Saturday, March 10, 2012

Back to the Future



Back to the Future is my all-time favorite movie or, better, movie trilogy. Marty McFly and Dr. Emmet Brown lead us in an incredible adventure without moving an inch away from sunny Hill Valley, California. At least, they don’t move in space, but they move a hell of a lot in time. Traveling on their trusted Delorean, thanks to the mythical flux capacitor, they end up in 1955, in 2015, in an alternative 1985 (their present) and in the far west…sometimes willingly sometimes by accident. Their aim is usually to fix what they have messed up during their “time trip” and go back to the future, which is 1985.


This trilogy is an heirloom of the 80s, but it is not just that: after all, it is my favorite and I have no memories of the 80s. It is a cult, a must, call it whatever as long as you watch it. There are several reasons why this movie is so cool to me and, given that I do not seem to be able to write an article with no lists, here is it:





  • The dynamic between Marty (Michael J. Fox) and Doc Brown (Christopher Lloyd): these two seem to be born to act together. Merit, of course, of the actors themselves but also the director (Robert Zemeckis) is particularly good in capturing this chemistry properly in every scene, in having them interact fluently, also thanks to nice games of light and close ups. My favorite scene symbolizing that is the one in which Doc sends Einstein in the future.
  • The dialogues, between Marty and Doc, of course, but also between everybody else. This is one of those movies when single lines have a weight and they seem to have been written with the purpose of sticking into your head. Ok, maybe they stick only in mine because I have seen it a thousand times; but, objectively, I have to say that “Frankly, my dear, I don’t give a damn” has nothing on “Get your damn hands off her” (by young George McFly, played by Crispin Glover.
  • The patterns, I am not just talking about the fact that they are always in the same place, just in different times. I am referring to the presence of Lorraine (Lea Thompson), at a different age, every time that Marty wakes up after passing out for a reason or another; about Biff’s (Thomas F. Wilson) inevitable encounter with manure; about the use of aging make up techniques that allow to use always the same actors. I find that this keeps a red line in the whole trilogy, keeping everything together.
  • The quotes and the “ohs”. Clint Eastwood and Chuck Berry are just two of the most evident ones. More deeply, we could say that the whole saga is a quote. A quote of different times, movie genres, famous people and so on. For “ohs”, I mean those moments in which you realize why Marty was called Marty or how the Frisbee game was invented. Kind of the same thing that happens in Forrest Gump, when you realize that he started Watergate! (Not a coincidence that Zemeckis directed both).
  • The music. Every time I do something cool, ta ta ta ta ta  ta ta ta ta ta ta starts playing in my mind. Just as it starts playing when Marty does something cool on his skateboard (another pattern, by the way). I find that the music is in perfect combination with the mood of the film and that the use of the same soundtrack but in different tunes according to the particular moment is another red line that keeps it together and makes every scene unforgettable.

There is, however, a doubt that has been hunting me since the beginning. This is just for people who have seen the movies and could, maybe, help! Let’s see if I can explain it. Time is like a line: if you change anything in one point, another line will start from that point, and stuff will be different on that line. Now, at the beginning of the first movie, Marty’s life sucks because that Marty has not gone back yet to make his parents cool. Once he does and goes back to the future, that Marty’s life will be better. The Marty our Marty sees going back at the end of the movie is another Marty whose life still sucks and has to do everything yet. Now, this would mean that everything that our Marty does in 1955 makes some changes in the new 1985, changes that Marty does not know of, because they were not there in his 1985, right? In this scenario, Marty “inventing” Johnny Be Good does not make sense to me. If Chuck Berry wrote Johnny Be Good only because his cousin heard it from Marty, this would imply that if Marty had not gone back to 1955, this song would not exist, just like his parents would still be lame. This implies that in the 1985 Marty lives in at the beginning, therefore before he has gone messing around in 1955, that song would not have to exist. So he does not know it. So he does not play it in 1955. So it never exists. It is a tautology, unless we assume that Chuck Berry would have gotten around to it anyways. However, the thing is that this inconsistency exists in other circumstances as well, like the Frisbee game I already mentioned, or Marty inventing skateboarding. Maybe there is no inconsistency and it is just me who does not understand. If it is so, somebody, please, explain!

2 comments:

  1. Damn, what a tortuous thought at the end of your article, but I understood your doubt.
    I have to admit that I’ve never noticed this hamletic problem in “Back to the future” that I watched so many times. I caught the occasion to re-watch the movie!
    You’re certainly right and I don’t know how to justify this inconsistency and the other ones. I can’t help you but I thank you to have given me this doubt.
    Probably, there are no rational solutions for the problem in a non-rational movie (a machine that take you back to the past or farther in the future will never exist, I believe); for this, I think that you have to consider the film as one with some poetic licences like in the most great poetry of the most great poets of ever (even if Zemeckis doesn’t leave nothing to chance...).

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    1. It is indeed quite complicated and maybe it is all in my head. If it is not, the non-rational movie excuse is not enough to me.
      Sure, time travel machines do not exist, but when you tell a story about them, you create a universe in which they exist and that universe must have rules...different than the ones we know of course! but still, once you put down the logic of that universe, then it has to stay coherent!
      I mean, Superman does not exist right? Yet, to me it is fine to see him fly, because that is part of the rules, but it would be absurde to see him turn himself into a fish! that is NOT part of the rules!hope this make sense!

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