Speaker 1: Hello everybody, and welcome to the final episode of Listener
Speaker 1: Request Month here on Second Take Cinema. It has been
Speaker 1: a journey, and today we wrap things up with a
Speaker 1: request not too far from home, coming from Luke in Chelmsford.
Speaker 1: He said, I'd like you guys to review Back to
Speaker 1: the Future. It's my all time favorite film. I saw
Speaker 1: it when I was nine or ten and I rewatch
Speaker 1: it all the time. I love everything about this film,
Speaker 1: and I think you will enjoy discussing it. Well, Luke,
Speaker 1: today's your lucky day, because we're gonna fulfill your request.
Speaker 1: That's right, Ladies and gentlemen, strap in, start your ignition
Speaker 1: and prepare to reach eighty eight miles an hour as
Speaker 1: we give a second ach to Back to the Future.
Speaker 1: Back to the Future of a nineteen eighty five American
Speaker 1: science fiction film directed by Robert Zamechis and written by
Speaker 1: Zamechis and Bob Gail. It stars Michael J. Fox, Christopher
Speaker 1: Lloyd Lear, Thompson Crispinglover, and Thomas F. Wilson. It was
Speaker 1: made for a budget of nineteen million dollars, where it
Speaker 1: grossed three hundred and ninety eight point two million dollars
Speaker 1: at the box office. Back to the Future received generally
Speaker 1: positive reviews from critics, with most reviewers agreeing Back to
Speaker 1: the Future was amongst the year's most entertaining films, partly
Speaker 1: because of its focus on storytelling instead of pure spectacle.
Speaker 1: Paul Attanasio and Gene Siskel argued that while Back to
Speaker 1: the Future appeared to be everything wrong with youth targeted films,
Speaker 1: it successfully subverted expectations by focusing on a relatable narrative
Speaker 1: and an emotional core an unemployed, irreverent, good natured humor. They,
Speaker 1: alongside Richard Carlis, agreed that it would endure because it
Speaker 1: offered something for children and adults. Some reviewers, such as
Speaker 1: Carlis and Leonard Moulton, agreed that the exposition heavy opening
Speaker 1: was Back to the Future's weakest part, but led into
Speaker 1: a stronger half filled with wit, wonder, comic epiphany, and
Speaker 1: original ideas. Dave Kerr remarked that Galen Zamechis were among
Speaker 1: the first generation of filmmakers openly influenced by growing upon
Speaker 1: televised entertainment, and their inspirations are evident throughout The Hollywood
Speaker 1: Reporter said that despite Spielberg's producer role, it was Zemeckis's vision,
Speaker 1: being more subtle, gentler, and less noisy. Some reviewers compared
Speaker 1: it favorably to the nineteen forty six fantasy drama It's
Speaker 1: a Wonderful Life, which offered a similar premise of a
Speaker 1: central character changing his future. Yeah. Roger Ebert said the
Speaker 1: film offered humanity, charm, humor, and many surprises that were
Speaker 1: among its greatest pleasures. Sheila Benson was more critical. She
Speaker 1: found Back to the Future to be overproduced and underdeveloped,
Speaker 1: featuring a hollow ending focused on materialistic rewards, and lacking
Speaker 1: tension because Marty's success never seemed in doubt. Siskell counted
Speaker 1: that the tension came from defying the expectations of a
Speaker 1: typical time travel film by making the past mutable and
Speaker 1: the future uncertain. Atanasio criticized some aspects that seemed to
Speaker 1: be mechanically designed to create the broadcast audience appeal. The
Speaker 1: cast performances were generally well received, particularly those of Fox, Lloyd, Thompson,
Speaker 1: and Glover. Reviewers consistently praised Fox's appealing performance, although some
Speaker 1: believed Lloyd's performance outshone the rest. Care and Atanasio considered
Speaker 1: his uncontrolled performance and unique intensity, a tribute to mad
Speaker 1: scientist characters portrayed by the likes of Sid Caesar and
Speaker 1: John Belushi, while creating the definitive scientist archetype for modern audiences.
Speaker 1: In contrast, Vincent Cambian Variety's review said that Thompson's deceptively
Speaker 1: passionate performance and Glover's bumbling to confident character provided Back
Speaker 1: to the Future's standout performances. Some reviewers considered the use
Speaker 1: of Libyan terrorists and actual fear at the time to
Speaker 1: be in poor taste. At the nineteen eighty six Academy Awards,
Speaker 1: Back to the Future received one award for Best Sound
Speaker 1: Effects Editing, and had a further three nominations for Best
Speaker 1: Original Screenplay, Best Sound and Best Original Song for That's
Speaker 1: the Power of Love by Huey Lewis and the News. Okay,
Speaker 1: so back to the Future, Rawsham, When did you first
Speaker 1: see Back to the Future.
Speaker 2: I'll be honest, I've seen the second one before I
Speaker 2: saw the first, so I can't remember.
Speaker 1: I saw him in the wrong order.
