Back to the Future

I'm confused already. It's easy to think of the third one as just the Wild West, but there's quite a bit in the other periods too. Is it II or III that has Biff running the casino and ruining the town?

The second one is the most all over the place, conceptually.

I don't know anymore. That 'Biff running the town' thing really upset me but I guess it is the better film.

why is the love interest a bad idea N?

They don't make 'em like this anymore.

If there were a way for Doc and Marty to have gotten to this alternate 1985, there would be nothing to prevent them from going back to 1955.  They embark on a fool's errand:  they seek to change the present by changing the past and, as we discussed with Terminator, there are only three possible outcomes of this:  first, you can fail to make the necessary change, so that the past is intact and you still desire to change it, causing an N-jump; second, you can make the change, eliminating your reason for doing so, and so undoing the change, creating an infinity loop; third--the almost impossible result--you can make the change and create a different reason for yourself to know to come back in time to make the change, creating a sawtooth snap which will hopefully terminate in an N-jump (but might still result in an infinity loop).  Marty and Doc return to 1955 with the intent to alter history; furthermore, they are basing their efforts once again on information which they are about attempt to erase.  A disaster stands before us.

You've got to love this guy

this proves he is great, u r all gay (except N)

Did you write the The Beggar's Opera?

Pope.

Chaucer.

trewartha.

g-kit

*confused*

The mall at the beginning of the movie in 1984 is called 'Twin Pines'. The doc tells Marty about an old man Peabody who used to own this land and had a 'crazy idea of breeding pine trees'.
When Marty goes back to 1955 he runs over and kills one of Peabody's pine trees.
Marty then returns at the end of the film to 1984, but now the mall is called 'Lone Pine'.

Ha, i thought that was brilliant. and couldn't believe I'd never noticed it before.

but i won't

These movies withstand the test of time pretty well.

still, that part made me laugh.

"yeah, bigger must be louder, right? so let's build a REAAAAAALY big speaker cone!"

and

the after

i never noticed the nixon vs reagan thing before

-- mummy wrapped in bacon (nickaliciou...), June 19th, 2006.

i do remember that! even begged my parents for a pair IIRC

I think they re-recorded it in II and it doesn't sound the same.

and more here

part one is one of my favorite movies.

The third one is actually fantastic if you watch them all back to back.

This should clear things up:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Image:BTTFTimelines.png

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Image:BTTFTimelines.png

i love this movie, probably because i grew up with it more than anything else. it always konda disturbed me though that at the end of the trilogy marty basically returns to a 1985 that is still rather different than the one he left.

-- latebloomer (latebloomer), Monday, June 19, 2006 10:43 AM (1 year ago) Bookmark Link

this still disturbs me

the third movie is totally zzzzzzzzzzzzzz after the first act. i can NEVER finish it past that point, no matter how many times i've tried. my interest just drifts off.

the second one is underrated. it's a really oddball movie, and kinda (ok not really but bear with me) "subversive" in how it messes with the audience's experience of the first flick.

kinda how the matrix sequels wanted to be but failed at.

ive thought about making a thread where we list things/inventions/technologies present in the 2015 of part II that we already have here in 2008.

i cant think of any!

new laser instrument unleashes the musical creativity that's harbored in every soul.

http://sicarius.typepad.com/home_security_information/2006/01/fingerprint_gar.html

It leaves me cold that II and III were made concurrently - the advert at the end of II for III is really upsetting. Also why the vast drop in quality for the last one?

HEY LOOK FRISBEE...FAR OUT

-- ESTEBAN BUTTEZ is a GE Money Genie (ESTEBAN BUTTEZ~!!!), Monday, 19 June 2006 12:21

lol

so when marty returns to 1985 at the end and sees the new 85 version of himself going back to 1955, what happens to that marty? remember he was raised by successful non-nerdy parents, has his own truck, etc etc

btw yes i am home sick thinking baout this :-/

homesick for 1985?

what happens to that marty? remember he was raised by successful non-nerdy parents, has his own truck, etc etc

The whole movie is flawed since you can't change the past. It's already been changed if it has. You can't be self-aware of a present that never happened.

But, going along with BTTF's rules, the Marty (1) that Marty (2) sees goes back to the past, eventually experiences everything again and arrives at Lone Pine Mall to complete the circle.

way to cut the gordian knot of time travel paradoxes there.

You can't be self-aware of a present that never happened.

Pleasant Plains IS Mr. Miyagi. Sorta.

so when marty returns to 1985 at the end and sees the new 85 version of himself going back to 1955, what happens to that marty? remember he was raised by successful non-nerdy parents, has his own truck, etc etc

This has bugged me my whole life.

You could probably do a whole alternate version of BTTF1 where Doc Brown reveals to George McFly in 1975 who the real Calvin Klein is, and how they have to set Marty up to still go back in time when he's older to make sure that the past is corrected.

I'm not sure what you're getting at but plz spell it out.

oh hahah, i thought you were suggesting that the real Calvin Klein was actually created by the time travel paradoxes

if Marty goes back in time and makes his parents cool, would the "new" Marty necessarily hang out with Doc Brown and go back in time to create "cool" parents?

He would if his "cool" parents and Doc Brown steered him that direction. Gave him a big fancy amplifier to play with when he goes over there.

oh right, Doc is conscious of the necessity of getting Marty in the Time Machine. That's why he fakes his own death.

Mary's motivation to get his parents together is survival. Their "coolness" is just a by-product of "pop culture" elements from the future slipping into the past (darth vader visit, guitar solos, etc)

Oh man, I don't even remember Mary.

er, Marty

Obama should just run on a promise to make the 2015 of BTTF2 happen for real.

FAKE TITS FOR YO MAMA SAY OBAMA

Or the old guy, whatevs.

yeah, and marty's girlfriend changes from the first flick to the
last 2. Claudia Wells -> Elisabeth Shue

whoa why did this never register with me?!!?

cuz she's ditched for sex-with-Mom hijinx in both pix?

there was only one sex with mom hijinx wasnt there?

btff2 sex with mom hijinx wasnt shown on-screen i dont think, or was it?

more importantly as far as this board is concerned, if it wasnt for marty, & marion barry's instincts, WOULD WE HAVE ROCK N ROLL TODAY???

maybe just tit job panic?

Haha, I'd never noticed Marty's girlfriend is a different actor in the last two films either! Maybe because she doesn't have much of a role in the first film?

Robert Zemeckis should be put on trial at the Hague.

In July 2007, Variety announced that Zemeckis had written a film adaptation of Charles Dickens' 1843 story A Christmas Carol, with plans to use performance capture and release it under the aegis of ImageMovers Digital. Zemeckis wrote the screenplay with Jim Carrey in mind, and Carrey has agreed to play a multitude of roles in the film, including Ebenezer Scrooge as a young, middle-aged, and old man, and the three ghosts who haunt Scrooge.[15] The film began production in February 2008, and will be released on November 6, 2009.[16]

why raised by cool mom marty turned out the same as raised by nerd mom marty: HE STILL MADE OUT WITH HIS MOM

nature/nuture riddle solved!

still waiting for one of those hover boards.

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

I remember I didn't understand that scene at all when I was a kid. I had no idea who this "Chuck Berry" was.

plus ça change...

And speaking of The Onion, I am more than aware that I sound like this guy when I'm going off about this movie.

Maybe Claudia Wells turning into Elisabeth Shue was a delayed reaction change caused by the time-travel hijinks in the 50s.

Now you're just fucking with all our heads.

Just like "cool" Dad Crispin devolves in the future into hack actor in rubber face.

Oh my gosh I wanted to rewatch the second one for months and I finally did on Saturday and why don't they make every movie in this world so mind-blowing and awesome and exciting and suspenseful and and and and and and and and and and and and banana

See it is SO GOOD my personal sun got knocked out of orbit there.

Hey I know you're from one of those flyovers states with shitty education but the earth orbits the sun!

Marty Jr.'s clothes wld actually fit in as bitching mod-ren hiphop fashion except for his completely dippy baseball cap (I used to have a belt of that same rainbowy-reflecty plastic).

those were the days

Watching it made me realize I am turning into my dad. Example:

MY DAD WHILE WATCHING AN EPISODE OF STAR TREK: TNG:
"Oh man, Lore is so evil...it's so scary...he's just like an evil Data. (pause) Lore is so. Evil."

ME AND BTTF2:
"Oh man, Biff is so evil...can you imagine if the world was really like that? It would be hell...I can't believe Biff took over the world...it's so scary....Biff is so evil..."

The third one is quite underrated, I like how it quite deliberately has a different tone to the other two.

otm

A good theme of all three is Marty's inability to dress in an era's clothes.

great movies, the third one is okay too but the scene with the doc's love interest really does go on far too long.

i watch them exactly in chronological order of action portrayed: viz
BttF3
bits of Godfather 2
Godfather 1
more bits of Godfather 2
BttF1 and Godfather 3 properly intercut
BttF2
― mark s (mark s), Friday, 24 January 2003

and you have to say that's magnificent

Apparently someone is working on/has finished a chronological edit of Back to the Future:

http://fanedits.com/fan-project-details.cfm/Fan-Edits/title/Back-to-the-Future-The-Chronological-Edit/project/68/category/4/

Let's hope they simply remove the Wild West parts...

I just found this on google video. A fan cut of the Enchantment Under the Sea sequence with the shots from films I and II:

http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=4589540173717485087

I suppose this would make the chronological edit that much more difficult to pull off! Maybe if you used the "multiple angles" function....

There more I think about this the more I really want to see it, but I can't seem to find any such edit on the usual channels. Iratepay Aybay has the only thing close I can find and it's simply the three movies back-to-back without the intros/credits. Boring! I want to see what kind of weirdness these time travel stunts appear as if time was one long linear stretch of points that they hopped around on. I want to see how confused things get, how dramatic musical cues get taken out of context, how characters will suddenly appear and spout what should be utter nonsense unless you've seen the films in their original incarnation before!

I don't think the overall narrative structure of these movies is why people love them moreso than the overly dramatic scifi-comedic silliness that fills each shot and every scene. I actually think this would be funny as hell, and very surreal, and it probably wouldn't take too long to do...

Has anyone found one of these or do I have to go ahead and do one myself?

Sounds more complex but probably not as good as the Evil Dead extended cut a friend did.

Marty McFly goes back in time, helps his parents get together, invents rock and roll, and everyone promptly forgets he was ever there the minute he leaves.

