NaCl and the cinema

On Sunday afternoon, the first day when the calendar had a 6 at the end, my girlfriend and I went to see a matinee showing of Brokeback Mountain at the local cineplex. At the refreshment counter, I passed on overpriced popcorn for a snack and went instead with an overpriced pretzel. When identifying what kind of pretzel to the young woman in the polo shirt who took my order, I noted, "Salted." No cheese sauce or anything, just pretzel with salt on it.

When she returned from retrieving the requested item, she handed me the pretzel in a plastic bag and the little packet shown above. Apparently it was too much overhead to stock pre-salted pretzels, and they chose to carry plain pretzels and consider the salt to be an add-on.

Okay. Bit of a challenge to sit in the surprisingly crowded theater and get the salt only on the pretzel and not all over myself, but I managed. I am, after all, a college graduate.

What piqued my interest, more than salt being separate, was what is shown on the packet.
It's "pretzel salt" that contains "salt". Only salt.

I found that comforting. I'm not sure why exactly. Just did. And that sodomy scene between Heath and Jake: really not that big a deal. Perhaps that had nothing to do with the salt, and was merely the maturity to appreciate the story, but if the salt had included other ingredients, who knows?

All I know is this: The next day, we went with another friend to see Memoirs of a Geisha. (Yes, the desperate and futile race to see all the movies before the awards ceremonies.) And at that show our friend got the mondo tub of popcorn with whatever's in that butter-flavored topping.

I'm not saying that unidentifiable goo on the snack was what made me think Geisha, while a beautifully shot film, was not as good as Brokeback. All I'm suggesting is it's worth looking into whether theres' a connection between what is on what one eats during the movie and one's enjoyment of said movie.

Up to this point I figured one preferred art that reflected one's beliefs back, but perhaps it was just the lack of real butter.


(Yes, I did hold on to the packet, rather than throwing it away, with the intent of making it an entry here. It's not right. I know.)