Speaker 2: I know I did the same with Terminate. I'm kind
Speaker 2: of crazy, child, but I'll be honest, I don't remember
Speaker 2: when I first saw it likes it. I couldn't pinpoint
Speaker 2: a date or even a rough time.
Speaker 1: Do you remember if you I was definitely a kid.
Speaker 2: I just can't remember if it was sort of late,
Speaker 2: like before I was ten or after I was ten.
Speaker 2: Essentially it's it's but either way it probably was close
Speaker 2: to ten one side or the other. I watched this
Speaker 2: film as a kid. I love this film as a kid.
Speaker 2: I did again I am. I'm going to say it outright,
Speaker 2: I do prefer the sequel, and there'll be some notes
Speaker 2: that I give during this discussion to maybe why and
Speaker 2: what I think some of the thoughtfuls were on this film.
Speaker 2: But yeah, I enjoyed this film and it was nice
Speaker 2: to go back to it. It's one of those films
Speaker 2: though that I find And again we'll get to this
Speaker 2: as we discussed, but it really doesn't hold up under scrutiny.
Speaker 2: So it's a really fun film to watch. It's not
Speaker 2: a great film to review because it doesn't like. Some
Speaker 2: of the layers they've put in don't hold up when
Speaker 2: you start to break them down, right, But yeah, I'll
Speaker 2: leave that for you. What about yourself?
Speaker 1: So I saw this very late, so I'm gonna hold
Speaker 1: my hands up right now. I do not have the
Speaker 1: same nostalgia for this movie that most people do. I
Speaker 1: didn't see this till I was thirty three. I only
Speaker 1: saw it for the first time a couple of years ago. Yeah,
Speaker 1: and this is my second time watching it. I don't
Speaker 1: know why. It wasn't planned. It's just one of those
Speaker 1: things where I've always known Back to the Future was
Speaker 1: this really important, you know, pop culture milestone, and for
Speaker 1: some reason, I just never got around to watching it.
Speaker 1: But no, I did like Back to Future. I'm not
Speaker 1: gonna sit here and be like, oh, it was garbage.
Speaker 1: I just don't have that nostalgia for it that a
Speaker 1: lot of people do.
Speaker 2: Yeah, I definitely have more nostalgia for the second one,
Speaker 2: but also the second one, And again that's that's a conversation.
Speaker 2: We'll probably save it. It's for an as and when we
Speaker 2: do the second film. But the second most people who
Speaker 2: know me know that I kind of have a love
Speaker 2: for cyberpunk, and there's some cyber punky elements, not fully cyberpunk,
Speaker 2: but there's some cyberpunky aesthetic elements to the second one,
Speaker 2: So it automatically wins my heart.
Speaker 1: More than the other two. Yeah. No, worries, but we
Speaker 1: were happy to do a review of Back to Back
Speaker 1: to the Future. So let me tell you the first
Speaker 1: thing that struck me other than I really like the
Speaker 1: opening shot of this film. I love that it's the
Speaker 1: slow pan over Doc Brown's clocks and like the papers,
Speaker 1: and then we come down to the door, the door,
Speaker 1: and we do a hero shot. It's all one take
Speaker 1: as well, let's all one take following Martin McFly around.
Speaker 1: And then the first thing he does is that plug
Speaker 1: is a plug is a guitar into that giant amp, yes,
Speaker 1: and literally blow himself up and it's like, oh cool.
Speaker 2: And then you get set a phone called by the way,
Speaker 2: don't use the ab but I think it'll blow and
Speaker 2: he's like.
Speaker 1: No perps And just like that, you've set up for
Speaker 1: me what tone I'm going to be expecting for this movie.
Speaker 1: It's a little bit goofball. Yeah, it's some really good opening.
Speaker 1: Martin McFly obviously has gone on to become a very
Speaker 1: iconic character, like that look has gone on to become
Speaker 1: iconic with the red body warmer.
Speaker 2: Yes, the life Preserver, The life Preserver.
Speaker 1: One thing that struck me when I first watched this
Speaker 1: film they never explain how Doc Brown and Martin know
Speaker 1: each other. This is just like a sixteen seventeen year
Speaker 1: old kid hanging around with a crazy old inventor man.
Speaker 2: Yes and that. Yeah, it's like yeah, okay, yeah, of
Speaker 2: course of course they're friends us their best is.
Speaker 1: Yeah, how did they even cross paths with each other?
Speaker 2: The closest you get is a lie, which is in
Speaker 2: the nineteen fifty five bit when Lorraine, his mum, comes
Speaker 2: to see them and Doc Brown suggests that I can't
Speaker 2: remember which one suggests it, but basically that Doc Brown's
Speaker 2: his uncle. But obviously that's a lie. It's not even true.
Speaker 2: But it's like, that's the closest we get to a
Speaker 2: backstory for these two and it's not even real.
Speaker 1: Yeah. It's kind of one of those things where the
Speaker 1: film very much is like doesn't matter.
Speaker 2: Yeah, I mean there is. It's awkward because if they
Speaker 2: were about the same age, you wouldn't question it. No, no,
Speaker 2: And I think that's the thing is like if it's like, well,
Speaker 2: you shouldn't have to explain these two people are friends,
Speaker 2: you know, why do you have to explain why they're friends?