Nobody notices that a famous clothing brand is later named after him, nobody notices that Chuck Berry releases a song that sounds pretty similar to the one he played at the big dance, and most importantly, nobody bats an eyelid when his Mom has a kid who looks exactly like him.

Now we don't claim to know exactly what first enters the mind of a married man when his wife births a child who looks identical to their old high school boyfriend, but we're guessing it's not "time travel conspiracy."

It's like it's some kind of movie or something.

IT's a movie with a lot of loose ends.

http://www.worth1000.com/entries/80000/80308MRUQ_w.jpg

My pinky stayed on the shift key too long.

I get excited sometimes, especially when it comes to disproving BttF bullshit.

so it changes back to pizza hut sometime in the next six years

seven years I am not from the future yet

http://www.overthinkingit.com/2009/01/16/the-science-of-back-to-the-future/

i'm guessing the new DVD edition doesn't cover Eric Stoltz being fired from the Marty role after shooting started cuz he was too "intense." which I can believe, it's hard to imagine anyone but Fox doing it.

(k, i will watch again sometime this year -- liked it fine in '85)

they talked about stoltz being fired on the commentary track and special features on the dvd i watched like 6 months ago, don't remember if they said why

obv that footage wd be interesting and we'll never see it.

So weird:

http://hurtyelbow.typepad.com/images/back-to-the-future1.jpg

http://hurtyelbow.typepad.com/hurtyelbow/2007/12/back-to-future.html

http://www.voicesfromkrypton.com/2007/07/back-to-the-f-1.html

http://www.halfchannel.com/2010/08/27/justin-bieber-marty-mcfly-back-to-the-future-remake-may-see-bieber

from Tom Wilson's website:

Q) You no longer sign any Back To The Future memorabilia. Is that true?
T) Yes, that's true.

Q)And why is that?
T) I've decided to do what I want to do in life, and follow my own path as an artist, so I've decided not to participate in any sort of nostalgia in which I'm marginalized as a pop icon of yesteryear. I no longer support in any way an insurmountable archetype, and now exclusively pursue the things that interest me.

i will watch a justin bieber "back to the future" if he plays the crispin glover role.

i will watch a justin bieber back to the future if it is slowed down 800%

Instead of getting sent back in time 30 years they just drop him into North Korea.

Also: woah.

http://imgur.com/ioBl1.jpg

http://www.popsci.com/technology/article/2010-08/nike-patents-mcfly-self-lacing-shoes-future

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fKaCt1YN0BE

YOU KNOW WhAT WAS GREAT ABOUT BACK TO THE FUTURE TWO MAN?
what
MEDALSTREAM
what?
MEDALSTREAM
what?
IT MERYLSTREEP
sorry, what?
MERYLSTREET
i really can't hear you.
BACK TO THE FUTURE TWO, MAN, IT MEDDLESTREET
did you say meryl streep? she's not in BTTF2!
NA I DINT SAY MERYLSTREEP I SAID MEDDELSTREEP
ok i don't know what's going on. back to the future two? the movie?
YA IT MAINSTREET
it's mainstreet?
NA MAN

IT
MADE
US
DREAM

oh ok.

^ actual pub conversation i had with a dude sat night.

(truncated, tbh)

your merylstreep drinking buddy is right!

it didn't seem like a conversation i wanted to pursue tbh

The future will be more than self-lacing shoes.

Movies like this make the future about consumer goods and creature comforts. In our New Society, where every unit's raison d'être is acting to the good of the whole, "comfort" will be an obsolete notion (all obsolete notions will be retired and erased from memory forever.)

comfort isn't a good of the whole?

just missed out on a few votes there son

comfort isn't a good of the whole?

no. you are thinking too small. comfort is a perk for organisms wired by natural selection to be hedonically rewarded by resting, eating, reproducing and serving other biological necessities. true collective units will be freed from the burden of self-regard through cognitive re-conditioning at first, followed by pharmacological and cybernetic additions, and finally through genetic engineering.

i'm aware of the drive for efficiency in the irish public sector, thank you

Heading along tonight to see the 25th Anniversary re-release at the cinema and I am soooooooo excited you wouldn't believe! I genuinely feel sick with anticipation. I was too young to catch the first one in the cinema, but have loved it forever, so to finally get the chance is immense. Hurrah!!

I haven't been so happy for a long time, that was utterly glorious!

:) it's hands down the best thing about the 80's

totally flawless movie imho

metalstream

http://movies.yahoo.com/feature/thr-eric-stoltz-as-the-original-marty-mcfly.html

I don't have a blu-ray player, and I just bought BTTF on dvd about six months ago anyway, but I'm glad we all finally get to see something more than just stills with Stoltz in the role.

I'm seeing this in theaters on the 25th. AMC theaters are running it the 23rd and 25th. The 25th, at 7PM (the movie's showtime), will be mark 25 years since Marty went back fwiw.

If I had a cinema I'd do a special showing on November 5th.

this movie is absolutely perfect. i can't think of another movie that rewards on so many repeat viewings. i've taught this film several times, and i learn more and more from it.

i like some of bob zemeckis's other movies, but it still astounds me that he made this one.

i have met probably two people in my life who claim (CLAIM) not to like this movie.

i love it of course but it seemed pretty far from perfect the last few times i saw it and their's a real creepy ugly reagan air to it right beneath the surface. mind you christopher lloyd and michael j. fox but esp christopher lloyd more than make up for any flaws or bad vibes that might be there.

What is the ugly Reagan air, aside from the new pick-up?

Agreed. The triumphalism at the end of the movie creeps me out; it's the nerd's version of Rambo.

Still like the movie overall. One of my best childhood experiences is watching this with my parents on a late Sunday afternoon in summer '85, with no expectations, and everyone had a ball.

reagan is on record as claiming back to the future as his favorite movie. He was fairly close to making a cameo in part iii as a sheriff or something, which i admit would have been pretty cool.

My little brother is such a diehard fan that when he was 11 or so he asked my mom to take him to the various filming locations for this.

We have a picture of him in front of Marty's house. It's hilarious because it made him tremendously happy to go there but in the photo his face just expresses that stoic sense of triumph little boys have in a lot of pictures. "I have conquered" is the feel.

I guess I get that.

I did always think it was weird that a little town like Hill Valley would have its own porn theater sitting in the city square.

What is the ugly Reagan air, aside from the new pick-up?

The city is a crappy cesspool with a bunch of closed-up stores and garbage in the streets and homeless dudes asleep on park benches (oh and BTW a black mayor who used to be a janitor) unlike in the 50s when everything was perfect?

Wasn't a small Californian town in the 50s less likely to have glaringly visible social problems than one in the 80s? That's my hunch, correct me if I'm wrong. Maybe I got that idea from the movies!

The black mayor is the present-day mayor even before Marty ruins the past though.

the 50s had racism underage drinking drugs violence peeping tomism incestful lust albeit innocent incestful lust and manure

reagan is on record as claiming back to the future as his favorite movie. He was fairly close to making a cameo in part iii as a sheriff or something, which i admit would have been pretty cool.

Wow -- do you have a link??

yes reagan was in cowboy movies and part iii was a cowboy movie

lol

He also mentioned wanting to use Barbara Stanwyck's corpse to play Elizabeth Shue -- he thought it was a remake of Cattle Queen of Montana.

from IMDB (which probably got it from the DVD commentary):
"Actor and former President Ronald Reagan was originally approached to play the part of Mayor Hubert because of his fondness for the first film in the trilogy. He reluctantly turned down the role, and the part went to Hugh Gillin instead."

would have been neat, the same way if The Man in the High Castle ever gets made, it'd be cool if Schwarzenegger was Governor of alt-California.

The black mayor is the present-day mayor even before Marty ruins the past though.

Well, yeah. That's what I'm saying. Marty's own experience of 1985 changes based on his activities in the past, but 1985 Hill Valley is a shithole regardless, not like those picture-perfect 50s.

Don't get me wrong, I like the BTTF movies, but there was always that underlying strain of conservativism that rubs me the wrong way.

i dunno if it's so much conservatism as unrepentant nostalgia (used cars, forrest gump, who framed roger rabbit),
which ends up being the same thing a lot of the time, but they seem pretty self-aware about it (cafe 80s in pt II)

In Reagan's America, your mother's attempted rapist is in your driveway, hired by your father to wash your truck.

in Reagan's cinematic America, nerds become heroes by adapting the methods of the guys who beat them up and winning, terrible furniture and all.

idg all this reagan's america- his ideal america, the one he created, what?

In Reagan's America, machine-gun toting Libyan terrorists cruise the streets of your hometown in VW vans.

http://farm2.static.flickr.com/1385/846917774_3468b25871.jpg?v=0

The city is a crappy cesspool with a bunch of closed-up stores and garbage in the streets and homeless dudes asleep on park benches (oh and BTW a black mayor who used to be a janitor) unlike in the 50s when everything was perfect?

Screenwriter Bob Gale is one of the 134 Republicans in Hollywood, so no surprise there is a certain conservative strain in the movie.

That being said, crime (especially of the violent sort) was the lowest it had been in decades in the 1950s, and in the sixties it skyrocketed and never looked back. Pointing out those social changes in America isn't Reagantastic, necessarily

would the perfect movie be the adventure of back to the future crossed with the politics of robocop?

No, because that would be called "Back to the Future II".

someone plz photoshop Reagan on Robocop to make him into RonnieCop. Thnx.

oh c'mon this film is totally silly and self-conscious about the nostalgic stuff.

the porn theater is a gag,. there are two movie theaters at either end of downtown hill valley in the 1950s. in the 1980s they have become, respectively, a porn theater and a storefront church. which were two very common fates for single-screen theaters in that period. it's more a cinephilic gag than a political one.

this film is beautifully, beautifully, beautifully made. it's like a masterclass in popular filmmaking.

This thread has made me want to watch it again. One of my favorites.

a film-making friend of mine didn't see this until he was 20, and only after my friends and I hounded him into seeing it. Were amazed he could go that long without ever seeing it.

He had also never seen Ghostbusters until recently

talk about great reaganite comedies!

Did he like them?

reagan is on record as claiming back to the future as his favorite movie. He was fairly close to making a cameo in part iii as a sheriff or something, which i admit would have been pretty cool.

Too bad they couldn't squeeze in Charlie Manson or Pol Pot instead, huh.

this movie is absolutely perfect.

ugh

First time I ever saw this movie was on a Saturday night and after the movie was over I picked up a newspaper THAT WAS DATED THE FOLLOWING SUNDAY. This is when I first learned that Sunday papers came out Saturday, but for the few minutes inbetween picking up the paper and being told that, my mind was suitably blown...

