Movies are the most obvious media purveyors of virtual reality, since their basic function is to immerse our senses in "experiences" that are not actually occurring.

This is not an entirely novel thing:  cinema is only a more technologically advanced way of presenting drama, which has been with us for thousands of years.  Also, at its higher levels, film is an art form that can enable us to see reality more acutely.

Movies do have a way, though, of "placing" us in the middle of events that we would otherwise seldom experience.   Seeing someone die, for example, is a fairly rare experience in real life, yet an extremely common one in the movies.  When we have seen a lot of dying in movies, and little or none of it anyplace else, our societal experience of death becomes essentially a virtual one.

Likewise, when we see more love and romance in movies than we can individually experience in our own lives, movies can profoundly influence our expectations of what these are supposed to be like.  The principle also applies to movie depictions of friendship, family relations, and a variety of other important real-life concerns.