Speaker 2: But it kind of feels like you have to when
Speaker 2: it's essentially an underage kid and an old man.
Speaker 1: I think maybe in nineteen eighty five that wasn't It
Speaker 1: probably wasn't as big of a an issue to people.
Speaker 2: There has always been this idea of certainly in America.
Speaker 2: Maybe it's different in America as well, because they had
Speaker 2: I know, we kind of had this here, but it
Speaker 2: wasn't as big. They had the like the boy Scouts
Speaker 2: and stuff like that, which was always older men going
Speaker 2: off into the woods with young, younger boys. And it
Speaker 2: wasn't anything weird or strange like that. It was. The
Speaker 2: idea was just that you'd have someone who was older
Speaker 2: who would be like a good example.
Speaker 1: Yeah, that would be their knowledge.
Speaker 2: Yeah, they'd be like friends of the kids. But they
Speaker 2: obviously it was at this distance. But that feels different
Speaker 2: because that's an agreed upon group thing, like I'm going
Speaker 2: to put my child into the Scouts, and I understand
Speaker 2: that this older man is going to be taking care
Speaker 2: of him, whereas in this scenario, it's just two isolated
Speaker 2: people that are in some way found each other. Yeah,
Speaker 2: but we again, we get no context.
Speaker 1: You kind of get the impression the weird thing is
Speaker 1: is and it doesn't I'm not saying this is a
Speaker 1: criticism of the film, by the way, I'm just sort
Speaker 1: of saying it as a oh, this is funny. On
Speaker 1: the one hand, you get the impression that maybe what's
Speaker 1: made Marty go to Doc Brown is it kind of
Speaker 1: feels like he doesn't really fit in in his family. Yes,
Speaker 1: and maybe it's sort of a farther figure uncle figure
Speaker 1: type thing, you know, like you said, an older, wiser
Speaker 1: person to pass on knowledge because his dad is the
Speaker 1: wettest of letterces.
Speaker 2: Yes, but he does. Also, the other thing is Doc
Speaker 2: Brown has a massive amp that he could explode, so.
Speaker 1: That the other thing, though that's an odd choice, is Ordinarily,
Speaker 1: if you have a young person who befriends an older
Speaker 1: person and like just go, you know, befriends an old
Speaker 1: inventor and just goes and hangs out the ham h
Speaker 1: you would expect that person to be a raging nerd. Yes,
Speaker 1: But Martin McFly is repeatedly shown as being cool as fuck. Yeah,
Speaker 1: he's a skateboarder, he's got a girlfriend. You'd expect it
Speaker 1: to be the person who has no friends, no girlfriend
Speaker 1: in his basement dweller. Yeah, and they're they're connecting with
Speaker 1: this person over a shared interest.
Speaker 2: I mean, the other thing is well is whether we
Speaker 2: like it or not. You when you're a young man,
Speaker 2: you take several cues from your father, sometimes good, sometimes negative,
Speaker 2: and sometimes you learn not to be them rather than
Speaker 2: learn to be them. But Marty kind of is in
Speaker 2: a weird zone where he's so out of sync with George,
Speaker 2: like that this version of George that we first meet,
Speaker 2: because as you say, George is such a simpering wet
Speaker 2: lettuce and Marty doesn't seem to have that in him.
Speaker 2: But it's not like he's you'd imagine, certainly with a
Speaker 2: sixteen to seventeen year old boy, if you're at a
Speaker 2: point where it's like, right, I'm actually as a sixteen
Speaker 2: seventy year old boy, I've got this kind of mickisma
Speaker 2: about me. I've worked myself out to a devil, and
Speaker 2: my dad is this simpering twat. There'd be a lot
Speaker 2: more basically f.
Speaker 1: You dad going on.
Speaker 2: But he has like enough respect to talk to his
Speaker 2: father like a human being, whilst also being like, oh
Speaker 2: this this fucking dude. When the way that he reacts
Speaker 2: to Biff, Yeah, and you like that, you know, yeah,
Speaker 2: And it's like I'm I'm not sure that's something that
Speaker 2: a sixteen year old would ask his dad. No, it
Speaker 2: would either be like you're such a web dad, I
Speaker 2: hate you, or it would be essentially like, oh, well,
Speaker 2: you know, brown nosing is the way that you go
Speaker 2: up in the world learning from the negative of your
Speaker 2: dad's example. So yes, okay, So let's let's start on
Speaker 2: some of the notes that I pulled when I watched Fume.
Speaker 2: So yes, Christmas Glove's version of the nerdy character. The
Speaker 2: thing I he's much better when he plays the nineteen
Speaker 2: fifty five George, but in this opening thing, he's so nerdy.
Speaker 2: He's playing it like basically like a comedy character you'd
Speaker 2: get in like a National Lampoon movie.
Speaker 1: It's very over the top. It's not even close to
Speaker 1: how even even the most bumbling of dads would act.
Speaker 2: Yeah, the thing is I've put here the performance is
Speaker 2: lacking depth in regards to an inner agony and shame.
