Back to the movies: After 14 months, it felt strange - but good - to be in a theater

Fourteen months after last stepping foot in a movie theater, it felt good -- if not quite a "Chewie, we're home" moment -- to be back. Yet even based on a sparsely attended screening there was a sense we might all need a refresher course in consuming entertainment outside the comfort of our homes.

The movie in question was "A Quiet Place Part II," the long-delayed sequel to the horror movie directed by John Krasinski and starring his wife, Emily Blunt. A review will come later, but for now it suffices to say that if I suddenly die, at least the last film I saw in public won't have been the Vin Diesel less-than-classic "Bloodshot." Admittedly, if you've spent the last year-plus conspicuously avoiding being in a confined indoor space for hours with lots of strangers, even fully vaccinated that prospect can feel disconcerting. Similarly, little personal tics during the movie -- like the tendency to touch one's face -- have a different meaning then they did way back in first-quarter 2020. (California still mandates masks in theaters, an extra level of protection.)