Did he like them?

loved them. Definitely filled in some pop culture gaps

"Too bad they couldn't squeeze in Charlie Manson or Pol Pot instead, huh."

Wasn't Manson in Forrest Gump? Dunno about Pol Pot.

you're thinking of lbj and nixon.

talk about reaganite comedies btw.

http://cache3.asset-cache.net/xc/74554383.jpg?v=1&c=IWSAsset&k=2&d=77BFBA49EF878921CC759DF4EBAC47D0BA7521FF1EE0C66796339EE03E4F95A2E0888CDBE38F96BF

frank and dean got some sun

And they all slicked back their hair with crude oil.

morbs you have a right to disagree, but your whole elitist schtick is so fucking corny.

now now ladies

If the McFlys enjoyed such a better life as a result of George becoming a famous writer, why do they still live in the same shitty house in the "new" 1985?

This movie is the worst when it comes to time traveling holes.

Morbs doesn't like Back to the Future? Explain your reasoning!

The future wouldnt be so disappointing if they hadn't invented the hoverboard in these movies!

This movie is the worst when it comes to time traveling holes.

agreed--i also think they kind of don't give a shit. or just enough of a shit to make it work.

Marty: What about all that talk about screwing up future events? The space-time continuum?

Doc Brown: Well, I figured...what the hell!

If the McFlys enjoyed such a better life as a result of George becoming a famous writer, why do they still live in the same shitty house in the "new" 1985?

Because in the awesome future, it has a higher property assessment!

because george is self-fulfilled in himself as a creative person, and doesn't gaf about property

a film-making friend of mine didn't see this until he was 20, and only after my friends and I hounded him into seeing it. Were amazed he could go that long without ever seeing it.

I have a friend, in her early 30s, who's never seen any of the Star Wars movies nor any of the LotR movies. Considering that most of her friends are geeks and hippies, it's pretty amazing she's managed to avoid them.

not sure either would stand up to the hype at this stage.

particularly if she's a LOTR fan from the book.

I do like Back to the Future. I also know it's imperfect and conservative, because I'm not 11 years old.

(BttF 2 sucked, never saw 3)

I still don't get how it's conservative.

it was made in the 80s

And it was about the 50s.

(Does no one see how it could just as easily be read as a satire of '80s America's retrenchment into '50s-style conservatism?)

i watched it instead of reading it- it was still pretty good that way tbh

Can't wait to read Jackass 3-D.

psyched forsure

I can't ever get past Marty coming back to 1985 and being the same old Marty while everyone else has had 30 years of changing. Even his siblings are different. Marty should be affected as well. If anything, he should've come back to the future and found Eric Stolz fucking his girlfriend.

(Does no one see how it could just as easily be read as a satire of '80s America's retrenchment into '50s-style conservatism?)

but then i wouldn't be smarter than the movie, and what fun would that be?

As much as I hate remakes, I'd go see a version of this movie where Marty goes back in time from 2015 to 1985 to save his mother from getting AIDS.

the porn theater is a gag,. there are two movie theaters at either end of downtown hill valley in the 1950s. in the 1980s they have become, respectively, a porn theater and a storefront church. which were two very common fates for single-screen theaters in that period. it's more a cinephilic gag than a political one.

― by another name (amateurist), Tuesday, October 12, 2010 9:54 PM (Yesterday) Bookmark

haha i never noticed that as a kid. it's totally—still—true.

i guess by the standards of this thread "the magnificent ambersons" is a pretty conservative movie too...

can't ever get past Marty coming back to 1985 and being the same old Marty while everyone else has had 30 years of changing. Even his siblings are different. Marty should be affected as well. If anything, he should've come back to the future and found Eric Stolz fucking his girlfriend.

Yeah, but he would have been affected in real time back in 1955. he stopped himself from disappearing, that's gotta count for something, right?

If you enjoy watching movies that you are smarter than, might I suggest

http://horrornews.net/wp-content/uploads/2010/08/troll2dvd.jpg

Yeah, but he would have been affected in real time back in 1955. he stopped himself from disappearing, that's gotta count for something, right?

If anything he should've erased himself completely for what he did.

harsh

Hey, I didn't write the rules of time-travel.

http://www.yankees2000.com/y2k/uploaded_images/timecop-787091.jpg

(Does no one see how it could just as easily be read as a satire of '80s America's retrenchment into '50s-style conservatism?)

It could be read that way, incorrectly.

Little white Canadian guy writes "Johnny B. Goode." Nuff said.

you really think there's a "message" the film is trying to impart there? and if so, what is it?

Not a conscious one, probably.

It's no big deal, I'd rather you guys realize that Obama is conservative.

yes, he's a nazi and he wasn't even born in america. we get it.

shaddap, furriner

xpost -- Who, Obama or Fox?

^ exactly.

if you want to rescue BTTF from conservatism, you could point to just how weird and perverse and Blue Velvet-y a movie it is (dude goes back in time to hump his promiscuous mum lurking under shiny suburbia), but maybe that just highlights the underlying conservatism of David Lynch movies?

s1ocki, you'd be a great Democrat if you moved here.

The incest angle is the extraordinary thing about it besides, of course, Crispin Glover.

is an unconscious message still fairly described as a message though? i mean, it's just BTTF, this framing of it in terms other than lol teenagers lol 50's lol timetravel seems a bit much.

wld be interested in any thoughts you folks have on teenwolf though.

"A great Democrat." — Dr. Morbius

^ gonna use this in my self-publicizing

movies people mistakenly tar as conservative > obviously liberal movies

In Reagan's America, science-fiction writers play tennis with their hot wives.

yes Eric, we know you hate Martin Ritt.

Where would cultural studies be w/out unconscious messages? When it comes to Hollywood, 'mersh filmmakers know a lot of what they "should" do without thinking about it. Like that new trailer where Vince Vaughn talks about "gay" electric cars.

And Teenwolf?

didn't see, but I assume like all werewolf movies it's about sex?

He'd rather play basketball.

points to morbs tbh

Yeah, it doesn't matter if a message is conscious or not – it's how we respond to the images.

This is also a "hail King Teenager" epic -- he not only 'fixes' his parents but changes the entire world. As only a teen has the right to do.

He didn't fix his parents' taste in interior decorating or his taste in girls.

As only a teen has the right to do.

With the help of the 100-year-old scientist kook. Who does all the legwork, really.

Teenager at heart.

are movies starring teens inherently conservative?

or inherently bad in some way i'm missing here?

Movies flattering teens that they are the center of the universe are beloved by young people.

back to the future is sort of like a perfect inverse of umberto d, is what you're saying.

Movies flattering teens ANY PARTICULAR SUBGROUP that they are the center of the universe are beloved by young peopleTHAT PARTICULAR SUBGROUP.

is this somehow a surprise to you

http://content8.flixster.com/question/39/50/87/3950870_std.jpg

http://moviesididntget.com/wp-content/uploads/2009/11/umberto_d_8.jpg

No, what is a surprise to me is that ppl maniacally refuse to re-evaluate what they loved as kids.

buh-bye

eh I re-evaluate stuff all the time. this movie is better than Star Wars, for example, which would've been heresy to the ears of 10yo me.

i'm trying to think have i ever seen an example of someone, anyone, ever, maniacally refusing to re-evaluate something.

just makes me picture an extremely aggressive antiques road show

I loved old people when I was a kid. I've since re-evaluated that opinion.

de Palma turning 70 hit you hard, eh?

as it will for you in 2 years when you reach that age

4/10

A perfectly good zing, ruined.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uM6Ms621898&feature=player_embedded

Only movie people refuse to see is shit is Ferris Bueller.

yeah i never 'got' bueller. one of the more irritating characters of all time

I love it, but I've learned that arguing in its favor with people who don't is a useless waste of time.

Also, YES! to the Scream Awards reunion thing.

I was rooting for his sister, he was a smug one.

Only movie people refuse to see is shit is Ferris Bueller.

?! I thought I was the only one who hated this movie

ferris bueller is kind of terrible but not as disappointing as timecop.

I could relate more to Timecop though.

I am coming to the slow-dawning realization that I like Ferris Bueller so much because I was Ferris Bueller in high school

This makes sense.

You asked for a car, you got a metronome.

hi dr. morbius i am 3x11 and i think this film, on its own terms, is pretty fucking perfect. or as close as almost any film comes. in terms of how the narrative is constructed, the mise-en-scene, the cinematography--everything is beautifully functional and then some.

save it for Craig's List.

http://weregoingback.com/Were_Going_Back_-_25th_Anniversary/Schedule.html

"We’re going back ... spanning november 5th 2010 to november 12th 2010, you can join fellow back to the future fans re-create marty mcflys week in 1955 to commemorate the 25th anniversary of back to the future!

the biggest back to the future event ... IN HISTORY!"

should i swear marty? godman it george swear.

scathing film criticism from the doc

buh bye

saw this last week for the first time in years. how is it that martys parents dont remember their own son looks like the guy they met in the 50s who brought them together?

also, when marty pretends to be darth vader from the planet vulcan, don't these names ring a bell with his dad when they finally appear in '66 and '77? or maybe there is no star trek and star wars in the new timeline...

by the time marty's an adult, i doubt they really remember what that random guy they knew for two days looked like.

the vader and vulcan thing, ok maybe you could forget that - it was kind of a weird dreamlike/barely awake vision he had after all. but come on, a guy who put you and your husband/wife together - you would remember SOMETHING about them!

it was a visitor from another planet! it kicked off his career as a successful sci-fi writer!

his parents didn't take a picture of marty back in the 50s. also, he probably didn't like he did in the 50s when he was born. also, they probably would never have imagined that time travel was possible.

also, IT'S A MOVIE.

it's not like marty overnight started looking like that guy they knew years ago, the gradual change would have softened it. i'm sure off-screen they had the occasional "you know marty kinda reminds me of that guy who brought us together", but no more.

If the dad would realize Marty looks like the guy that they knew 30 years ago, the guy who his wife had a crush on before getting together with him, I think he might ask some questions about Marty's real father rather than about time travel.

How do we know they don't remember Marty looks like Calvin? There's just one short scene in the new post time-travel reality. Should they have said "oh hey son who looks like the guy who hooked us up, here's my new book!"??

Marty should look a lot different, after being raised in a loving family with plentiful income and a better diet. The fact that he was so cute and pert before the change was made is pretty surprising in itself.