Speaker 2: Like he's I know, he's meant to be like a weak,
Speaker 2: simpering man. And Biff's come around and he's basically throwing
Speaker 2: his dick around.
Speaker 1: Hello McFly, where's my things? Did he keep calling him
Speaker 1: a butt head?
Speaker 2: Yeah?
Speaker 1: Who but it.
Speaker 2: He says that the second one, that's my favorite one.
Speaker 2: But yeah, no he yeah. So he's bullying the dad
Speaker 2: in his own home and there's a bit where he
Speaker 2: just goes he just takes sweets out of the sweet
Speaker 2: jar without asking and shit like that. Biff is doing
Speaker 2: a great job. Tom Wilson is smashing it. The problem
Speaker 2: is is Biff. Tom Wilson's Biff doesn't have much to
Speaker 2: push against because Christian Glovery is too accommodating. And here's
Speaker 2: the thing. You don't have to rewrite the scene. The
Speaker 2: scene is fine, but there has to be a point
Speaker 2: where you can see in the performance somewhere that that
Speaker 2: George is allowing it to happen because he's too scared,
Speaker 2: but that he hates it. But he doesn't seem to
Speaker 2: hate it. It's just like, oh, well, you know, that's
Speaker 2: just the answer of oh well, you know, that's just
Speaker 2: how it is. That's meant to cover his ego and
Speaker 2: his shame. But you don't feel any ego damage or shame.
Speaker 2: It's just like, yeah, it's played too cool. So it
Speaker 2: feels like an SNL sketch more than it feels like
Speaker 2: an actual movie scene. Maybe I'm being a bit unfair there,
Speaker 2: but I think there could have been a bit more
Speaker 2: depth to this intro of modern day George. I don't
Speaker 2: know if you'd agree with that or yeah.
Speaker 1: I just all that struck me was how completely unrealistic
Speaker 1: of a portrayal it was. I will say one thing
Speaker 1: that I don't think works in the film, and I
Speaker 1: think anyone who takes off the nostalgia goggles would admit, yes,
Speaker 1: I think the young actors playing the aged up versions,
Speaker 1: so Crispin Glover and Leah Thompson, it just doesn't work.
Speaker 1: And the makeup doesn't work because even the performance on
Speaker 1: Christopher Lloyd is fine because Doc Brown is kind of
Speaker 1: played in a timeless way where.
Speaker 2: He could because it's a ball direct man, ball inventor. Yeah,
Speaker 2: he plays it the exact same way in both time periods.
Speaker 2: But it works at any age. But the maker is
Speaker 2: either at centric or an old ball for the.
Speaker 1: Makeup doesn't I should I should mention that I watched
Speaker 1: the four K restoration version.
Speaker 2: See I watched the Blu ray version which is full HD,
Speaker 2: but you could still tell that the makeup was fake.
Speaker 2: What a fine interesting in retrospect is so the very
Speaker 2: opening of back to the future too. When they arrive
Speaker 2: in the future, right at the beginning, he immediately starts
Speaker 2: peeling his face off, and when Marty goes, what are
Speaker 2: you doing, is, oh, it's a facial scrub latex cover.
Speaker 2: So now, and they basically they use it as an
Speaker 2: excuse for Old Doc to remove the old man makeup,
Speaker 2: and they pretend it's a latex mask thing from the
Speaker 2: future that rejuvenates his youth, and it did not remember,
Speaker 2: it's played away in like one or two lines, and
Speaker 2: just they knew them. They knew a makeuple shit. So
Speaker 2: they apply it right at the start because he's still
Speaker 2: got it at the end of the first film, and
Speaker 2: they immediately carry on from each other, so they apply it.
Speaker 2: They arrive in the in our well at the time
Speaker 2: was our future, and then he just peels his face
Speaker 2: off and goes, yeah, no, it was just a mask anyway.
Speaker 1: And we all just move on. We all just move on. Yeah, okay, yeah,
Speaker 1: that was a thing with me. Like Leah Thompson's kind
Speaker 1: of doing the if you ask any young actor to
Speaker 1: play an old person, they kind of default to like her, Oh,
Speaker 1: I'm Marty, how you doing type thing. Yeah, he's kind
Speaker 1: of doing that. Chrispin Glover is not aging his physical
Speaker 1: performance at all. It is still as over the top
Speaker 1: and flappy.
Speaker 2: Yeah, he's he's kind of got that I'd say nineties
Speaker 2: Jim Carey energy, the way that he carries his arms
Speaker 2: and stuff. Yeah, he's got that kind of overly manic
Speaker 2: youth energy even as an older man. It's a bit
Speaker 2: weird one. The other thing with Leah Thompson's character, and
Speaker 2: it's not her fault. This is a script thing because
Speaker 2: I think she performs it just fine. I don't really
Speaker 2: see any reason that's told why she hasn't left, because
Speaker 2: by this point she clearly hates him because she thought
Speaker 2: he was a hard man and now he's just this
Speaker 2: simpering loser and she's still with him with three kids,
Speaker 2: drinking vodka, she at breakfast time. Yeah, there's a really
Speaker 2: weird dynamic.
