Before having kids, my wife and I would go to the movies every Tuesday. Once we had our son, those movie days ended. Seeing the latest and greatest movie as soon as it hit theaters definitely became a low priority.
However, now that our son is FINALLY old enough to see movies, we have been getting back to the theater! So far, we have seen two movies there. "Moana" was the first. It had everything that my son would want in a movie. Animated? Check. Singing in all the right places to keep his attention? Check. Dwayne “The Rock” Johnson as a main actor? Check. (Okay, that last one was for me.) With snacks in hand, we were ready to enjoy the movie. Unfortunately, about 30 minutes into the movie, my son decided he wanted to run around and play. I didn’t catch the whole movie, but I think we still had an enjoyable time. A few months after the "Moana" madness, we took him to see "The Lego Batman Movie." Thankfully, this was a completely different experience for us. For weeks before the movie, he kept talking about how he wanted to see it. At the theater, he sat through the entire thing, excluding the one time that he had to go potty. He talked about it for days after (and still does)! He was a bit sad that it was over because he had waited for so long. I learned two things from these experiences. First, the subject matter needs to be extremely interesting to my son; his current obsession with Batman was a huge plus. I definitely need to keep the movies more catered to his current likes. Second, we made sure to have enough snacks. When we went to "The Lego Batman Movie," we had his lunch and other treats to keep his mouth occupied. He was simply too busy to do anything but eat and watch his hero on screen.
I don’t expect every movie experience to be like "The Lego Batman Movie" time, but at least my son reminded me how fun it is to go to the movie theater. I am very hopeful that we can have a fun family outing the next time we go to a movie. What will it be next? If my son gets to pick: Power Rangers.
