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Friday, June 24, 2011

Friday Flicks: Back to the Future

Back to the Future (1985) ROCKS! Literally.

Michael J. Fox is perfectly cast as Marty McFly, the time traveling teen. And was there ever a more colorful character in film history than Doc Brown, brought to life by Christopher Lloyd?

If you know the history of this movie, you know that it wasn't originally meant to be a trilogy. But Robert Zemeckis and Bob Gale did a great job with continuity of the sequels.

My only logistics problem is with Back to the Future Part II (1989) -- the scene in 2015 where "old" Biff steals the DeLorean and gives the sports almanac to himself in 1955. How does he know how to operate the time machine? And how could he bring it back to the right time for Doc and Marty in 2015? Wouldn't the future have already been changed because of the book? I'll give a vanilla shake to anyone who can answer that question.

But it doesn't really matter. It's a fun roller coaster ride and one of the best films of the 1980s. Every American should see this movie.

6 comments:

  1. Loved that movie and so did my kids. I never noticed the time problem, but I have noticed problems in other sci-fi movies.

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  2. Back in 1985, I remember thinking - "Back to the Future? What cheap-o crap scifi movie has that guy from Family Ties agreed to be in?" Then I went to see it. WOW. And WOW!!! I fell head over heels for this movie - one of the most clever, lively, and all around fun movies from any decade. I also enjoy the sequels - I've always had a soft spot for sequels - and I have a dream of somehow watching them all tied together with the overlapping shots from each into one 6 hour time travel epic. I know they've been shown back to back - and I could always throw the Blu-Rays in one after the other - but there's something that really appeals to me where the final shots are not repeated and there's no break - it just flows from one movie to the other - the change from Claudia to Elisabeth be darned! Another terrific flick, Luana!

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  3. Belle: It's a fun movie. I liked the first one the best. I heard that no one wanted to produce it...until the director had a hit movie with Romancing the Stone. It was only then that he was able to get support for this movie.

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  4. Craig: LOL...yeah that would be cool to them back to back. I love the way each movie picks up right where the others left off.

    There are so many amazing things in this movie...such as the fact that in the future, the DeLorean time machine is powered by garbage instead of uranium. How cool is that?

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  5. It blows my mind that BTTF wasn't meant as a trilogy from the outset - in terms of plot continuity and evenness of tone, it fares considerably better than some intentional trilogies I can think of (Matrix being a relatively recent disappointment of that sort).

    Btw, tag! Some kind visitor left me some questions to answer, and, having answered them, I'm paying them forward to some of my blog reads... your mission, if you choose to accept it, is over on my blog.

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  6. Hi, Mojo: I agree. They did a great job with the sequels. And I really enjoyed BTTF Part 3...the western theme was truly grand! Thanks for stopping by.

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