Back To The Future

Ok, so before we get into the movie, a little background. Back To The Future, which for now will be referred to as BTTF to save me some time has always been one of my favorite movies since I was a little kid, it along with The Goonies, Gremlins, Pee-Wee's Big Adventure and Teen Wolf were pretty much in a rotation of movies that I would constantly watch. So, with that said some time ago at work, I was taking to someone that at the time I worked with, who is a few years younger then me, I made a reference to BTTF, she had no idea what I was talking about and told me that she had never seen, whihc amazed me for a couple different reasons, first, it's a classic and second it's on TV all the time. Basically the conversation played out something like this: (ignore the first part)

Now maybe this particular co-worker wasn't a good judge of stuff, I also later said something about having "Two Turntables and a Microphone" to wit she had no idea what I was talking about, then I called her a "Loser" which she got mad about, turns out that she had never heard of Beck. But whatever, she's dead to me now, and no not because of the BTTF or Beck things, and to be honest it's more like I'm dead to her based on what I feel was a misunderstanding. None of this really matters, can't imagine she is reading this anyway, she already unfriended me so can't imagine she's reading my blog. Ok, I'm totally getting off track, haven't even started the first movie yet and this is already broken, all of this other crap will be covered in my blog post "My Life As The Office" which I will be posting probably never. Anyway, so the point of the story was, for the younger audience that I have that might not totally be familiar with BTTF, I'm gonna fill you in on why you should be. Also I want to re-educate those of you that for one reason or another don't like BTTF, like another co-worker of mine, although her issue is with Michael J Fox, who she doesn't like, but she also doesn't like Muhammed Ali, I think she just doesn't like people with parkinson's, probably cause she is evil. Anyway, that actually leads to another point, Michael J Fox, despite being the first choice for Marty McFly and wanting to do it, cause of his commitment to Family Ties, almost couldn't do it, and they originally casted Eric Stoltz, now you might be thinking to yourself, Who?, exactly, had he been in the movie, might have been a household name, instead he went on to star as Rocky Dennis in Mask with Cher and then go on to have a bunch of small roles in a bunch of crap. Interesting to also note, that if he were to have been Marty, then the role of Jennifer would have gone to Melora Hardin better know as Jan from The Office, and now I'm back on the office again. Let's just get to the movie already. I got the 25th Anniversary Blu-Ray edition, so it's gonna be a HD expierence.

Back To The Future was released on July 3rd, 1985, which is interesting cause even before the movie started it was messing with the timeline, the events of the movie are supposed to take place on October 25-26, 1985, so when people were going to see it in July it was like they were already watching the future, course when I saw it, it was later on video, so it was like I was watching the past, confused yet? good. The movie starred Michael J Fox, Christopher Lloyd, Crispin Glover, Lea Thompson, Thomas F Wilson, Claudia Wells, James Tolkan, Huey Lewis, Billy Zane and Jason Hervey. Directed by Robert Zemeckis, written by Robert Zemeckis and Bob Gale and produced by Stephen Spielberg. It grossed 210m domestically, 170m internationally. Let's get too it

0:00: Universal Studios, good studios I guess. Stephen Spielberg presents, but really was there anything from that time that he wasn't involved with, seems like he has his name on everyhing. We start off with clocks, makes sense Time travel and all, has alot to do with time as do clocks. Ok, so here's a little something that was happening a lot in 1985 with movies, crazy contraptions that did stupid stuff, Pee-Wee had the Breakfast machine, Goonies had all sorts of things going on, even just to open the gate for Chunk, and here in this movie, Doc has some crap setup to make breakfast and feed the dog, not to mention turn on the TV, which has the Mom from Just the ten of us, letting us in on some of the plot.

0:03: and Marty McFly makes his first appearance, and we get to see him play a guitar reallly loud, seems like there is just way too many knobs and switches for this thing, and that speaker seems a little big, no? The one thing that is never explained, why are these 2 friends, when did Marty and Doc meet, why is Marty even coming over to his place? Also, why is Doc calling his own place, did he know Marty was gonna be there? why?

0:06: Power of Love for the first time, they got a lot of use out of this song. BTTF was one of the first movies that I can remember that really used Product placement, Burger King and the Mountain Dew hat were a little obvious.

0:07: Mr. Strickland, what an ass, what kind of educator would treat a student like that, calling everyone slackers and telling them they won't amount to anything.

0:08: Huey Lewis making his acting debut, telling The Pinheads who are playing his song, they are too loud.

0:09: Ok, so this has always bothered me, the van goes by telling everyone to re-elect Goldie Wilson, it sounds so much like Phil Hartman, but I have never been able to find out it it him or not, oh and by the way. "If you put your mind to it, you can accomplish anything"

0:11: Save The Clock Tower, interesting to note that that Clock Tower, which was actually used in some other movies, was almost burnt down a few years ago when there was a big fire at the Universal Studios lot.

