Most memorable was Eyes Wide Shut. Being a big fan of Kubrick, I had to see the one last film. But how it went was even more special.

When I watch a movie, home or theater, I do have tendency to check clock. It's a quite good measure on how good a film is: how often I check time and how long it takes from beginning till I do it first time.
I'm not sure if EWS made records, but it might be. However that's not the significant point. I only checked my watch twice. First in an hour or less and... then I lost sense of time. When I checked time for second time, I thought there was little over an hour to go. I was wrong (didn't see well in the dark). The film ended in few minutes later. And considering how this and most of Kubrick films come to a sudden end, that effect was amplified infinitely.

I'm not even disappointed and I wasn't then, because that made it my most remarkable cinema experience.


Another special experience was first LotR. Not entirely positively, but special. When the movies were coming I thought I have to finally read the book (I had avoided for years). I decided to read each part before the movie, one per year.
If you know LotR, you know what went wrong there: the first movie includes the beginning of second part, most notably death of Boromir. So having only read Fellowship of the Ring, that was completely unexpected for me when I saw the movie.

The greatest one was Jurassic Park.

After that we have:

Terminator 2
Titanic
Avatar

The Sixth Sense

Spiderman 2

Avengers: IW

Avengers: Engame

I'm rereading the books again (been almost 40 years since I first read LotR) and imo a lot went "wrong" with the movies. They are great movies but the books are so much better still. 

Of course a faithful adaptation wouldn't be much to look at as a lot of travel and events happen at night / in darkness. Yet bringing the inner struggles and dark power to light also doesn't really work in the movies. 

I was always and still am drawn more to the journey of Frodo, Sam and Gollum which is a bit better in the extended movie edition but the least well brought over to the screen. Things that didn't make sense to me in the movies now make sense again. Encounter with Faramir for example.

I'm currently in Book 5 (battle of Minas Tirith), kinda waiting to get to 6 to get back to Frodo, Sam and Gollum. I'm not really invested in these big battles, those are indeed better viewed on the big screen than reading about. Some writers can make them exciting in written form but Tolkien is much better at the more intimate stuff, as well as mystery and diplomacy.


The best answer I found for the differences between the movies and the books is this:

Jackson never really accepted that The Lord of the Rings is not merely a fantasy novel of action and adventure, it is what Tolkien called a fairy-story, and it includes many such elements -- talking eagles, for example. Perhaps he was right, and the modern movie-going public would not have tolerated that kind of thing. So he turned the book into an action flick at the expense of much of its deeper, richer, more mysterious material, including Tom Bombadil, who is just about the most mysterious of all.


Anyway leaves room for another movie trilogy :) 

I saw the LOTR films on opening day in 2001-2003 as my family was big on Tolkien; my Mum read the books to me and my brother maybe 5 times during our childhood, which looking back was crazy given how long they are.

Seeing them brought to life on the big screen in all their epic scope was one of the defining moments of my childhood, just mind-blowing stuff.

While they may not be 1:1 adaptations of the books, I feel like they work near perfectly as films.

I was 11 years old when the first The Lord of the Rings came out. No prior knowledge about it. No expectations going into it. Had not seen a single trailer.
Holy moly, nothing could have prepared me for that. A true revelation about what film could ascend towards. Still, to this very day, nothing can top it (all three really). A was a normal kid going into it, but my little brain was forever rigged towards fantasy going out. What an unbelievable achievement.

Sadly, I was not able to see The Matrix or T2 in theaters. These deeply impressed me but would have undoubtly benefitted from the big screen given the spectacle of it all.

Funny that, I'm also rereading the books, for the first time after twenty years.
And I was bit disappointed on the movies (especially first), thought they were mediocre adaptation. But I've become more used to them along years - at least until now reading the books again.
The movies wanted to push certain characters into bigger roles than they have in books, particularly Merry and Pippin, not to mention Arwen.

Watching Gravity in IMAX 3D in a theater is probably the best cinema experience I have had. I felt like I was in outer space.

Last week I saw my favorite movie The Departed in theaters for the first time. It was great to finally see it on the big screen. It had a decent crowd too.

I got to see the 40th Anniversary 4K screening of Akira Kurosawa's Ran at the Tokyo International Film Festival at a screening attended by some of the cast and crew. That was epic.

I saw Spider-Man: Across the Spider-Verse three times in theaters. The third time was with a live orchestra performing the score. That was amazing!

I recently saw a 4K re-release of the movie Diva at a theater. I knew little about the movie but it blew me away, especially how pretty the film is.

I am a filmmaker myself so I always enjoy when I get to screen my film in theaters at festivals. One of my short films had its World Premiere at the Magic Johnson theater in Harlem on a giant IMAX screen. I will never forget that feeling.

I attended the Cannes Film Festival. I got to walk the red carpet for a bit then I saw a film have its world premiere at the giant Lumiere theater with 2,000 seats. I had to wear a tuxedo. Another epic cinema experience.