Speaker 1: I did I do, Like Marty skateboarding to score though,
Speaker 1: hanging on the back of the pickup truck while The
Speaker 1: Power of Love plays.
Speaker 2: That was cool. Like again, this film knows how to
Speaker 2: This film, if nothing else, knows exactly how to play
Speaker 2: Marty and the doc because Marty is immediately cool in
Speaker 2: an effortless way. The other thing I just want to
Speaker 2: mention before we move on from the family last minute thing,
Speaker 2: he's got a brother and sister in this film, which
Speaker 2: are kind of important because the photo of them disappearing
Speaker 2: shows him that he's wiping out his own timeline. But
Speaker 2: they never returned in the sequels.
Speaker 1: Yeah, well, because they're kind of nothing characters, aren't they only.
Speaker 2: Because the films it's a trilogy and they choose to
Speaker 2: do nothing with them. Yeah, it's kind of weird, like
Speaker 2: because in this version, before he goes back into the past,
Speaker 2: his brother, for example, is a pizza delivery guy, and
Speaker 2: then when he returns, he's like a businessman in a suit,
Speaker 2: and you're just like, Okay, we'll get to that at
Speaker 2: the end, because I actually have some commits on that,
Speaker 2: but like, it's it's very weird that they've changed the
Speaker 2: characters so much, rather than just changing Crispin Glover, because
Speaker 2: that was the thing is I think Crispin Glover.
Speaker 1: I think the implication's supposed to be that because they've
Speaker 1: this could possibly be considered a little bit sexist. Yeah,
Speaker 1: but I think the implication is supposed to be that
Speaker 1: because the kids have been raised by a stronger, more
Speaker 1: confident father. Yes, they've actually gotten their lives together, whereas
Speaker 1: a weak man like George war Raised, it's just like, yeah,
Speaker 1: careers don't really matter. Like if you don't want to
Speaker 1: go to school, don't go to school, so you end
Speaker 1: up the best you can do is deliver it pizza
Speaker 1: delivery man? Or what does the sister do she's got I.
Speaker 2: Think she's still in college, right, yeah, because I know
Speaker 2: Marty is, but I think she's younger than him.
Speaker 1: I can't recall.
Speaker 2: I don't know why Marty is the last one to
Speaker 2: disappear in the photo either.
Speaker 1: I thought he was the youngest. I thought that was why.
Speaker 1: Oh is he the youngest? I think that's why he's
Speaker 1: the last one to go. Oh.
Speaker 2: Yeah, because she's got a thing that says in the
Speaker 2: photo she's got a jumper on, doesn't she. That says
Speaker 2: class of eighty four, which is the year before, So yeah,
Speaker 2: she must be older. Then he'd be the first one
Speaker 2: to go, though she in college, he's in high school. Yeah,
Speaker 2: but surely then he'd be the first one to go.
Speaker 1: No, because time's going that way, times are raising that way, so.
Speaker 2: No, but if some raises that way, then no, because
Speaker 2: if times are raising that way, he'd be the first
Speaker 2: one to go, because surely the idea is that they're
Speaker 2: getting wiped out because essentially George and Leanne Lorraine sorry,
Speaker 2: don't have a long lasting relationship, so as that relationship
Speaker 2: time span short, and surely the youngest kid would be
Speaker 2: the first one cut because you wouldn't get to sleep
Speaker 2: together to get to the third kid if you hadn't
Speaker 2: the first and second.
Speaker 1: Yeah, but I think they're just doing it in that
Speaker 1: sort of way where it's going along. Time just happens
Speaker 1: to be linear backwards. Right again? Why not what they ever? Yeah,
Speaker 1: you were right. I really don't have any other notes
Speaker 1: until we get to him showing him the DeLorean exactly.
Speaker 2: My next thing is about the Dolorean.
Speaker 1: So well, my next was just it's real. It's real
Speaker 1: weird the way they crowbar in or I ripped off
Speaker 1: the Libyan nationalists, and it's a little bit like it's
Speaker 1: the eighties and you didn't just go Soviet Russia, Like
Speaker 1: do you know what I mean?
Speaker 2: Like, yeah, why choose Libya?
Speaker 1: The whole point is to get you. It's getting plutonium,
Speaker 1: isn't it.
Speaker 2: Yeah, there's news reports we see, right, from the opening
Speaker 2: shot of the fact that plutonium has been stolen. Yeah,
Speaker 2: and you know that's being referenced because he's got the platonium. Yeah.
Speaker 2: It's kind of weird though, because it'd be like if
Speaker 2: you were to reference I don't know, like the Cold
Speaker 2: War was huge, it'd be like talking now where you've
Speaker 2: got IM not going to go into politics, but like
Speaker 2: there's tensions of Palestine, Israel, Russia and China, et cetera,
Speaker 2: and going, Yeah, the Turkish nationalists, You're like, why the Turks?
Speaker 1: Yeah, why aren't we doing the big thing?
Speaker 2: Yeah?