0:12: Biff and George McFly make their first appearances. Biff is a great character, probably the best character in the whole franchise, "Hello, anyone home? Think McFly, Think." He has great quotes. "Shoe's untied, don't be so gullable McFly." I do have one issue with Biff, but I'll ge to that later

0:14: Tons more product placement here, Diet Pepsi, Bud Light, just seems so blatant, like all the labels perfectly pointed at the camera, whatever.

0:18: Once again, what the hell is this relationship that Marty is going to a mall at 1 in the morning to meet the Doc, I would love to know the back story here.

0:19: The DeLoreon, I guess you could consider this product placement, but I think they were actually making fun of it, plus the company had already gone out of business by this time.

0:21: I wonder how they came up with 88mph, guess it seemed like it was fast, but not too fast. I don't know, can't imagine  there is actually any scientific reasoning for it.

0:22: Ok, one of the biggest issues with this movie, why did they never fix the fire marks, it looks like Doc is standing right on top of the first, shouldn't it be between his legs, couldn't they have fixed that in editing? I mean I'm fine with them leaving it as it is now, don't need to go all Star Wars or anything, but really, everyone was just like "Eh, that's fine, it's not even noticeable"

0:25: November 5th, 1955, the day Doc visioned the Flux Capacitor, which somehow by flashing makes time travel possible, not totally sure how, what the hell does it actually do? Great name though, Flux Capacitor.

0:27: Is this stuff with the plutonium accurate, do those suits actually do anything?

0:29 The Libyans!!! Still topical, whether it's the 80s with BTTF, 90s with In The Army Now or today, Libyans always make for great bad guys. Want to note that when I was younger, whenever I saw one of those VW vans, I always thought there were Libyans in it and I would get scared and run away from it, chances are that if it wasn't Libyans, it was probably Hippies, so either way it was probably a good idea to run.

0:32: Ok, so imagine you are these people seeing this thing from the future crash into your barn, that would be pretty messed up, I don't blame them for flipping out. "Take that you mutated Son of a bitch."

0:35: Mr. Sandman, bring me a dream. Were the 50s actually like this? 4 guys running out when you pull up to a gas pump? Everyone wearing Suits and hats and stuff

036: The Clock Tower, it works, ain't that something.

0:37: This Diner scene is a great scene, Marty sitting next to his Dad, Biff coming in with some awesome lines, "You Irish Bug" plus Billy Zane, he's a cool dude, Then Marty realizing that it's his Dad.

0:40: "A Colored Mayor, that'll be the day" Lot of not so subtle racism in this movie, was that just a reflection of the 50s?

0:42: Ok, so interesting not, the street that they used to film the scene where Marty gets hit by the car saving his dad, was the same street that they also used for scenes in Teen Wolf, Michael J  Fox loved that street, he actually bought up all the property around it and turned it into a shrine, don't believe me, look it up, I'll wait... ha, ha made you look it up, yeah that part isn't true.

0:43: First "Mom? Mom, it that you?" this would become a reoccuring theme in the series. Calvin Klein's no friend of mine, don't want nobody's name on my behind. Marty, purple underwear? I know it was the 80s, but still.

0:46: Jason Hervey making his appearance, this role wasn't as good as his role in Pee-Wee, and obviously he would go on to be Wayne Arnold.

0:47: "He's an Idiot, come from upbringing, his parents are probably idiots too."

0:50: Interesting that Ronald Regan being the president in 1985 would seem so crazy in 1955, but I guess if you went back to like 1988 and told everyone that Arnold Schwarzenegger would be governor of California, it would seem pretty crazy to them too.

0:52: Seems pretty crazy that in 1955 they would be able to hook up the camera to the video, but i guess Doc is a scientist, so he could figure something out "1.21 GIGAWATTS" wonder where they came up with that number too, wonder if that is accurate in any way to Plutonium or lighting or something.

0:55: "Next Saturday night, we are sending you BACK TO THE FUTURE" got to love when they work the title into the movie.

0:56: "Erased from existence."

0:57: "You're A Slacker, you want to be a slacker for the rest of your life?" George McFly was a pretty big dork, and people loved to pick on him, Crispin Glover really did fit that role well, he's kinda a whacko.

0:58: Doc raises an interesting question, why does Marty keep saying things are "Heavy" I don't really remember that ever being something that people said other then in this movie.

1:00: Biff loves saying Butt-head in this movie, was that something people said alot in the 50s, I mean sure, I said it alot cause of this move and then Beavis and Butt-Head, but when did that become a thing? "Now why don't you make like a tree and get out of here."

1:02: A little Eddie Van Halen to wake you up. "Last night Darth Vader came down form Planet Vulcan and told me if I didn't take Lorraine out, that he'd melt my brain." So many good lines in this movie. For instance, like " Lou, give me a Milk, chocolate." and then "Lorraine, my density has popped me to you." also " Yes, yes, I'm George, George McFly, I'm your density, I mean your destiny."

1:05: Not sure how Marty was planning on helping George get Lorraine, but beating up Biff in from of here, when she already had the hots for him.

