Barry Kryshka loves watching movies. He'd just rather not watch them alone, which is why he helped build Trylon Microcinema.

With 50 deluxe red rocker seats, a 20-foot screen and a schedule of mostly classic, repertory films, Trylon Microcinema, which opened in July 2009, brings to mind an expanded living room or the ultimate home theater. Most programming is 35mm film but the theater occasionally presents high-definition digital video.

Kryshka values the "communal experience of watching classic films." Going to a theater eliminates many of the distractions of home viewing — the pause button, sandwich fixings, e-mail. "It's a social activity for antisocial people," he said.

Kryshka got into movies when he was growing up in Queens, dodging summer camp by going to the neighborhood theater. He moved here in 1989 to go to Macalester College, opening AVS, a small business that sells professional video broadcast studio gear, in 1994.

He worked at Oak Street Cinema for several years before that art-house cinema closed. In 2006, he formed Take-Up Productions, a volunteer group that built Trylon and programs films there and at other independent theaters.

The nonprofit group spent three years raising money for construction, programming festivals and engaging in occasional acts of "guerilla cinema," which Kryshka said sometimes involved, "a marine battery and a video projector in an alley behind a coffee shop."

This month, Trylon features a racing series that includes "Viva Las Vegas," while February brings a batch of Bette Davis, including her defining "All About Eve."

I've got a secret list of films that are going to get here eventually. In particular, (British film director) Carol Reed. The Universal Pictures film noir. A lot from the '30s, the '40s, those screwball comedies of the '30s are high on my list.

3-D makes me a little crazy. When you put 3-D on everything, it turns into a distraction. There was a Blu-ray release of "Coraline" that uses red-blue 3-D glasses. I kind of wanted to do that just for the chance to have a photograph of an audience in red-blue glasses.

People ask if the goal was to build something with 50 seats. Our goal was to build whatever sized thing we could build. We'd be just as interested in being a 250-seat theater. Our goal was to make something that could do 35 mm film projection.

We generally do three-quarters film and one-quarter digital. In a space this size, digital has caught up pretty well when you can work with high-definition sources. It's less an issue of image quality and more an issue of availability. Being able to run film means you have a wide range of material available.