Time & Perspective Quote by Ivan Reitman

Reitman is describing a magic trick that’s really a contract: get the audience to nod along with the first domino, and they’ll accept the impossible when it finally tips over. The genius of the line is how unglamorous it is. “Domino theory” isn’t the language of inspiration; it’s the language of logistics, of plot mechanics, of a director thinking in beats. Reality, in his framing, isn’t a sacred thing to preserve but a sequence to manage.

The intent is practical and slightly mischievous: build plausibility through incremental cause-and-effect, then spend that credibility on something wild. It’s how Ghostbusters can start with cranky academics, grants, and city bureaucracy, then ask you to buy a marshmallow colossus. You don’t believe because you were lectured into it; you believe because each step felt socially and emotionally legible. The outlandish arrives with the momentum of everything that came before.

The subtext is a quiet defense of mainstream entertainment as craft rather than accident. Big comedy and blockbuster filmmaking often get dismissed as “dumb” when they’re actually precision engineering: calibrating tone, character behavior, and internal rules so the audience feels safe enough to follow. Reitman’s also telling on himself a bit. This approach flatters viewers by treating them as rational—people who can be persuaded—while also admitting how easily “sense” can be staged.

Context matters: he came up in an era when high-concept premises had to play to broad theaters. The domino method is how you smuggle strangeness into the multiplex without losing the room.