Back to the Future (1985, PG)

*Premise spoilers.*

Confession time: I had never seen this movie before. There’s a huge swathe of cultural touchstone films that were just a little before my time that I’ve never gotten around to. The Back to the Future trilogy was one of them, along with movies like Indiana Jones, Jaws, and nearly every John Hughes movie. At any rate, I’m starting to rectify at least one of those today.

Marty is perplexed when his friend, the eccentric scientist Doc Brown, insists on meeting him in a parking lot at 1:00 in the morning. It turns out, Doc has invented the first time machine! The initial tests are disrupted in a serious way, and Marty is forced to flee, inadvertently using the time machine to send himself back to the 1950s. One well-meaning mishap later, and he’s left scrambling to help his teenage parents fall in love to ensure his own birth.

I had a lot of fun here. The film shows its age in a number of ways—from the endearing but hokey-looking practical effects to the love interest who feels like she exists purely to be Marty’s girlfriend—but it takes a tried-and-true time travel premise and packages it in an easy, entertaining story for mass appeal. The “make one mistake in the past and you might never be born!” scenario is a classic, along with Marty having to seek out help from the 1950s Doc, who’s eager to pitch in but adamant that Marty not give him any information about the future.

It's a (very light) sci-fi story, but it’s also a story about Marty and his family. Back in his own time, he’s been trying to figure out how to take up space for himself and go after what he wants. He feels very misunderstood, including by his parents. When he travels to the ‘50s and meets his parents’ younger selves, he gains a whole new perspective on them. He learns things about them that he’d never known before and connects with them in new ways—seeing his vibrant young mother makes him long to prevent her sadness and apathy in the future, and as an aspiring musician, he’s floored to discover that his young father writes sci-fi stories.

All in all, the film has a strong blend of comedy, action, suspense, and romance. It spins a fun yarn, led by its likable everyman and his kooky mentor. Michael J. Fox is terrific as Marty, veering easily from perplexed to panicked to empathetic to full of misguided confidence as the plot demands. It’s amusing to watch him “invent” the skateboard in the ‘50s or realize with horror that his young mother has a crush on him. Meanwhile, Christopher Lloyd is pretty much in his quintessential role here as Doc, full of energy, nonsense, and offbeat warmth. He and Fox make a fantastic duo together, to the point that you nearly forget to wonder why this teenage boy is friends with this old man. Marty’s parents are nicely played by Lea Thompson and Crispin Glover—in the opening scenes, I was really confused when I realized Glover was playing Marty’s dad, since he wouldn’t have been nearly old enough in 1985, but then I twigged that the old-age makeup in the present meant the grown-up characters would be played by the same actors in the ‘50s.

One final note: it’s been a while since I watched a film that highlights the weirdness of the pre-PG-13 era. This is a PG-rated film with an attempted rape scene, yikes!

Warnings

Sexual references, violence (including attempted rape,) language (more than you’d hear in a PG-rated movie today, curses like “asshole” and “son of a bitch,”) drinking/smoking/drug references, and a cheap “Arab menace” plot device.