That said, they still live in the shitty house, albeit a bit more decorated. Seems like even with the added boost of confidence that seemingly occurs when you turn your wife's attempted rapist into your handyman, there may be some genetic code that swerves toward fatalism.

what's wrong with their house? it looks like a nice house.

http://img821.imageshack.us/img821/8451/20138608.jpg

Well, for starters, you get really shitty TV reception.

Loolll Pleasant Plains your massive knowledge about this series really is scary.

http://www.cincinnatichildrens.org/assets/0/78/1067/2199/2297/2299/2301/2303/2305/2307/40613e33-f547-4642-a793-cdbf70fdb11f.jpg

It's embarrassing because I repeat myself so much. BUT WHY WON'T ANYONE LISTEN.

https://p.twimg.com/Awa7JT4CEAAe3jJ.jpg

https://p.twimg.com/Awa7JT4CEAAe3jJ.jpg

stop it

http://www.rakehellrow.com/blog/wp-content/uploads/2010/07/b2tf2.jpg

http://www.rakehellrow.com/blog/wp-content/uploads/2010/07/b2tf2.jpg

mea culpa

I don't immediately understand the significance of those posts, but... my local cinema is showing this on Sunday evening - happy!

http://terminator.wikia.com/wiki/Judgment_Day

LOL my fb feed today has been littered with pp posting the fake BTTF clock, and then getting schooled on it by other people.

ppl, that should say, not trying to blame pleasant plains here! (my l key appears to be somewhat busted. llll )

any excuse to contemplate BttF is fine by me, honestly.

Why would one date be 30 years exactly before the movie and the other date would be 26 years, nine months and one week into the future?

THINK, SHEEPLE.

Oct > June & July

http://img846.imageshack.us/img846/2038/simpsonsblogspan.gif

This extremely mild hoax has been going crazy today.

any excuse to contemplate BttF is fine by me, honestly.

I can't nod my head hard enough.

this hoax prompted some great BttF talk with a friend. His insights:

"The whole the-Lyon-Estates-house-is-just-slightly-better-decorated thing always made me giggle. And being slightly more affluent apparently impairs Marty's parking ability, as his 4x4 is parked at a ridiculous angle in that updated garage.

And I love that flooring the truck in reverse and 180-ing is considered a wiser decision than racing Needles."

how is this a hoax?

i'm missing something aren't i

this hoax:

https://p.twimg.com/Awa7JT4CEAAe3jJ.jpg

I'm still not getting it.

Yes I can see that someone has changed it to todays date, but how is it a 'hoax'? I look at that and think, 'oh someone has altered a picture to show todays date, for whatever reason'

People keep posting it on facebook and saying that it's actually from the film.

ahhh i get it now.

Ya people were all "look out for Delorians today", but its not for another 3 years. My housemate was all "I thought I was a bad bttf fan for thinking it was 2015, but it turns out I'm the BEST bttf for being right!".

wd take bttf futurism over minority report futurism any day 2012 2015 whatever

I have still never seen MR, damn I'm slack.

(not to mention put off by T Cruize)

I am too, but I love MR anyway.

you would rather have xbox kinect over hoverboards?

Oh, my love of BTTF casts a very long shadow over my love of MR.

my love of BTTF casts a long shadow over my entire life.

These idiots don't think Buzzfeed/Reddit/Snorg aren't gonna have some like 30 countdown clock when this shit actualky happens?

*30 day

Snorg will prob invent an actual moving-gif tee with the digits on it or some shit.

These idiots don't think Buzzfeed/Reddit/Snorg aren't gonna have some like 30 countdown clock when this shit actualky happens?

You have a good imagination for soft evil.

Caught this on the freeway this morning.

http://i47.tinypic.com/2hekbh4.jpg

So the June 27th thing was legit then?

"It's your kids, Marty! They create idiotic screencap hoaxes on reddit!"

oh man did everybody just hear that in perfect christopher lloyd voice? i know this film way too well.

i agree that this is nearly a perfect movie. not to sound to pretentious but i love how it's one of the definitive oedipal dramas simply because it literalizes it.

one false note is the queasy feeling i get at the "hey Chuck, listen to this!" moment. Ignore everything else and it's still a cheap Forrest Gump style gag.

"Your COUSIN ... MAR-VIN BER-RY!"

Eh, I don't even mind that part at all. Without it, we'd miss out on the ridiculous guitar solo that bewilders everyone at the dance (including the band).

i think that part would still work! you'd have to cut out like 5 seconds to make this movie perfect.

But yeah, i see your point(s). It's just a throwaway gag that's unnecessary. They could've still played "Johnny B. Goode" without that.

I watched BTTF in the theater a few weeks ago and felt the need to sketch this once I got home.

http://desmond.imageshack.us/Himg831/scaled.php?server=831&filename=soundsb.jpg&res=landing

HAHA

OMG ABBOTT. Can I steal that and show other people or would you rather I didn't? I love it <3

I wanted to draw a nicer version someday.

amazing

that's hysterical

clasic ilm thread: If Marty McFly went back in time thirty years ago today, what song does he play at the dance to blow everyone's mind?

(started by cunga!)

I still think ponder that idea.

So close to 2015, I'd be supportive of a reboot where Marty goes back to 1985.

MARTY finishes glass 16 oz bottle of Pepsi

MARTY: So, George, where's the recyling bin?

GEORGE: Huh? Oh... THROWS BOTTLE INTO TRASH WITH EVERYTHING ELSE.

I've always thought Rainn Wilson is the frontrunner for the role of Doc in any BttF remakes/reboots

*assuming they, the studio, aren't good Christians and don't let Christopher Lloyd play him again

Oh, I think I know who the studios would want.

http://www.images99.com/i99/01/16607/16607.jpg

Keep in mind however, that JC would be six years older than Lloyd was during filming of the first BttF.

Smh

one false note is the queasy feeling i get at the "hey Chuck, listen to this!" moment. Ignore everything else and it's still a cheap Forrest Gump style gag.

except the paradoxical causality aspect kind of puts it over the top.

also the whip pan after he says "LISTEN TO THIS!" and holds the phone up toward the stage.

damn this movie is excellent.

except the paradoxical causality aspect kind of puts it over the top.

yeah, i mean, come on...

It's called the "bootstrap paradox":

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/bootstrap_paradox

As always, tvtropes.org has plenty of examples of the paradox used in fiction:

http://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Main/StableTimeLoop

i like this:

A young physicist receives an old, disintegrating notebook containing information about future events sent by her future self via a time machine; before the book deteriorates so badly as to be unusable, she copies the information in it into a new notebook. Over the years the predictions of the notebook come true, allowing her to become wealthy enough to fund her own research, which results in the development of a time machine, which she uses to send the now old, tattered, disintegrating notebook back to her former self. The notebook is not a paradox (it has an end and a beginning; the beginning where she receives it and the end where she threw it out after she copied the information), but the information is: It's impossible to state where it came from. The professor has transferred the information that she wrote herself, so there was no original notebook.

in my mind this is what that film "the notebook" is about.

You want obsessive poring over details, you got it

http://nymag.com/daily/intelligencer/2013/01/back-to-the-futures-terrible-newspaper.html

Yeah, saw that. Maybe he just needed a break from depresso politicking converge and had this kicking round in the back of his head for years

http://i.imgur.com/Z3HHgNP.gif

DELOREAN WITH IT

I've often kinda wondered what happened to the other Marty seen at the end of the first movie, who seemingly is sent back to the 1955 of his timeline, which is the 1955 where the protagonist Marty changed the past. So I came up with silly fan theory; I already posted this to TVTropes, but thought you might want to read it too:

Let's call the timeline at the beginning of movie 1985-A, and the Marty we follow throughout the movie Marty-A. Marty-A travels back to 1955-A, but when saves George from being hit by a car, the timeline changes into 1955-B. At the end of the movie Marty-A travels back to the the future of this timeline, i.e. 1985-B. He then sees the Marty who grew up in this timeline, i.e. Marty-B, being sent back to the past. Now, remember that Marty-B's past is the timeline where Marty-A appeared in 1955. If the events of 1985-B played out exactly as those of 1985-A, Marty-B travels back to the same 1955 where Marty-A was. So they'd both be in Hill Valley at the same time, and Marty-B would probably try to get back to the future the same way Marty-A did (by asking Doc Brown of 1955 to help). However, this would mean that Marty-B had a high chance of meeting Marty-A, and Marty-B might also change the past so that 1985-B never happens. To put it short, the chances of Marty-B either causing a paradox or messing up the timeline are pretty high.

Even if Marty-B somehow managed to avoid changing the timeline and managed to get back to 1985-B, that would mean Marty-A and Marty-B both now exist in 1985-B, which would be a pretty awful situation. (Since George and Lorraine are technically Marty-B's parents, and Jennifer is his girlfriend, Marty-A would probably have to create a new identity and move out of Hill Valley.) Now, Doc-B realizes all this could happen, so he has to come up with a plan to avoid it. His only option is to set the timer of the DeLorean to some other year than 1955, to either send Marty so far back in the past that he can't change the lives of his ancestors, or so far in the future that his future version has already died. If he sends Marty-B to the future, he probably has to sabotage the DeLorean too, so that Marty can't get it to work again in order to travel back to 1985-B.

Now, this a pretty awful thing for the Doc to do, since he's known Marty-B for much longer than Marty-A, but it's still better than the alternative. (All the Doc can hope for is that Marty-B get to live decent life in the time period he sends him to.) Since Marty-B isn't seen in 1955, nor does he come back to 1985-B, it means the Doc's plan worked.

If some of you have other theories on what happens to the other Marty, I'd love to hear them.

We can talk about it face to face next month.

I've noticed that many people try to explain the dilemma of the other Marty with parallel timelines, i.e. each time you travel into the past and change something, you create a new timeline, but the old one still stays intact. So that would Marty-B's time trip creates a new timeline, 1955-C, and if he ever manages to return back to the future, he returns to 1985-C, not 1985-B, and so 1985-B would still have just one Marty. (You can take this further by presuming Marty-C travels to 1955-D, Marty-D to 1955-E, and so on, so you have an endless cascade, and no Marty ever returns to the exact same timeline he started out in.) But the way time travel works in BttF doesn't support the ideas of parallel timelines, because if they existed, then the pic of Marty's family and Marty himself wouldn't start to fade when he changes the past; his own timeline, timeline A, would still be intact, and he'd simply created a new parallel timeline B, which shouldn't affect his past. But since changing the past clearly affects people and objects brought from the future, there can be only one timeline at a time, and it can be changed, even if the change would lead to a Grandfather Paradox.

