Back to the Future (1985, Robert Zemeckis) (Patreon)

[Alternately: What You Gonna Do When the World's on Fire? (2018, Roberto Minervini). Keeping at this for the time being, though it's hard to focus sometimes; I'll let you know if/when doing so just seems absurd. Stay safe, everyone.]

87/100

Harbored some anxiety that my deep love for this film (which came out the summer I was 17) would reveal an adolescent's as-yet-undeveloped taste, but all worry vanished by the end of its magnificent opening shot*, which rivals Rear Window's for concise front-loaded exposition. While the camera isn't touring the protagonist's home in this instance, we still learn that (a) time will be crucial (admittedly knowledge most viewers will possess going in, but the zillion clocks—one of them foreshadowing the movie's climax—are a nice touch nonetheless); (b) an inventor will be involved somehow; (c) he's apparently fallen on hard times; (d) he has a dog; (e) he hasn't been home in a while; (f) some plutonium recently went missing; (g) Libyan terrorists have claimed responsibility for the theft; and (h) the inventor has the plutonium. The news broadcast might feel like overly blatant setup, I suppose, were it not for the sublime wit of Zemeckis subsequently moving down to floor level (by following the empty dog food can as it's dropped into the trash), picking up Marty's feet as he enters, and then following his skateboard as it rolls under a table and gently bumps into the plutonium case. Plants and payoffs abound—indeed, most of the comedy is structural rather than verbal or visual; a superb joke like "Better get used to these bars, kid" depends entirely on our retaining and applying prior "incidental" knowledge—but there's no real effort to disguise the stuff that'll be recapitulated. We're meant to revel in the intricacy itself, which is why this film is almost endlessly rewatchable. Why did I go so long without rewatching it?

One advantage to growing up pre-Internet is that I never heard about casting changes and reshoots back then. There were two biggies in 1985: Michael Keaton being replaced by Jeff Daniels in The Purple Rose of Cairo, and Eric Stoltz being replaced by Michael J. Fox here. Decades later, I'd kill to see footage of those original performances (the short, dialogue-free Stoltz clips that finally emerged aren't really satisfying, alas), but I'm very grateful to have initially experienced both films without the burden of involuntarily imagining someone else in the lead. For those too young to have seen Family Ties, be advised that Marty McFly was a change of pace for Fox, who had become a star playing a sardonic Young Republican; the ingenuous, flustered quality he brings to this role actually served as evidence of range, albeit within a fairly narrow register. In any case, he's the capable straight man surrounded by first-rate eccentrics—not just Christopher Lloyd and Crispin Glover (sad reminder: Don Ameche won Best Supporting Actor that year, for Cocoon; neither of these guys was even nominated), but also Lea Thompson, who creates an indelible portrait of barely repressed lust. The Oedipal cringe humor only works if she gets the tone exactly right; it has to feel as if Lorraine is battling a restraining impulse throughout, even if she doesn't consciously register it until the "kissing my brother" moment. 

All in all, Back to the Future comes about as close to perfection as mainstream Hollywood entertainment gets after the Golden Age. I don't think that's mere nostalgia talking. (Incidentally, this film is refreshingly un-nostalgic for the '50s, which it definitely does not perceive as some idealized paradise we've since lost. Goldie the mayoral candidate even provides what then passed for progressive ideals.) The only stretch that falls flat for me is Marty joining the band onstage at the dance—partly because of the whole "white kid invents Chuck Berry" aspect (though if you ignore the racial element—admittedly not possible—information with no logical origin is a very standard time-travel paradox), partly because the voice to which Fox lip-syncs doesn't even remotely sound as if it could be his. Also, while I understand why Zemeckis and Gale wanted some visual indication of Marty's existential jeopardy, the gradually vanishing family photo was a dumb idea, and tying the kids' existence specifically to the moment of their parents' first kiss doesn't make a whole lotta sense. It's a fairly cheap additional bit of fake suspense that opens up a real can of worms: Now, for example, I'm wondering whether the changed circumstances of George and Lorraine's romance (which significantly alters their lives, though for expediency's sake they still live in the same modest house 30 years later—it's just better furnished) wouldn't result in Marty at the very least having a different eldest sibling, assuming that he still exists himself, which likewise seems doubtful. Doc's right: Any interaction at all would be potentially catastrophic. And now I'm trying to imagine Doc's mindset during the entire sequence of events after Marty re-enters his life, during which he already knows what's going to happen but is obliged to act it out anyway à la Primer, and this was really not a path I wanted to go down. Would've been wiser to just let George clock Biff and move on.

One last thing:

"Then tell me. Future Boy. Who's President of the United States in 1985?"

We must never allow this movie to be remade. I do not want to endure a 2020 version of that joke. It will not be amusing.

* Technically it's two shots, as there's a quick insert of the dog food landing in a large uneaten pile. Ah, for the days when directors were unconcerned with impressing the audience. Today nobody would dream of interrupting their complicated "oner" simply because cutting briefly to another angle would provide more information.