Speaker 1: Well, why are we avoiding the bigger I do just
Speaker 1: wonder if maybe they just wanted to be different, because
Speaker 1: because you know, in the eighties everyone did the Russians
Speaker 1: as villains, didn't.
Speaker 2: They Yeah, maybe they wanted to sell it in Russia. Yeah,
Speaker 2: they thought that Libya wasn't going to be a big
Speaker 2: enough the store base to worry about Lucia.
Speaker 1: Maybe.
Speaker 2: I mean, this seems something that's also very weird because
Speaker 2: bear in mind they even mentioned in the film that
Speaker 2: in nineteen eighty five, while they this film, Ronald Reagan
Speaker 2: is the president, and he was a famously right wing
Speaker 2: president for the Republican Party. It seems very odd and
Speaker 2: like a very purposeful choice that the Libya Nationalists arrive
Speaker 2: and kill Doc Brown driving a Volkswagen camper van, which
Speaker 2: is famously an image of the hippie movement. Yeah, I
Speaker 2: thought that had to be a deliberate Yeah, and it's
Speaker 2: that whole idea that hippies are pro fucking death and destruction,
Speaker 2: which is a stupid, weird thing. Like, I'm not saying
Speaker 2: that hippies are the best culture. My dad was one,
Speaker 2: so I've got a bit of an opinion, I guess.
Speaker 2: But like, they don't go around shooting people. Yeah, that's
Speaker 2: not what hippies do. It's a very odd choice. The Dolory.
Speaker 2: Can I talk a bit about that? Yeah, please do
Speaker 2: the DMC Doloran, because I do like vehicles a little bit.
Speaker 2: I'm not I'm not fucking Jeremy Clarkson, but I do
Speaker 2: know a little bit about them. I love the Dolorean.
Speaker 2: It's beautiful, it's gorgeous, legendary vehicle. By the time they
Speaker 2: made the movie, the vehicle was already dead. Like the
Speaker 2: it had a very short shelf life from nineteen eighty
Speaker 2: one and then they ceased production in December nineteen eighty two.
Speaker 1: Whilst it's a year.
Speaker 2: Yeah, it had a year of production and then died
Speaker 2: on its ass. It was basically destined for the dustbin
Speaker 2: of history and was revived because of Back to the Future.
Speaker 1: Did it die because I'm not saying it doesn't look cool,
Speaker 1: because it does. It does, but is it because if
Speaker 1: you park in a car parking spot in a parking lot,
Speaker 1: you can't open the fucking doors without hitting the car
Speaker 1: next seat.
Speaker 2: So weirdly, the golding doors weren't the end of it.
Speaker 2: That wasn't the problem. The issues so looking when I
Speaker 2: looked up the DeLorean, it was basically built on a
Speaker 2: nineteen seventies engine used in Renos and Volvos of the time,
Speaker 2: so I'm guessing that was considered reliable. But it was
Speaker 2: renowned for poor build quality and a poor driving experience.
Speaker 2: So yeah, the only thing that it had going for
Speaker 2: it was John Delaurian, which is the name of the
Speaker 2: man who invented the Dolorean Company and built the DMC DeLorean.
Speaker 2: He wanted to create the perfect driver's car, and the
Speaker 2: first part of that was creating the most beautiful vehicle
Speaker 2: he could do, and to be fair, to the car,
Speaker 2: it's gorgeous, but obviously when it came to production side,
Speaker 2: it was like, yes, it's gorgeous, how do we cut costs?
Speaker 2: That was essentially what ended up killing the car, was
Speaker 2: that you ended up with this premium looking vehicle that
Speaker 2: looked as good as any Ferrari or anything like that,
Speaker 2: but at a build cost of a Mondeo. So it
Speaker 2: ended up Yeah, it ended up just dying. And the
Speaker 2: problem is in the car industry, and this has always
Speaker 2: been the case. You don't really get indie developers of cars, No, No, because.
Speaker 1: It's a massively expensive thing to do.
Speaker 2: Yeah, so it but there was a lot of tryers
Speaker 2: during the seventies and eighties. A lot of the muscle
Speaker 2: cars came out of stuff like that because they were
Speaker 2: smaller developers. But again, like even the big ones, they
Speaker 2: were big in America. Dolaurians didn't really get shipped anywhere else.
Speaker 1: No, you never ever seen one. I've never seen one
Speaker 1: in Britain. I've seen that one except at like comic
Speaker 1: conventions where it's someone deliberately doing a back to the future.
Speaker 2: And that's the thing is even the revival of the car,
Speaker 2: and that the so there's over five thousand still in service,
Speaker 2: which is on bad for a vehicle that lasted one
Speaker 2: year and died on its ass. But again, like, let's
Speaker 2: be honest, if it weren't for Back to the Future,
Speaker 2: how many do you think would still be running? Yeah,
Speaker 2: you'd you'd maybe have twenty.
Speaker 1: How many in the world, how many of that five
Speaker 1: thousand have flux capacitors?
Speaker 2: And the question, the honest answer is I reckon probably
Speaker 2: about fifty percent, because I reckon most of the ones
Speaker 2: that have been recovered, restored and kept on the road
Speaker 2: are made.