Also, even if parallel timelines existed in BttF, regardless of the fact that the movies don't support that theory, that would leave us with another tragedy: in 1985-A, Doc Brown is dead and Marty has disappeared forever (since he jumped to 1985-B), and his family will never know what happened to him.

http://farm8.staticflickr.com/7371/8719415177_bd17832f6f_o.gif

prepare for mind blowage:

http://philosophypress.co.uk/?p=866

All right, both arguments - BttF and Terminator - are flawed for similar reasons.

Let's start with the Terminator argument that Kyle Reese going into the time machine/portal whatever after the Terminator goes through dooms the mission. He says it would be like starting a marathon an hour late. He says once the past is changed, the future is altered in an instant (the nail appearing out of nowhere.)

This doesn't mean the Terminator is flawed. It makes perfect sense. (In fact, it's one of the few time travel movies to get it right.) Sure the past is altered creating an alternative future. But it's that altered future that the Terminator and Reese have been born in. Unbeknownst to them - and you'd think Skynet would catch on to this - their present is a result of their actions in the past. The Terminator should know his mission is doomed to begin with since there's a John Connor running around in the first place. Obviously, with Connor fighting against them, it proves that he was never killed before he was born.

It would be like someone from our time going back to the 30s to kill Hitler. Being that we all know who Hitler is and what he did, it proves that any time travel mission to kill him failed. If it worked, then how would we know we need to go back and kill him?

Something that may have worked is a time traveller going back into time to stop Gerald Ford from being fatally assassinated and President Rockefeller taking his place. Since we know that never happened, maybe the plan worked. (But if it worked, how would anyone know to go back to stop the killing? Maybe a time traveller saw what a close call it was and figured he'd go back just to make sure the right history occurred.)

As far as the marathon argument goes, who's to say the time machine works in real time? If the Terminator jumped through and landed on June 1, 1984 0100, what's not to say Reese could jump six hours later and still land on the exact time? With a time machine, that's very possible. In the marathon example, you'd oversleep an hour and then instantly appear in your spot with the rest of the runners who started before you.

Such as Doc Brown's DeLorean. I don't know if the clocks on that dash were atomically timed, but they seemed pretty accurate. In theory, the Marty-A who sees the second Marty jump in time is the same Marty. The biggest flaw in Back to the Future is that you can't change the history that you're already aware of. You can't have a brother or sister disappear from a photograph, but retain a memory of them. If Marty's appearance in 1955 was so disruptive that caused the name changes of a mall and a ravine, the odds of being able to watch his second self disappear in time at the exact same moment as he did originally is pretty far-fetched. It's like watching Marty step through a portal on one side of the room and exit through one on the other. Same guy, different places. When Marty-B came back to 1985, it would be right back in the town square where he would take his little skateboard and go to the mall to see himself go back in time.

I would worry about Marty's mental health in the new 1985 as well. Even the Marty-A is fucked. How do you compensate for having this 18-year memory of your family being dipshits and poor, and all of a sudden, everything is changed? It doesn't make sense.

If you want to subscribe to the parallel streams of time (I don't), don't imagine Marty-A as Marty-A. That's just the first Marty we see in the movie. For all we know, there have already been hundreds of Back to the Futures before the movie even started. Maybe the mall used to be called "Pine Grove Mall" and Marty has steadily been whittling down the number. Thing is, the Marty of 1985 is always going to exit and return to 1985 in the same place, so it's always going to be a Marty with memory of the past parallel line entering a new parallel line. That's why I don't believe two Marties are ever going to run into each other. If they do, they'll handle it like they did the 1955 scenes of BttF2.

the backtofuture (and also star trek, and pretty much every time travel movie ever) time travel conventions are a hodgepodge of parallel streams + gaia.organic mysticism so they've covered themselves in any dramatic situation. i'd say the only movie that ever picked a single convention for time travel and stuck with it is primer, but i don't understand primer.

Terminator*
possibly 12 Monkeys
Timecrimes

Those are some linear/non-parallel can't change history time travel movies.
______________________________

* At least the first two. I never saw the ones that came after those, but I assume the 1997 date got changed - which would shoot to hell my proclamation that the series is a one-shot line through time.

terminator series is definitely in the incoherent 'destiny can't be escaped; the future is not set' hodgepodge camp
even in the first movie, there's presumably a bootstrap timeline where john conner's dad is trent reznor instead of kyle reese.

Terminator totally doesn't make sense what are you people thinking

The first one did, and I'd even allow that the second one does too.

Now, why T-9000 didn't come back when she was pregnant or John was a small child who couldn't ride a motorcycle, I have no idea.

The Terminator should know his mission is doomed to begin with since there's a John Connor running around in the first place.

this is the part that doesn't make sense

Well, you can't blame him for trying just to make sure.

they blew up the time machine after terminator and kyle went through, i thought. it's clear they don't have a lot of intel on conner since arnold is just going through the phonebook. what if she was unlisted?

"sad computer invents time machine to change the past" is such a fucking stupid premise on so many levels. ugh hate these movies so much.

terminator makes no sense because John's actions in the future provide the means of him being conceived in the past

Kinda what it's going to look like if you read this thread backwards.

yeah xp to Granny I thought there was some standard grandfather paradox involved but couldn't remember the details of Conner's involvement with sending his dad back in time

soldier john gave gave young kyle the photo of his pregnant mom and forced him to swoon.

would've been better if Terminator impregnated Sarah and audience realizes OMG John Connor is 1/2 part machine!!

anyone who's hung out w/cyborgs even a lil knows "kill" is their slang for fuck

the Impregnator tested poorly with audiences

"i know now why you cry, but it is something i can never do"

The movie ends with Sarah patting her bun in the oven and driving off into some ominous clouds, showing that she has accepted the fate of what's to come.

BUT, if I had been Sarah Connor, I would've named my son Preston Xavier Connor, just to see if there would be some weird way he'd become John anyway.

prob would, cause no one is gonna follow the lead of someone w/that name

The Terminator should know his mission is doomed to begin with since there's a John Connor running around in the first place.

This is assuming that Skynet is thinking like a human and is only concerned with self-preservation in its own immediate timeline. What if it is actually playing a longer game and is trying to ensure its survival in as many timelines as possible? Sure some attempts are bound to fail but others are bound to succeed if it is done enough times. It's the same logic as natural selection for organisms that reproduce in large quantities, just applied over multiple possible universes.

Would Skynet accept the possibility of multiple timelines though. That sounds like the human part. Machines are much more linear

I don't think there would be anything particularly hard for a super-intelligent being (biological or machine) to comprehend about multiple universes or timelines!

I mean, if Skynet can build a time machine in the first place obviously its understanding of physics is pretty advanced already

it was human scientists who built it i thought -- skynet just finished it. in the later movies they show human slaves, so maybe skynet forced humans to invent it, too?

From what I remember (if we're going solely by the movies), originally Skynet built the time machine and sent the terminator to kill JC, but then Connor and the resistance seized it and used it to send Michael Biehn and the reprogrammed "good" Terminators back to defend his mom and himself.

But for my argument's sake it doesn't really matter who built the machine as long as Skynet understood what it was trying to do by using it. Each time it sends a terminator back it creates a new timeline.

Perhaps John Connor (in at least one timeline) is far-sighted enough to be playing his own version of the same game, which is why he keeps sending back protectors.

It's the same timeline, every time! Not only is Kyle Reese a product of a past that included him impregnating a 20th century woman with the man who would become his leader, but he is also a product of the T-9000 wreaking havoc, even though he wasn't alive to see it, because he died too soon or was born too late.

my brain hurts

timey-wimey stuff guys
http://images.wikia.com/halofanon/images/9/9d/Wibbley-wobbley-timey-wimey.gif

it was either t2 or t3 where the tagline was "we didn't stop judgment day... we only POSTPONED it!"

"Aged 30 years" vs Aged 30 years

http://weknowmemes.com/wp-content/uploads/2013/08/back-to-the-future-makeup-aging-actors-30-years-vs-actors-actually-aging-30-years1.jpg

HAHA Biff

kinda smdh at all the "this movie is so reaganite and conservative" talk upthread.

that shit is definitely in the film

what would a 'liberal' BTTF look like?

He sleeps with his mom then she has an abortion?

Bob Gale, co-screenwriter of Back to the Future, 'I'm a registered Republican…and very anti-Communist from way back.'

Anti-Communist from way back, back when people were anti-Communist.

what would a 'liberal' BTTF look like?

vision of the 50s would be p different imho (no chuck berry joke etc)

and the ending would probably conform more closely to Glover's preferences

And the town wouldn't have gone to shit when it elected a black mayor.

other anti-communist republican reactionaries: john ford, howard hawks, frank capra

In the liberal BTTF III, Marty prepares to draw against Buford 'Mad Dog' Tannen, when he looks down and sees the gun fading. Mad Dog draws and lays Marty out. As Marty gasps his dying breaths, a flying Delorean appears overhead. Out its drivers window pops the head of Barack Obama. "Sorry Marty," he shouts down, "but repealing the Second Amendment was worth the cost. I guess at least now you can get great healthcare!" He points over to the local doctor's office, which has a line circling the block.

irl lol

well ford was, at least for a long while, a sentimental republican leftist, and he famously stood up to Demille's communist witch-hunting at a director's guild meeting (“My name’s John Ford. I make Westerns. I don’t think there’s anyone in this room who knows more about what the American public wants than Cecil B. DeMille — and he certainly knows how to give it to them…. [looking at DeMille] But I don’t like you, C.B. I don’t like what you stand for and I don’t like what you’ve been saying here tonight.”) but yeah, his politics moved rightwards w/ age.

J.D., surely there must be other 'republican' - or at the v. least 'problematic' - movies you enjoy? i mean, dirty harry is a great movie imho but i wldn't subscribe to its newsletter, and i think it's p difficult to make a case for BTTF as a 'progressive' text

I would subscribe to a Dirty Harry newsletter btw.

* PUNKS CELEBRATING A BIRTHDAY THIS WEEK

* SFPD WELCOMES CALLAHAN'S NEW PARTNER DINNER SATURDAY @ PINE OVEN GRILL

* Y/N ARE THE WALDO TUNNELS TOO DISTRACTING FOR DRIVERS?

