Back to the Future (1985)

Tagline: He’s the only kid ever to get into trouble before he was born.

Curiosity: It’s a sci-fi classic… and I’ll be honest, I’m really only writing about it on account of Back to the Future Part II, a legitimately bad movie that actually deserves to be discussed here.

Plot: Marty McFly (Michael J. Fox) is your typical teenager – he loves rock ‘n’ roll, making out with his girlfriend, and hanging out with the local mad scientist, Doc Brown (Christopher Lloyd). Brown invites him out late one night to show off his latest invention, a DeLorean car which he has converted into a time machine. It’s kinda cool and it works, but there’s a big problem: It’s nuclear-powered. This is a problem because the good doctor obtained the plutonium needed to generate 1.21 gigawatts from terrorists who thought he was going to use it to make a bomb. When they realize they’ve been ripped off, the terrorists politely march on over to Doc Brown and shoot him a bunch of times. Marty escapes in the time machine to 1955, where he accidentally prevents his parents from falling in love. Dude’s some problems to resolve, including, but not limited to:

1. Get the time machine to return him to the present (1985), which I suppose would be considered the future in 1955. So, if you wanted to be succinct, I reckon you could say “back to the future,” were you so inclined. Yes, if you were.
2. Get his parents to fall in love, thereby ensuring his continued existence.
3. Save Doc Brown’s life.
4. INVENT THE BEATLES.

Thoughts: Twenty-five years later, Back to the Future still holds up. Sure, some of the special effects look dated, especially that iconic shot of Marty and Doc standing in the DeLorean’s flame trail. Oh, and, uh, the Oedipal complex between Marty and his mom (Lea Thompson) in the ’50s is fucking weird. Part of is the believability. Thompson plays it like a straight, innocent seduction since her character doesn’t realize that Marty is her son from the future while Fox ups the creepiness by being mostly freaked out with a slight dash of acknowledgement that his mom was hot back in the day. It’s gross, doubly so after watching the deleted scenes.

But get past the ick factor, and Back to the Future is a funny sci-fi/comedy/period piece. Fox, Lloyd, and Thompson are all stellar in their parts, as are Crispin Glover as George McFly, Marty’s dad, and Philadelphia native Thomas F. Wilson as Biff Tannen, who bullies George. Both actors throw themselves into the parts, with Glover apparently inventing most of George’s characteristics on the fly. Sadly, Glover’s demands for a pay raise on the sequels excluded him from the other installments; although Wilson went on to do the whole trilogy, with mixed results.

Reflection: The original Back to the Future is a damn funny movie, and the strongest part of the trilogy. I’m so original in my thinking.