While box office continues to play catch up with pre-pandemic numbers, there’s been a notable increase in the popularity of experiential cinema

Ordinarily, you’d have to imagine the scent of fresh blueberry pie that lures the sister missionaries of Heretic, a recent psychological horror film, into the off-limits home of a single man. (Sister Mormon missionaries are not allowed to be with a man sans a chaperone; the potential convert, a psychopath played by Hugh Grant, assures them that his wife is in the other room baking dessert.) But at a special screening in Brooklyn last month, blueberry pie smell filled the theater at Grant’s cue, thanks to a themed, one-night-only collaboration with fragrance company Joya Studio. The scent lingered for a few scenes, waning along with girls’ faith and sense of safety.

The aroma and an extra treat – unlike the poor missionaries, viewers were eventually served real blueberry pie (and gifted a potent pie-scented candle) – added a layer of special to the experience of watching a cerebral thriller in a theater. A small, not revolutionary layer – Smell-o-Vision was a hot movie gimmick in the 1950s – but memorable nonetheless. Which is the point: the screening, a joint production by A24, Joya and Alamo Drafthouse theaters nationwide, was a level up from the normal movie-going experience – an extra in-scentive (sorry) to actually go sit in a theater when at-home entertainment options abound. “People have choices on where they’re going to see a film,” said Chaya Rosenthal, chief marketing officer at Alamo Drafthouse. “We need to give them as many reasons to come out and enjoy the film and the full immersive experience in a theater.”