* MENTION THIS AD GET 15% OFF JOHNNY SQUARES SHOW AT MISTY CLUB.

that ford story is great! you can definitely see that left-wing streak in his earlier films ('grapes of wrath' obv, but also 'how green' and 'the informer').

oh, there are lots of movies with absolutely questionable politics i enjoy -- 'dirty harry' is a fav of mine too. i think i'd just like to see the BttF-as-conservative argument elaborated on a bit beyond just the obvious stuff -- i feel like 'reaganite' gets thrown around a lot in discussions of '80s american movies in kind of a glib way. has anyone written any good serious criticism of it?

like Ward, I'm not saying the underlying politics make BttF a bad movie. it's a great movie! but the politics are there, sorry if I don't have time to write an in-depth textual analysis at the moment.

anyone else see this?
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lcG61w474zY

that was what I was referring to above re: Glover's thoughts on the ending (I totally agree w him fwiw)

ah yeah gotcha.
isn't the shit they tried to pull with CG over BTTF2 the same deal as Brando in Superman 2? pretty amazing people could get away with that stuff.

The most enigmatic thing about Glover is the way he carries this reputation as a crazy loose canon, but then he sits down for something like that and makes perfect sense, is totally coherent. not at all kooky.

ACTING!

But ... which Crispin is acting?!

you have to love the dedication

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Xy305eZt6co

There used to be this insane screed that Glover wrote about BTTF on his website (I think?) but I can't find it anymore. Anyone?

the dedication, the dedication, the dedication.....

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=htyYy9ML5rk

Glover does go into massive amounts of detail here, including salary specifics:

http://www.avclub.com/articles/crispin-glover,67635/

I think it's possible that Claudia Wells had some, um, work done since she gave up acting.

http://www.fritzharmon.com/blog/wp-content/uploads/2013/08/claudia-wells.jpg

well ford was, at least for a long while, a sentimental republican leftist, and he famously stood up to Demille's communist witch-hunting at a director's guild meeting (“My name’s John Ford. I make Westerns. I don’t think there’s anyone in this room who knows more about what the American public wants than Cecil B. DeMille — and he certainly knows how to give it to them…. [looking at DeMille] But I don’t like you, C.B. I don’t like what you stand for and I don’t like what you’ve been saying here tonight.”) but yeah, his politics moved rightwards w/ age.

― Ward Fowler, Thursday, August 8, 2013 2:33 PM (Yesterday) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

this is more complicated, actually, as joseph mcbride discusses in his ford bio. ford stood up to demille at the meeting, but he also sent letters to demille pledging his support for his cause. so he was kind of working both ends, which wasn't uncommon for him.

ford's politics are complex and not necessarily coherent. an uncharitable explanation was that he went with the times--ardent new dealer in the 1930s, nixonite in the 1970s. but that's just the public side of things.

most have tied BTTF into the reactionary nostalgia ("morning in america") that was a key part of the reagan ethos (and honestly was already there in nixon's campaigns). hill valley (what a fabulous name for a suburb!) in the 1950s is depicted as being cleaner, happier, etc. admittedly there's also a sense that it's smaller-minded, but mostly in fairly inconsequential ways (they are not ready for Van Halen). 1980s hill valley is decrepit, nastier, etc.

unless i'm missing a deeper reaganite subtext, that's the connection. but i'm not sure it really sticks, and bob gale professing to be a republican isn't really the smoking gun it seems to be. hill valley's downtown is decrepit because a lot of small-town downtowns were semi-abandoned by the mid-1980s, replaced by the kind of shopping-mall developments represented by twin/lone pine mall in the film. and I doubt we're supposed to connect Goldie's mayoralty to this state of affairs. it's more like: both trends (minorities in more power roles; shifting of commerce outside of city/town centers) were major features of the 80s and both things function as running gags (such as: Hill Valley's two downtown movie houses have been replaced by a church on one side of the clock tower, and a porn theater on the other side).

i mean along with other filmmakers of zemeckis/gale's cohort (john landis, zucker/abrahams/zucker, harold ramis, ivan reitman), there's definitely a kind of normative quality to the films no matter how unruly they may seem; a largely unquestioned assumption of white male privilege, classism, sexism, etc. in landis in particular there's an often-hilarious but also often unsettling urge to laugh at/with black culture--a kind of miscomprehension and patronization mingled with genuine respect. but i'm not sure that these aspects of films of the 1980s, including BTTF, really add up anything much more offensive than most films made in hollywood. I think in film histories they sometimes stand out, or are made to stand out, in a more-or-less explicit contrast to the putatively radical/liberal "Hollywood Renaissance" of the late 1960s–mid 70s (penn, hellman, altman, rafelson, hopper, polanski, etc.).

i also think that BTTF is one of the towering instances of (hyper)classicism in cinema. the mind-boggling neatness of its plotting, the intricacy of its motivic patterns (running gags and references and visual emblems), the precision/ crispness of its characterizations, and the absolute denotative and expressive efficiency of its style are, put together, kind of awesome in the sense of that word we've lost through overuse. i mean this sounds weird but in its own Pop (meaning buoyant and accessible, not paranoid and cryptic) way BTTF is an achievement not all that far from Eisenstein's Ivan the Terrible. i mean that from the bottom of my heart.

which is why I can't say that zemeckis and gale have done anything nearly as impressive since, even if I adore Roger Rabbit and more-than-like Contact and Cast Away (and there's some great stuff to be found in all of his movies, yes, even Beowulf).

ford stood up to demille at the meeting, but he also sent letters to demille pledging his support for his cause. so he was kind of working both ends, which wasn't uncommon for him.

I've read the mcbride bio, but had forgotten this - similar i suppose to the difference between the public and private Capra.

Interesting that you mention the Zuckers and Reitman, who are also Hollywood Republicans - and yeah, I definitely get a sense that things like BTTF and Trading Places were positioned (critically and creatively) as a return to classical Hollywood narrative values of neatness and completeness, against the ambiguity and incoherence of 'New Hollywood'. I guess it's a matter of taste as to which you prefer.

And I don't disagree w/ any part of yr reading of BTTF, but I think the xenophobic treatment of the 'terrorists' at the start of the film, the sense that things were better in the past/the merits of 'traditional values', definitely mark this out as a Reaganite movie.

I guess it's a matter of taste as to which you prefer.

I wouldn't say I have a general preference, since I like and dislike films from both groups. I just think BTTF is pretty exceptional, just as Two-Lane Blacktop and McCabe & Mrs. Miller are in their own ways. Wouldn't want to do w/o any of them.

I don't really read the terrorists as a sign of xenophobia, Libyans were on people's minds and they are treated as cartoonish action villains. If anything it's a wink at the portrayal of Arab (not necessarily Islamic!) terrorism in the US media (and in cannon films, TV movies, etc.). it's really hard to imagine this film taking anything all that seriously, so I'm not sure what sort of villains you would want it to have. if the libyans came across as too genuinely serious and menacing the comic tone would kind of be ruptured.

Needed more backstory on the Libyans... them back at the motel on the interstate, rolling up their prayer rugs, gnashing in anger at the Honeymooners rerun everyone's watching. What's their motivation?

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zzYBge4193M

So, people are doing this:

https://twitter.com/_HillValley/the-hill-valley-project

That's really boring. Why would they bother?

I don't know.

Pauline Kael basically got it right, and was miffed at the fact checking:

The movie has the structure of a comedy classic, but it doesn't have the rambunctiousness or the maniacal edge of Zemeckis and Gale's 1980 USED CARS; despite their wit in devising intricate structures that keep blowing fuses, the thinking is cramped and conventional. Christopher Lloyd is blissful silly, though, and Lea Thompson's woozy-faced young Lorraine (Marty's mother-to-be) has a sly lustiness that's entrancing; as the tall, skinny, sad-sack George McFly (Marty's father-to-be), Crispin Glover is almost too painful a caricature, but he has more force than anyone else in the movie. With Claudia Wells, Wendie Jo Sperber, Marc McClure, Thomas F. Wilson, and Frances Lee McCain. There couldn't have been many people on the movie set who were old enough to remember the 50s: Patti Page's first name is spelled Patty in the record store window on the town square.

I've seen Crispin Glover twice at close range and he is awesomely hot btw.

i would not weep if nobody ever quoted pauline kael ever again

yeah i read "...kael" and my eyes immediately glazed over

this is a fantastic movie, one of the most finely-tuned, exuberant, compulsively re-watchable american movies of its era. a personal favorite.

not my fave either, but when the crabby ol' faghag was right, she was right

and yes to the extent that the film has a politics it's casually reactionary, but i'm not convinced that really matters.

btw re Bob Gale's conservatism, there's very overt Jimmy Carter-bashing in Used Cars, which likely means the dingleberry didnt even notice JC was conservative.

it's true that crispin glover's off-kilter line readings really work in this film, whereas in some other films (e.g. river's edge) they kind of grind the movie to an awkward halt.

honestly who cares what a filmmaker's politics are.

it's also true that USED CARS is rougher and more anarchic (if not necessarily any more perverse), and i can totally see someone preferring that. i don't, though.

btw re Bob Gale's conservatism, there's very overt Jimmy Carter-bashing in Used Cars, which likely means the dingleberry didnt even notice JC was conservative.

― skateboards are the new combover (Dr Morbius), Wednesday, October 21, 2015 9:48 PM (7 minutes ago)

funny how all those ppl who voted for reagan failed to see what a far-right conservative jimmy carter was

amateurist otm. a joyous movie. politically thoughtless (thus ambiently reaganite) but one of the most ingeniously perverse comedy premises ever. ("that's the structure of funny," as alan alda says.) lloyd's performance remains almost constantly right up against the line of over-the-top screaming he'd leap over in the sequels. (the precedent is gene wilder as young frankenstein, right?) thompson and glover both terrific caricatures; thompson actually affecting and real even when delivering parody lines like "over there, on my hope chest".

whereas in some other films (e.g. river's edge) they kind of grind the movie to an awkward halt.

you are insane

he is perfect in River's Edge, absolutely nails that character

nah Glover is.

xpost

He does nail that character, and that's partly why River's Edge is insufferable and interminable if you're over 19.

partic in River's Edge he brought a kabuki alienation effect

worked for me

everyone in RE brought a kabuki effect, the blowup doll excepted

eh I love it. it is very evocative of that grey pacific northwest seasonal affective disorder sorta vibe. and there are a lot of great, funny lines and little performances.

