If you had the option of being able to walk into the movie of your choice, would you do it? On the surface this seems like a very appealing notion.
After all, wouldn’t it be wonderful to be able to wander through Oz, or Tatooine, or Hogwarts, or the Shire? For many people these would be childhood fantasies come to life.
Yet part of the appeal of these fictional worlds is that we can keep them at a comfortable distance. We ourselves never need to encounter an Orc or a Dementor.
The perils of such worlds are, to us, merely literary devices. They have been designed to give us vicarious thrills at a safe remove.
Perhaps it is good, on the balance, that we cannot literally actually enter into the world of our favorite movie. The safety and comfort of a proscenium may very well be a necessary part of the experience.
I recall an exhibit where the original Star Wars Darth Vader costume was on display. However, the display case was rigged so you could only see in when a special light flashed on, otherwise the glass was opaque and the costume wasn’t visible.
For the first two or three flashes, you’re like “oh wow – Darth Vader”! ​But by the fifth or sixth flash, you could see how crude and jury rigged the actual costume was, and the magic wore off.
So the “comfortable distance” may be needed for the magic to work at all.