Speaker 1: To look like the Back to I think I read
Speaker 1: that they chose the dolore In for the film specifically
Speaker 1: because it had that space shippy look.
Speaker 2: Yes, and this isn't unusual for films. What I think
Speaker 2: this did a lot better than something like Seven Days
Speaker 2: in May, where they just imported a bunch of old cars.
Speaker 2: This one took a car that was recently dead but
Speaker 2: still new enough for its era that it's still fit
Speaker 2: the modern you know supercar wedge shape that you know
Speaker 2: the testa Rotta was doing and all the modern Ferraris
Speaker 2: of the era, and they basically went, well, this has
Speaker 2: the similar shape. It's already gone, but it's super shiny
Speaker 2: because it's all silver and just built on that. Because
Speaker 2: it's not a standard DeLorean. Let's be honest, they've stuck
Speaker 2: like that. The big boxes at the back for which
Speaker 2: are like massive exhausts. Those aren't on a standard Delaorean. No.
Speaker 2: The rocket thrusters, yeah, but those are, I'll be honest.
Speaker 2: Those are some of the bits that help accentuate the
Speaker 2: look of the vehicle.
Speaker 1: So something that surprised me when I first watched Back
Speaker 1: the Future, having not seen it until I was thirty
Speaker 1: three and just having gathered it from cultural A's moss. Yes,
Speaker 1: the first time I watched it, I was legit shocked
Speaker 1: when Doc Brown gets shot. Yes, because I had always
Speaker 1: just been like, yeah, Doc Brown and Marty go back
Speaker 1: in time. I thought that was what the film was.
Speaker 1: And then it's like, oh no, Doc Brown dies and
Speaker 1: Marty goes back in time.
Speaker 2: Yes.
Speaker 1: One little detail I do like here, which I bet
Speaker 1: you I could see you've probably thought of it. Just
Speaker 1: a little thing that I did like is it's twin
Speaker 1: pines mall yep. And when he goes back in time,
Speaker 1: he knocks down one of the two pines. And then
Speaker 1: in the when he comes back to the future. It's
Speaker 1: lone Pine more or one. Yeah, lone Pine More, isn't it. Yeah?
Speaker 1: I liked I thought that was a little, a cool,
Speaker 1: little it's.
Speaker 2: A blink and you'll miss it sort of thing as well.
Speaker 2: Something I noticed and it's irrelevant. I don't know why
Speaker 2: they put it in. This is a line you could
Speaker 2: have cut and it would have made no difference. Just
Speaker 2: before the Libyans turn up, Doc Brown is trying to
Speaker 2: fill the car with the plutonium and et cetera, et cetera,
Speaker 2: and during his waffle, he talks to Marty about going
Speaker 2: into the future in the car and he mentions that
Speaker 2: he's allergic towards synthetic while wearing Latex gloves.
Speaker 1: I missed that.
Speaker 2: Yeah, there's a bit of just goes. I can't buy
Speaker 2: clothes in the future. I've I'm allergic to all synthetics,
Speaker 2: and I'm like, you're wearing Latex marms, like you can't
Speaker 2: get much more synthetic.
Speaker 1: Yeah, I would agree with that.
Speaker 2: It's a really weird choice because again, it doesn't come up.
Speaker 2: It's not a bit later where it's like, oh my god,
Speaker 2: I'm wearing the synthetics.
Speaker 1: It's I I liked the little touch that when the
Speaker 1: dolorium comes back it's iced over. Yes, whenever it travels
Speaker 1: in time. I don't know if that would actually happen
Speaker 1: if you traveled in time, but I thought it was
Speaker 1: a cool fucking something I do.
Speaker 2: With how cold it is trans like going through.
Speaker 1: I think it's meant to be that if you're going
Speaker 1: faster than the speed of light, which you technically have
Speaker 1: to do to travel, then the heat from the sun
Speaker 1: isn't getting you. Ah, that's cool.
Speaker 2: Yeah, yeah, that's a good point.
Speaker 1: But I'm pulling that out my ass. Roberts and Mechis
Speaker 1: may have just had a bunch of dry ice laying
Speaker 1: around and been like, we've gotta find some use for
Speaker 1: this dry ice. One effect that's cool, but it has
Speaker 1: aged is when the Dolorean first travels, obviously it leaves
Speaker 1: the flaming skid marks. Like, yeah, it's very cool. A
Speaker 1: fact when the when the skid marks, could they go
Speaker 1: through their legs, don't they?
Speaker 2: Yes? That bit aged.
Speaker 1: That's that is such a clear, super superimposing.
Speaker 2: They're blue screened over like over the car park lot
Speaker 2: with the flames going between their legs. It's only for
Speaker 2: one very brief shot, and obviously at the time people
Speaker 2: would be like, wow, but you.
Speaker 1: Can see the edging that. Yeah, which you know, fear
Speaker 1: enough films due age.
Speaker 2: And you know what, I'd rather they didn't try and
Speaker 2: fix it too much nowadays, because A you probably can't
Speaker 2: and B it's the age of the film.