1:06: Another reoccuring theme of these movies, a Tannen and crew chasing after Marty, as well as Manure, which brings up a good question, why are their manure trucks just hanging out all over the place?

1:09: This whole plan to get Marty Back to the Future seems way to ridiculous to actually work, i mean in order for to work, would you need to test it out with a real car and real lightning a bunch of times, i mean, sure it's a movie, whatever, but seriously.

1:14: "Hey you, get your damn hands off her. You really think I oughta swear?"

1:15: It would be kinda weird is someone from the future did come back and tell you a bunch of stuff about what happens to you in the future, like would you want to know, I mean I guess I would want to know if I was gonna be shot by terrorist, but if I already knew everything, I don't know, it would be weird, cause there's no way that because you know, you wouldn't do something to change it, maybe not on purpose per se, but somehow

1:17: This whole scene in the car with Marty and his Mom, imagine this, that would be the most awkward situation to ever be in, i mean, completely unrealistic, but i guess maybe it would be the equivilant of going on a date with someone and maybe finding out that they were your long lost sibling or something, I don't know.

1:20: "Well, lookie what we have here."

1:21: Some great lines in that exchange, "I don't want to mess with no refer addicts"  Never really noticed that the car is filled with smoke before.

1:22: Anyone else bothered by the fact that Biff is forcing himself on Lorraine her, I mean, that's not right, I realize that Biff is the bad guy here, but what would have happened if George hadn't come around then and punched him out?

1:25: I wonder if Michael J Fox could actually play the guitar or else did they just have him fake this part, cause when he's doing Johnny B Goode, I don't think that's him, certianly not him singing. The whole hand disappearing thing looked kinda cool at the time, now it looks totally fake.

1:27: Ok, so what made him think to do Johnny B Goode, just so they could make the Marvin/Chuck Berry joke? Now, when they inevitably remake this movie, and you know at some point they will, lets say in 2015, so 30 year later, and lets say they keep the same general plot, so he goes back to 1985, and lets say they include this type of scene, what do you think would be the song that chose to use? I don't know, haven't been able to figure that one out, maybe like Guns N Roses, or Nirvana or something.

1:31: "Damn, where is that kid? Damn. Damn, Damn."

1:33: Still don't understand this relationship, I'm not sure that Doc from the past totally gets it either, he seems like he's still trying to figure out why they would even know each other.

1:34: Great Scott, the cable came off, so not only is the idea that this whole thing would actually work far fetched, but just throw another element in there to make it more improbable, eventhough you know it's gonna work out.

1:36: I wonder if the riming of this movie is actually accurate, he does say some precise times and stuff, wonder if you time it out, it actually works. Speaking of time, antother thing that really bothers me, he says if he goes back 10 minutes early, he'll have enough time, but he sets the clock for 11 minutes earlier? Like what the hell, noone noticed that, could have been an easy fix. but also, why would he cut it so close, if you really wanted to save him, go back like 30 minutes earlier or something. I guess that would have set up the senario where he might have ran into his other self and created a paradox in the space time continuium that would have destroyed the universe, but at this point they hadn't been over that.

1:41: So the lighning strikes, he gets to 88mph, the flux capacitor fluxes and he goes back to the future, not that there was gonna be anything else that would have happened, but imagine that it didn't work. The other thing though, he then crashes into the movie theater, "Crazy Drunk Driver" I mean I guess there was no way to avoid it, but that seemed like an oversite by them.

1:43: So, I guess since the Libyans pass him, had the car not stalled, he would have had time to warn Doc, but not really, they came along not much longer after, didn't help that he then fell down that hill for some reason.

1:45: It's not a very convincing arguement for why he went against his word and read the note. " I figured what the hell?" really, that's it? Also don't understand why he changed his mind to fo 30 years instead of 25 like he originally said.

1:47: Why is his alarm set for 10:28? but more Huey Lewis, his other song on the soundtrack is played "Back In Time" and is brother works on Saturdays? but clearly goes in late.

1:48: So clearly this doesn't use the butterfly effect theory that all the memories that would have changed based on what happened get inputed into his brain.

1:50: This final scene is interesting cause then it becomes the first scene in the 2nd movie, but they of course had to redo it, but it's basically the exact same other then Jennifer being a different actress.

1:51: "Roads, where we're going, we don't need roads." So, interesting to note that this version doesn't say anything at the end, which I guess was how it originally ended in the theaters, but when the release it to video and knew they were gonna do a sequel, they added "To Be Continued"

Well, there you have it, the first Back To The Future still one of my favorite movies of all time. I think that was probably my 114th time watching it, that number might not be right, but I wouldn't doubt it. Back to the Future is probably also one of the most referenced films or franchises in pop culture, or atleast in my lifetime, The Godfather and Star Wars franchise probably are ahead of it, but even just recently they referenced it to open up the Oscars and also Modern Family just had something referencing it a couple weeks ago. Family Guy has pretty much reference every scene at this point, The music is iconic, everything about it screams classic, and other then some of the clothes and stuff, it still holds up pretty well I say. Ok, that was fun, now let's move on to Part II