I saw Bus 174 in the most auspicious of settings.

The first time I saw it was during the SF film fest last year. Film festival audiences (at the smaller, less well known festivals, at least) tend to be very very good audience members. No bullshit. No babies. No cell phones. No seat kicking.

The second time I saw it was at a very small screening at a contemporary art museum here in SF. Great little screening room. Very respectful audience.

I also get to see a number of films through my movie club, which means smart and respectful audience, no trailers or other pre-screening bullshit, a fabulous moderator.

And then I also find that because of the kind of movies that I go see, I rarely have really horrible audience experiences. The people who go see films like Bus 174 turn off their cell phones because they don't want to hear anyone else's phone. They don't talk because they know talking bothers them. Etcetera.

But there's a bad apple in many barrels. I had to ask someone to put away his rattling plastic bag of food back a few weeks ago. But I did it nicely, and he nicely stopped making noise.