I went to see a matinee of King Kong today, after surviving an encounter with my dentist. As I sat in the theater with half my face thawing out, gingerly trying to sip coffee without spilling it down my jacket, I marveled at the spectacle before me. I was grabbed right from the opening scene, of gritty, gutsy, 1930's reality, a beautiful montage that introduces us to Ann Darrow's world. The color of the opening scenes was remarkable - it looked just like the color photography of that era. And you know that had to be a planned detail of the movie. There is so much thought that goes into whatever Peter Jackson does, all to serve the story, it brings the audience into the movie itself.

What was remarkable about this matinee, on this day, in that theater, was how incredibly evident that relationship was. About 2/3 of the way through the movie, while Kong was whipping taxi cabs around Times Square, I began to smell the smell of the street and the cars. At least, that's what I thought of first. It turned out that something in the projector room had caught fire, and the theater was beginning to fill with smoke.

When it began to get thick, a few of us got up and started to leave, but most people stayed in their seats. Someone yelled out "fire!", and even then no one else budged. They were so engrossed in the film that they were willing to possibly suffer smoke inhalation and a fiery death in order to see the end of the film. In the end, people started to file out after someone managed to turn off the projector, and no one got hurt. I still need to know how it all ends.