector room, but this didn’t interest him because at the time it wasn’t operating.
He was more interested in all the people, many of them children, piling into the theater, filling nearly all the seats. When somebody sat down next to him, he jumped onto my lap where he remained for most of the movie.
When the movie started, Braden’s head turned to watch the projector, since it was now actually doing something. I grew up in an era where projectors were used in the classroom, so I probably take them for granted. He couldn’t even see most of the projector, so he’ll only know it as a hole in the wall with a light that shines onto the screen.
Braden sat on my lap eating popcorn for nearly an hour after the movie began, captivated by the giant screen and the funny animated story on it. He laughed when others laughed and sometimes when no one else did, perhaps thinking everyone else would follow suit if he laughed first.
After an hour, though, Braden became restless, something he is prone to if confined to one place for too long and if he becomes tired. We were sitting in an aisle seat, so he thought he could hang out in the aisle. I told him no, although giving him a strong verbal warning was out of the question.
A whispered warning was not, though. I reiterated my earlier warning, prompting him to get back on my lap where he enjoyed the rest of the movie.
When it was over he wanted more popcorn, to which I replied no, and to see it again, to which again I replied no. He also wanted to see “Wall-E,” which I told him was impossible since it hasn’t opened yet. I did tell him that we will go see it in a couple of weeks; he just needs to make sure he is a good boy between now and then.
Taking Braden to the movie theater has been something I’ve been looking forward to since he was born. My mother took me to a lot of movies when I was a kid, and those trips to the theater are some of my fondest memories. To this day, I can remember every movie I saw as a kid in the theater with my mother, starting with “The Fox and the Hound” in the early 1980s and ending with “Terminator 2: Judgment Day” as a freshman in high school.
I love a good movie, and sometimes even a bad one, when I see it at a movie theater. My mother passed this passion onto me and I’m hoping to pass it onto Braden. Judging by our first experience together, I have to say we’re off to a good start.