"N-O spells nuh-uh" = still a thing I say

he is perfect in River's Edge, absolutely nails that character

― Οὖτις, Wednesday, October 21, 2015 5:03 PM (19 minutes ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

"it's warm, even?"

i think river's edge has a lot going for it, but there are a bunch of completely inexpicable crispin glover line readings that make no sense, not just literally but poetically, rhythmically, whatever. i can't help but think that this was the closest to a sane line reading he gave the director, either that or tim hunter needed to be more assertive with his actors.

i mean glover's character in BttF is a cartoon but the whole movie has a heightened, cartoonish sensibility, whereas in river's edge everyone except glover and hopper is working in this mode of deflated naturalism and glover sticks out like a sore thumb (which sometimes means he gives the film a necessary jolt of energy, other times he just seems to be doing something unfathomable)

honestly who cares what a filmmaker's politics are.

You don't think it has any relevance to film criticism or theory?

some inevitable johnny b goode talk on another thread, so re bttf's politics here's the swm defending the totems of his childhood: have always felt objections to this moment are overstated, since for the joke to function as a joke you have to know how important chuck berry is. the whole idea is that the causality is backwards. it's not even true that "in the world of back to the future" marty mcfly invents rock and roll; it's obvious that he would have nothing to show chuck berry had chuck berry not shown it to him, and if this is not foremost in your mind the joke immediately dissolves. if the complaint is really "considering the extent to which rock and roll actually was hijacked financially and aesthetically by whites, this is a hard joke to laugh at or to enjoy the sight of people taking lightly" then okay i get that. but i don't think the joke is inherently disrespectful to chuck berry or to rock and roll as black form in general. the opposite: it relies on respect for them.

on the other hand, the movie has lots and lots of similar jokes (it taught a lot of kids the word "paradox") and one of them is imo much clumsier w its semiotics, but never gets thinkpieced because it isn't funny: marty in 1955 gives the black mayor of his own time the idea to run for mayor. ("MAY-or! now THAT'S a good idea!") essentially, this is the same joke-- marty is only able to give this guy the idea because the guy already had it. but because it's about a fictional person with only fictional credentials, who's played in his brief appearance for affectionate and condescending lols, and because it doesn't involve a passionate debt marty is magically+accidentally reversing (politics don't matter to him but he loves rock and roll), it seems to me much worse, more casual and less self-consciously absurd in its robbery of agency, than the chuck berry joke.

sure, it has some relevance, but often that "information" is wielded rather clumsily. i don't like the idea of putting filmmakers (as opposed to politicians!) to some political litmus test. it seems obvious to me that plenty of great art was created by people with whom i share little politically.

and in this specific case, i really don't much care what bob gale or bob zemeckis's politics are, because it doesn't seem all that pertinent to my appreciate of their films. zemeckis's attitude toward his audience, which appears to have coarsened considerbly since he and gale parted ways, is a real problem, but i'm not sure if it has anything whatsoever to do with his politics, whatever they are.

that he would have nothing to show chuck berry had chuck berry not shown it to him, and if this is not foremost in your mind the joke immediately dissolves

yeah this is so obvious that i have to think people claiming this as an instance of racism are just trolling. it's a joke about paradoxical causality, one of many in the film.

first part was an xpost

You don't think it has any relevance to film criticism or theory?

― sʌxihɔːl (Ward Fowler),

A movie's politics are often addled without knowing a thing about the director.

but there are a bunch of completely inexpicable crispin glover line readings that make no sense

yeah I just don't agree with this. he sounds to me like a norcal teenage speedfreak

HURRY YOUR ASS

The actor playing the mayor does Fetchit Lite iirc

What's more offensive about the Berry scene: Marty introducing hair metal riffs to Chuck Berry song.

More offensive than either: Zemeckis-Gale's idea of what constitutes high fashion (i.e. the horrible furniture in the last scene that symbolizes the McFly's boring yuppie success).

a movie's politics are always interesting; a filmmaker's politics are often irrelevant.

the horrible furniture in the last scene

haha this supposed idyll is what i was thinking of w "ambiently reaganite".

my own personal deeply-lodged longed-for image of Success, resistant to all changes in life experience or politics, is glover unboxing his novel.

for those too young to know: this furniture was horrible in 1985 too.

Glover's critique of the ending as being overly materialistic propaganda (they're rewarded with riches/material goods rather than just love and domestic happiness) seems relevant here

xp

I mean this is less tacky:

http://www.presidentsrus.com/wp-content/uploads/2009/02/reagan-nancy-pillow.jpg

What's more offensive about the Berry scene: Marty introducing hair metal riffs to Chuck Berry song.

i like tho that nobody covers their ears or runs out like they're at the rite of spring; they just stop dancing and stand there in perplexed offense. then marty's mom is so polite about it.

(like a mom.)

alfred i knew that picture was coming.

i like tho that nobody covers their ears or runs out like they're at the rite of spring; they just stop dancing and stand there in perplexed offense. then marty's mom is so polite about it.

― playlists of pensive swift (difficult listening hour)

The principal does, but he's set up to do that

he never had hair.

who was HIS Lea Thompson?

and i suppose jane wyman is the first lady!

Morbs bait: Reagan loved BTTF.

if your critique of the film is "it valorizes material success" well then you have a very, very long line of films to knock down. welcome to america!

and is this really any worse than the transparently insincere "love is all that counts" hokum that is the lingua franca of commercial cinema? i dunno, i just can't get that angry about this aspect of the film considering how inventive and engaging the experience of watching it is.

here's an article too clever by half:

"Back to the Future" shows its age in more than its cultural references, though, and a 2015 audience should have the language to talk about why. Many more of us in the theater now than in 1985 will notice, for example, that Marty's scheme to secure his parents' union involves orchestrating a fake sexual assault which turns into a real sexual assault that's in turn thwarted by an assertion of paternal authority through violence. Great Scott! An American classic is born. "I can't imagine anyone not liking this movie," said Gene Siskel, who probably never met Edward Said and did not live to see Twitter.

not sure what Edward Said has to do with orchestrating a fake sexual assault

On another level, "Back to the Future" is a damn delight. It deserves to be remade, not for the sake of updating its special effects but because its basic formula is so clever and winning that bumping the decades forward would be enough to make it fresh

if it's such a delight in 2015, why remake it?

honestly i think gene siskel got the better end of things

before 1999 at least

"did not live to see twitter" is kind of heroic IMO

really feel enmity towards anyone who says something "deserves to be remade".

In our Marvel-"Transformers" era, when every minute of every blockbuster is saturated with CGI, we can only imagine how a 1985 audience would have really anticipated the spectacle of a DeLorean vanishing down a strip of pavement. "When this baby hits 88 miles per hour," Doc Brown tells Marty, "you're going to see some serious shit." That shit might not look like very much today, but it's a reminder that movies can still draw without piling on the explosions, collapsing infrastructure, and undulating hordes of robots/orcs/apes.

also dislike when people talk ridiculously as if everything beyond a nonspecific caricature of 21c blockbuster filmmaking has been totally forgotten and its pleasures can only be imagined and experienced in reminders. somehow simultaneously slanderous of the modern blockbuster and enslaved to it.

seriously no links? http://www.october212015.com/

Anybody photoshopped a Star Wars VII poster into the background of BTTF2's "future" scenes yet?

really feel enmity towards anyone who says something "deserves to be remade".

^^^ so so true. If a film is "good enough" to be remade, it's good enough to be left the fuck alone and enjoyed as it is, thanks very much

Lorraine: Do you have a computer?

Marty: Nah, just a laptop and a couple of iPhones.

Lorraine's Mom: Oh, he's teasing you. Everybody has a computer these days.

also this wasn't a bad piece imo

http://io9.com/back-to-the-future-is-a-damn-perfect-movie-1737657700

ignores the fact that BTF3 does totally look like a sound stage set the whole way through, but then again that's not exactly why people like these films. I mean, they kinda hung the lampshade when they put a Mr. Coffee on the back of the DeLorean

I do think certain films 'deserve to be remade' in the sense of say '50s kiddie scifi like The Fly/Cronenberg; always thought the right hands could make a good adult version of Forbidden Planet

makes no sense with BttF that i can see tho

they'd probably cast some pencil-dick like Jai Courtney as Marty and Johnny Depp as Doc

Remember the rumors of a BTTF remake with Bieber as the lead? Even though it ended up not being true, that's exactly the kind of shit I could see a studio pulling with a BTTF remake.

Biff played by Michael Shannon

but '80s morals/culture vs the Age of Whatever the Fuck Today Is? I don't see a dynamic there.

I live in fear of a 'Harvey' remake with Jim Carrey or Mike Myers as the all-too-visible rabbit.

some viewing and reading

https://www.fandor.com/keyframe/four-times-back-a-back-to-the-future-tribute

https://thedissolve.com/features/movie-of-the-week/888-the-real-back-to-the-future-time-machine-is-the-fr/

I feel like a BTTF remake would be guilty of the same shit latter year 80s remakes have pulled:

*too many "easter eggs"
*would devote a half hour to Doc's 'origin story'
*completely reworked screenplay that periodically manages to shoehorn pieces of the original dialogue into awkward new contexts
*pathos - laden coda

Pretty sure Marty travelled back and accidentally altered the future once more, keeping the Cubs from their 2015 World Series victory.

Marty is chosen one.

I kinda liked this:

http://www.gq.com/story/i-re-watched-back-to-the-future-ii-because-none-of-you-will-shut-up-about-it

lord that needs to be trimmed by like about 45%

forgot about elizabeth shue. i know it's movie-to-movie but the opening scene of 2 hilariously+queasily implies that one of the effects of marty's dad manning up and becoming a yuppie is that marty's girlfriend is now elizabeth shue.

upgrades all around

I do think certain films 'deserve to be remade' in the sense of say '50s kiddie scifi like The Fly/Cronenberg; always thought the right hands could make a good adult version of Forbidden Planet

makes no sense with BttF that i can see tho

― skateboards are the new combover (Dr Morbius), Wednesday, October 21, 2015 5:38 PM (2 hours ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

yeah there are def cases like this, where you have some reason to think the old material will interact w yr time in some interesting way. a little like resetting shakespeare. my enmity was for the idea of saying it by way of praising a movie, like, this movie was so good for its time it ought to be rescued from it.

forbidden planet would be good in 3d. surprised it wasn't in it at the time. too classy i guess. apparently not a problem now.

that one bird's-eye shot of them walking onto the bridge amidst the ludicrously big mine shaft is what i am thinking of.

also have the tiger jump at the audience, why not.

that lindy west thing also reminded me of, and surprisingly declined to pursue,

Marty goes to his house and discovers that a completely different family lives there!

