Anna

I've got twenty two minutes to kill before Anna Karenina crackles to life on this tiny silver screen. It's a disappointment to me that any independent film that rolls through Amarillo is hosted by the old theater in the mall.  They've cut their screens in half to accomodate more movies being shown simultaneously, but these are the movies that have been out for a while. Some of them are possibly being sold on blu-ray and dvd right now. It only costs two bucks to get a seat in here, so the place is often overrun by sticky, loud, unattended children whose parents couldn't stand the thought of dragging them through the stores on a dreary winter afternoon.

Not in Anna's theater, though. This is a five buck affair, and you won't find too many preteens who've heard of Tolstoy. There are a couple of academic types sitting well to the rear, and there might be one or two stragglers in the middle somewhere. I can hear some quiet mumbling going on back there.
The screen will crackle to life in a mere eleven minutes. The image will need to be manually focused, as they cannot seem to set it automatically in this shin-dig. The fake red velvet drapes hang to the sides, giving the illusion of a old-fashioned, presentation-oriented theater, but nobody here is fooled. I don't think they care if I enjoy the movie or not. Nobody has even come along to ask me to turn off my cellphone.

 
You just know it's got to be annoying to those folks in the middle.

Well, see, I wrote that too soon. A few chucklers have just moseyed in and one frowning old biddy who is giving me the stink-eye.

I'd better put it away. The speakers are popping, anyway.