Hero of a moving picture ends up with girl

On just their third date John Santiago-Miller thought he had blown his chances of wooing Karima Hussein when his idea for a romantic walk up a Lake District mountain ended in near disaster.

Frozen to the bone and lost at over 2,000 feet somewhere near a misty Stickle Tarn, Mr Santiago-Miller was forced to call mountain rescue and wait for four hours until midnight before salvation came.

He thought his girlfriend, who had sodden feet and was shivering with cold, would never want to see him again.

But seven months on from that dating disaster the couple can look back and laugh after he bravely popped the question in front of an audience of cinemagoers at the Vue cinema in Kirkstall Road, Leeds.

As 200 people prepared to watch Clash of the Titans on Saturday night there was a pre-rehearsed "technical glitch" which allowed the projectionist to play his home-made video in which he declared his love for Karima.

After the video the 31-year-old led Karima to the front of the auditorium, got down on one knee and asked for her hand in marriage. In tears, she "of course" said yes and the audience applauded – apart from one unromantic soul - a middle-aged man – who loudly complained that he wanted to see the movie.

Later the 25-year-old bride-to-be, a secondary schoolteacher in Leeds, described Mr Santiago-Miller's romantic gesture as "amazing". She told the Yorkshire Post: "When the manager said there was a technical problem I had a weird feeling. When the song (All My Life by K-Ci and JoJo) came on I thought it was a coincidence as we had been listening to it in the car.

"I was looking at him and he was looking away. Then I got emotional and teary because I saw all my family there.

"Normally I talk a lot but I was just speechless. I still can't believe it."

Mr Santiago-Miller, who is a project manager for a property firm in Manchester, said the home-made video had taken six weeks to make and many "takes" because he kept fluffing his lines through nerves. "I never thought I would propose to anyone this quickly. I have never been so sure about something," he said.

She added: "When you know it, you just know it. When he proposed I had no doubt and said 'of course'."

Both of them said their experience on the cold mountainside had taught them something important about one another.

"He was a real gentleman and didn't care about himself. I have never experienced cold like it. He offered me his jacket and I saw that sweet, caring side of him. I love that."

He admitted that he was so scared and cold that he thought they might die before they were rescued. "I thought we were not going to make it. It was cold, cloudy and you could not see anything. Karima was shivering and the mountain rescue people could not find us. Seriously, I have not been that worried, ever."

Miss Hussein's reaction to their near-death experience surprised and delighted him.

"I thought she would be going nuts with me and shouting. I thought she would never want to see me again. When we got back to the car she was really understanding."

His cinema proposal was made possible by Vue cinema manager Paul Denbow who said: "We rehearsed it twice on Wednesday and again at 11pm that day, finishing at 1am. The projectionist, Tim Daly, even came in on his day off.

"The video is extremely romantic – it takes some guts to do it in front of an audience."

The audience included Miss Hussein's parents, five of her eight sisters and one of two brothers.

Wacky ways people pop the question

Getting down on one kneein a romantic setting is a bit too tame for thosewho favour a more wacky approach.

One man reportedly popped the question in a funeral parlour, in front of his brother's casket, because he knew his brother was looking forward to seeing him getting married.

Other weird proposals include a man who wrote his proposal in concrete.

Others have said it with the aid of fireworks or had it broadcast at a sporting event.

Recently Pete Simson, 25,told girlfriend Hannah McDonagh, 25, that they

were going to watch an arty French film at the Watershed cinema in Bristol for her birthday.

After the lights came down Miss McDonagh could not believe what she was

seeing when Mr Simson came on the big screen in his pants miming the words to Daniel Bedingfield's pop hit If You're Not The One.

The five minute-long spoof showed Mr Simson in a variety of colourful underpants.

Afterwards he proposed and she said yes.

Marriage proposals by Twitter, the microblogging service, have also been reported.