(i do appreciate that they take the time w that family to specify that realtors are fucking with them.)

i was gonna suggest a remake of Children of the Damned but forgot God is Not Dead came out last year

morbs did you like the day keanu stood still

i think he's made his opinion on Bram Stoker's Dracula quite clear

what do you think are the odds i saw it?

how about George Lucas' The Hidden Fortress?

pfft gene siskel and edward said totally went to a bulls game during the 72-10 season

These are different films now, far more interesting than they were on first release, in ways their makers never could have anticipated. If anybody wants to know how America saw itself in the eighties, the "Future" films are an unbeatable way to answer the question.

http://www.rogerebert.com/mzs/back-to-the-future-is-now-all-back-and-no-future

how a shopping mall saw itself

forbidden planet would be good in 3d. surprised it wasn't in it at the time. too classy i guess. apparently not a problem now.

― playlists of pensive swift (difficult listening hour), Wednesday, October 21, 2015 10:42 PM (Yesterday) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

by 1956 the 3-D craze was over (it was very brief) and the studios had moved on. but yes, that would have been a cool film to have been shot in 3-D.

how many 3-D crazes have there been? a few years ago every new big-screen TV seemed to come with two pairs of 3D glasses, but that craze is over too.

at least 4 iirc

also lol:However, industry observers have noted that 2011 showed a considerable decline in audience interest... there has been box office analysis concluding the implementation of 3D presentation is apparently backfiring by discouraging people from going to movie theatres at all. As Brandon Gray of Box Office Mojo notes, "In each case, 3D's more-money-from-fewer-people approach has simply led to less money from even fewer people

The most recent 3D cycle was mainly used by the studios to get all the theaters holding out on digital projection to upgrade their shit. Now that just about every theater everywhere is up to standard, wgaf about 3D.

and by TV manufacturers to sell expensive 3D TV sets

the current 3D cycle is the longest-lasting for sure. the main precedents were in the early 1950s and the early-mid 1980s.

but there have been one-off 3D films in distribution at plenty of other times....

I've still only seen one film from the current cycle in 3D (it was Gravity, in IMAX 3D, and that was cool), but one was enough.

Watched BTTF2 yesterday. Kind of a cool movie kind of a dumb movie. I lost track of the number of times it would go from "Marty we can't do anything to interfere w the course of events!" and then they decided oh what the hell they really want to spy on their other timeline selves. Like Marty finally gets the almanac that KILLS HIS FATHER and instead of booking it to the time machine he is just hovering around school spying on himself for no real reason.

Also people get knocked unconscious with shocking regularity in this movie. Elizabeth Shue spends like half the movie this way. I made a running joke of it when watching the movie yesterday and was surprised to see the movie ending with Doc Brown losing consciousness.

I didn't read any of the back to the future two commemorative thinkpieces

I like the film tho. it was funny how everyone was blathering on about hoverboards and self-tying trainers because the future in this film is shown as depressing and alienating, although to an extent I think that's due to the idea (which I appreciate) that hill valley is a shitty and hostile place to live in any time in any timeline. Every stranger Marty meets will just immediately yell at him for being a stupid kid (rightly, probably)

So much stuff I associate with this series comes from the 2nd one: the guy who thinks Marty took biffs wallet, biff as archvillain, Marty not liking being called chicken... I even like the weird dystopian present. Lorraine's breast enhancement, like this franchise needed any more creepiness.

Speaking of creepy, putting glover's actual face on a stand-in was obv a horrible thing to do, especially since crispin/everyone in the world is otm that "Marty erases his entire family from existence and wins a car" is one of the most horrible "happy" endings ever

Also people get knocked unconscious with shocking regularity in this movie. Elizabeth Shue spends like half the movie this way.

They said in the Netflix doc that if they'd known at the time they were going to make a sequel, they'd not have put Jennifer in the car at the end of the first one. They didn't really know what to do with her when filming II & III, so they just kept knocking her out.

because women aren't funny apparently. it's not called doc & marty & marty's girlfriend

They said in the Netflix doc

woah there's a netflix doc?

Yeah, not a very good one: 30 mins of making-of, 70 mins of fluff about fans

BTW, anyone who's sick of these movies being talked about: try living with a 2-year-old who, despite having only seen about ~20 mins from the 3 movies combined, has become totally obsessed with them and, in any given situation, dozens of times a day, demands to know "What does Marty say about this?", as well as needing 'Johnny B. Goode' played to her on endless repeat

you could go back in time and show her sumthin else!

what does Marty say about this?

Yeah, not a very good one: 30 mins of making-of, 70 mins of fluff about fans

otm everything after the first section is a waste of time.

Glover's critique of the ending as being overly materialistic propaganda (they're rewarded with riches/material goods rather than just love and domestic happiness) seems relevant here

Not buying it. The ending just reverses everything "negative" about Marty's domestic life. Sister has boyfriends. Brother a good job. Mom is thinner. Dad has turned the tables on Biff. Mom and Dad seem to be in love. And yes, they are wealthier.

dave kehr tries to "recuperate" the ending by saying it's actually some kind of critique of the emptiness of materialism. neither that interpretation nor glover's critique wash with me.

I see it as the quickest way (whole scene is like 4 minutes) to show how Marty's 1955 interventions flipped his and his family's lives from neg to pos. Feel like screenwriters prime motive was to wrap it all up and contrast the "after" with the "before" wrt Marty's time-travelling rather than make any sort of sociocultural statements.
Totally agree w/you upthread re: 50s vs 80s hill valley downtown etc, Am

It definitely feels like a weird criticism to direct at this particular movie. Unless yr Crispin Glover, I suppose.

http://i.imgur.com/RipthnI.jpg

http://i.imgur.com/nM80TiG.jpg

http://i.imgur.com/JzwA6Nk.jpg

http://i.imgur.com/QwNrfA1.jpg

http://i.imgur.com/Js3LZCN.jpg

http://i.imgur.com/CagnPoi.jpg

http://i.imgur.com/azKT9hq.jpg

http://i.imgur.com/pqPPWrD.jpg

http://i.imgur.com/RR418zr.jpg

I guess those jokes would make more sense if I knew what turn signals are...

Indicators? The lights you use to show you intend to turn left or right.

the thing which always bothered me about the ending is that the wealthier mcflys are still living in the house they owned before marty changed the timeline- why aren't they living somwhere swankier?

Where we're going, we don't need Claudia Wells

or crispin glover

The thing that always bothered me about the ending is that it seems like a horror story. That's not the family he knew but rather some alternate universe analogue of same. It seriously creeped me out when I was younger, in a similar way to the kid in Flight of the Navigator discovering that his parents that are ten years older than they were five minutes earlier.

yeah but he gets a sweet truck tho

Fair recompense.

In III, why does Clara's name appear on Doc's grave? In the non-Marty-affected timeline, Doc never meets her, doesn't save her life, and ends up getting shot by Buford Tannen, right?

because you touch yourself

Indicators? The lights you use to show you intend to turn left or right.

Oh yeah, I know what those are. So I guess the joke is that the states in those gifs are supposed to be so boring you'd want to drive straight through them?

In III, why does Clara's name appear on Doc's grave? In the non-Marty-affected timeline, Doc never meets her, doesn't save her life, and ends up getting shot by Buford Tannen, right?

No, there are three different timelines:

1) Neither Doc nor Marty travels to 1885. No one is there to save Clara, so she falls to the ravine, and its renamed after her.

2) Only Doc travels to 1885. She saves Clara, they fall in love. They go to the dance (note that without Clara, Doc probably would never have gone dancing by himself), where Buford shoots him. The 1955 Marty and Doc see the gravestone of this timeline, where Clara was left mourning for Doc.

3) Doc and Marty both travel to 1885. Marty saves Doc from being shot, the gravestone disappears from the photo Marty took in 1955. The ravine is renamed after "Clint Eastwood".

"He saves Clara"

Actually, I'm not sure if Doc even has to save Clara in timeline #2. He specifically promised to pick up the new town teacher from the railway station; if he'd been there to meet her, and would've escorted her all the way, her horses might not have gone out of control. But since Marty's knowledge of Clara makes Doc decide he won't meet her at the station, they spot her only after the horses have already gone wild.

So I guess the joke is that the states in those gifs are supposed to be so boring you'd want to drive straight through them?

No, it means people in those places* are reckless drivers who make turns/lane changes without signalling.

*Which is basically everywhere in the US.

I'm glad nobody posted the memes about "I've just got back from [insert way in the future year] and [major local thoroughfare] is still under construction!",* Because then Tuomas would be asking about 'why are Americans building numbers?', and that's kinda sad.

*I know these are a thing because there's one for every fucking highway in Houston.

2) Only Doc travels to 1885. He saves Clara...

But how could this have happened? Without Marty, Doc would have never been at the ravine searching for an acceptable railroad track to get the DeLorean up to 88 miles per hour, therefore he wouldn't have been nearby to save Clara.

What I want to know is, in the timeline where only Doc travels to 1885, does ZZ Top still play at the wild west hoedown dance?

Also, why wasn't there an 1885 robber baron version of Flea? And isn't it a shame that Crispin Glover didn't get the chance to play an eccentric cowboy? Could have beaten Val Kilmer to the punch by three years.

But how could this have happened? Without Marty, Doc would have never been at the ravine searching for an acceptable railroad track to get the DeLorean up to 88 miles per hour, therefore he wouldn't have been nearby to save Clara.

Like I said above, Doc was originally supposed to pick up Clara from the railway station. It's expicitly mentioned in the movie. It's only after Marty shows the photo of the tombstone that Doc realizes this new teacher he was supposed to pick up will somehow become his lover, and he decides not go the railway station after all, so he won't mess up the past. So in the original timeline #2, Doc picks her up from the station, and the horses may not go wild to begin with, or if they do, he's right there to save her.

I'm glad nobody posted the memes about "I've just got back from [insert way in the future year] and [major local thoroughfare] is still under construction!",* Because then Tuomas would be asking about 'why are Americans building numbers?', and that's kinda sad.

I've been on a roadtrip in the USA, I know about the numbers.

im waiting for a reboot/remake of this.

not that i want to see one.

i just cant believe its not been done yet.

first one is all time 80s classic. second one is great too.

What I want to know is, in the timeline where only Doc travels to 1885, does ZZ Top still play at the wild west hoedown dance?

The band seems to have been booked well in advance, so Marty's arrival wouldn't affect that.

Also, why wasn't there an 1885 robber baron version of Flea?