Movies

Favorite movie memories

Thursday, August 6, 2026

🔗 TC Sottek for The Verge | “Our favorite memories at the movies”

This is such a fun piece. For me, like Ursa Wright, my favorite movie-going experience revolves around The Lord of the Rings franchise. A group of friends who had read the books waited in line for a midnight showing on opening night—several of whom in costume (not me, sadly)—in a completely packed, sold out theatre, for The Fellowship of the Ring. It’s hard to explain the anticipation we (and I thing many, many others) held for this first in the franchise adaptation. This was 2001 and I think I’d first read the books, which was a relatively life-changing experience for me, in probably 1997-1998 so everything was still fresh in my mind. There was a lot of skepticism about the whole endeavor of Peter Jackson to bring these beloved books to life. It’s always a challenge to adapt book to film and the people who loved these books really loved them, but I’ll never forget how amazed I was at how perfectly the film seemed to capture exactly the world and characters that I’d had in my head from the books, and being in a packed theater alongside close friends who were cheering, laughing, screaming in unison along with the events of the movie made it all so much more enjoyable. 

There’s nothing quite like the communal experience of a packed house for a great movie.