Back To The Future - 1985
Directed by - A Fellow Lithuanian
****

Since I double-posted the "Burn Holly Wood Burn / Black To The Future" thread, I figured I'd write something about this. It is ironic that this showed on HBO a day before the fire that consumed the courthouse set. What hit me watching it again, is that how much this film echoes today, and how much it predicted correctly. Back then it was kind of weird that terrorists would want uranium to build a nuke in the US, as terrorists were just overseas. Back then it was weird that there would be a car with "butterfly" doors - now David Banner (the Mississippi rapper, not Bill Bixby) writes songs about them.

Michael J Fox's character is so bland - but in a good way - that he could just as easily be a character from 2008. There's not much 80's slang, or situations. Fine, he likes Van Halen, and his dream car is a Toyota pickup, what can you do.

What the film has a great understanding of, is the fact that the Rock & Roll Age is similar from decade to decade. It's the reason Marty can jump right in and play Johnny B Goode, but would've had a whale of a time trying to figure out what to play in a Big Band. The post war high school experience is basically the same, and has been the same for decades.

It's other thesis is that things that happen in high school, reverberate for the rest of our lives. I remember reading something about Kurt Cobain's suicide, when the author asked if we ever truly get over "teenage angst." This film says we may, but only if we overcome it as kids.

Great movie that holds up even better today.

Hmm, good points there.

I absolutely love Back To The Future. It's one of the rare movies where everything just works. And Crispin Glover is just genius in it.

Some things make no sense, of course. But those scenes come at the end, by which time the viewer ought to forgive the inconsistencies. For example, why would Marty's family, obviously enjoying a much higher standard of living in 1985 Mk2, still live in the house they occupied when George McFly was a low level drudge. And, if the McFlys were better off in 1985 Mk2, surely Marty's bedroom would have had different amenities.

Also, what is Doc Brown's hurry with getting Marty and his girlfriend into the future? Surely they can wait another day before travelling to the moment at which Doc Brown believes some intervention is necessary.

And what happens to the Marty whom the returning Marty watches driving off in the DeLorean into the past. Will that Marty also return and watch the Marty who returned from 1955 watching the original Marty take off into 1955. How many Martys will there be if that loop continues.

I take these questions very seriously.

I sort of liked the sequels. The western one is incongruous, of course. Is the McFly family incestuous, or why does Marty's paternal great-grandmother (or whatever generational gap was presented) look like his mother?

The second one is just too confusing; loads of things make no sense. Still, so much is happening that you just don't get a chance to think abiut it.

The third is easily the weakest, but still a good romp. Love the first two, every kid in my class wanted a pair of those Nike's with the self aware shoelaces.

This is one of those films where I feel like I'm the only person in the world who's never seen it.

http://www.theonion.com/content/news_briefs/chuck_berry_remembers_call

Chuck Berry Remembers Call From Cousin About White Kid Playing 'Johnny B. Goode'

April 18, 2008 | Issue 44•16

WENTZVILLE, MO—In a shocking revelation that turns a half century of rock-and-roll history on its head, legendary musician Chuck Berry recalled Monday how he got the idea for his iconic song "Johnny B. Goode"—believed for decades to have been written by Berry himself—after listening to a white teenager playing it over the telephone. "I'll never forget that night back in 1955 when I got the call from [cousin] Marvin [Berry] saying, 'Chuck, this is that sound you've been looking for!'" recounted Berry, explaining that his cousin was playing an "Enchantment Under The Sea"–themed high school dance when the mysterious teen, Calvin Klein, took to the stage and single-handedly invented rock and roll as we now know it. "Marvin held up the phone and I heard the song that would make me famous. Then I stole it."

Ha! I could never decide whether that scene was subliminally racist or not.

I'm sure there's some other "theory" connected to the car's numberplate too but can't remember what. Anyone else heard of this?

This film had such a profound effect on a friend of mine that he still always wears white t-shirts underneath shirts.

My favourite film of all time, bar none.

The license plate on the De Lorean is "Outatime", for which there seems to be a very straightforward reason to me (if anyone would like to suggest a racist subtext, I'd be interested to know about it).

Other Predictions -
I forgot, the other prediction that it will nail is garbage-as-fuel thing from the end - http://www.planetark.com/dailynewsstory.cfm/newsid/24028/story.htm

Imp -
Don't worry imp, Mrs. V's the other one. I only saw it the first time because my Junior High screened it during graduation/last day of school. And this past Saturday on HBO, of course.

Onion Article -
Hilarious.

PauTau -
You're going to need some hardcore Whovians (Purves, Wyatt, etc) or Steven Hawkins fans to explain, but what I liked about it was the fact that the time travel aspect was secondary to the plot, and they did enough to keep it plausible. He has mad scientist friend, he goes back in time, he meets mad scientist friend as younger mad scientist, has to get parents together, has to go back to the future. The end.

There's this theory they always talk about in time travel stories about some loop where the future thing causes the invention of the past thing. Like the machines in The Terminator being caused by the Terminator going back in time and the scientist building the machines based on its arm. Shit like that.

Fartle - I actually liked 3 much better than 2. 2 had a nightmarish situation that had a toxic mix of being a little too unpleasant and unnecessary at the same time. The train scene at the end of Part III was right up there with The General & Mad Max Beyond Thunderdome.

Also, what's great is how they did so much with so little. The special FX budget is almost nothing, and is almost all ancient techniques (as in since Georges Méliès figured out trick photography in 1896.)

The biggest effect is Fox seeing his hand become clear - but look at how he sold it and how it was set up. During a song, up on stage, and at the end. These idiots making movies today can learn a lot from that.

His hand disappearing and becoming weak while playing the guitar seriously scared me as a kid.

Oops, my mistake. It wasn't the numberplate but the speed the car had to reach: 88mph. What's the significance of this number? For white supremist / Nazi groups, 88 is a code (88 = HH = Heil Hitler). Utterly ludicrous, of course, but some people out there have waaay too much time on their hands.
Besides, everyone knows if you turn the number on its side, you get double infinity...

Yeah, Steven Spielberg is just the kind of guy who'd insert subliminal Nazi propaganda into his movies.

Speilberg ? It was Robert Zemekis. Don't you dare take the pride of Lithuania away from us.

Spielberg was Executive Producer on it, I believe.