Speaker 1: Yeah, don't touch it. There's nothing worse, no reason to
Speaker 1: do a Star Wars digital, And there is nothing worse
Speaker 1: than people like George Lucas who won't stop going back
Speaker 1: and tweaking things and tinkering. No, let the film be
Speaker 1: a product of its time. If that means that at
Speaker 1: a certain point it's going to reach age where certain
Speaker 1: people turn around and go, well, I'm not gonna watch
Speaker 1: because it's too old. Fine their loss. Yeah, well, I
Speaker 1: actually had this conversation works today randomly at work today.
Speaker 1: Someone asked me if I watched black and white films,
Speaker 1: and I said, yeah, I watched black and white films.
Speaker 1: I named a few. He's went, oh, yeah, she went
Speaker 1: she she can't.
Speaker 2: Yeah. I spoke to her and she was like, you
Speaker 2: don't watch black and white steal. I was like, yes,
Speaker 2: I can't. I don't know how you can. How could
Speaker 2: you possibly watch Black and White. I was like, because
Speaker 2: they're so old, and when there are some modern black
Speaker 2: and white films, like you don't have yeah, yeah, and
Speaker 2: she went, well, I know Sin City. I was like, technically, yes,
Speaker 2: like there's there's there's different elements. But also like even
Speaker 2: if you are talking about old films, like if you
Speaker 2: haven't seen them, you don't really know what you're on about.
Speaker 2: Like I think the problem is when most people have
Speaker 2: been introduced to black and white films, they've been introduced
Speaker 2: to them when they're off sick at school or work,
Speaker 2: watching Channel four late in the afternoon while you know,
Speaker 2: if they're not on some sort of pain medication, and
Speaker 2: all that's on is those stupid old blacks. Don't worry
Speaker 2: in Ala all come from get a bad far out
Speaker 2: and it's literally just some kitchen sync drama bullshit because
Speaker 2: they're not gonna play the kren de la creme of
Speaker 2: black and white films at two pm on a Tuesday,
Speaker 2: So they think that's all black and white films? Is
Speaker 2: that sort of plodding the mush of black and white?
Speaker 2: But you get some like Black and White also exemplifies
Speaker 2: films that some films you quite colorize them, you ruin
Speaker 2: them because the black and white really show like noir films.
Speaker 2: Don't colorize the noir film for Christ's sake.
Speaker 1: No, but you know it's perfect. If people can't handle them,
Speaker 1: that's fine. Yeah, it's a different You have to have
Speaker 1: a switch in your brain. I think that lets you
Speaker 1: dial back because even take it's not just about the
Speaker 1: black and white. We focus on act. It's the mos
Speaker 1: obvious visual element. But filmmaking was just different then that
Speaker 1: it's slower, the camera doesn't move as much, it's a
Speaker 1: lot more static, there's less cuts.
Speaker 2: Well, it was evolving from how you just record a
Speaker 2: stage play.
Speaker 1: Yeah, literally, because that's literally how it starts, isn't it.
Speaker 1: And you know, and I completely undersigned someone who's raised
Speaker 1: on films today where an average shot is one and
Speaker 1: a half seconds, and.
Speaker 2: It's one after two seconds before you have to cut
Speaker 2: your shirt.
Speaker 1: Yeah, and there's always something brand new for your eyes
Speaker 1: to look at. I completely understand why if they went
Speaker 1: back and looked at say Psycho, which is only nineteen sixty,
Speaker 1: it's not that long ago. It's a while, but it's
Speaker 1: not that long sixty.
Speaker 2: To seventy years ago.
Speaker 1: Jah, shut up, but Psycho, which you know, I can
Speaker 1: understand they would struggle with that because Psycho is a
Speaker 1: film that asks you to sit and steep in a
Speaker 1: slow building tension. Now I would I would urge people
Speaker 1: if you can, if you can make the effort to
Speaker 1: find it in yourself to give that a go, I
Speaker 1: highly recommend you do. It's totally worth it because Psycho
Speaker 1: is a fucking incredible moan and these other black and
Speaker 1: white movies like you say that are incredible as well.
Speaker 1: But at the same time, I also understand if you
Speaker 1: can't or if you aren't willing to. But yes, it's uh,
Speaker 1: it's one of those things. Why do be go on
Speaker 1: to that old George Lucas. Yeah, you have to let
Speaker 1: your film just be a time you know, part of
Speaker 1: its time period. Yep. I do want to put out
Speaker 1: a little fun factor that I noticed a little funny
Speaker 1: fun thing. Yeah. So the when he first gets When
Speaker 1: Marty first arrives in nineteen fifty five, it plays the
Speaker 1: song mister sam Man, bring Me a Dream.
Speaker 2: Right right.
Speaker 1: The dop for this movie is Dean Coundy. Right. Dean
Speaker 1: Coundy was also the dop on another film that famously
Speaker 1: uses that song, which is John Carpenter's Halloween. He was
Speaker 1: the dop on Halloween one, two and three. Nice but yes,
Speaker 1: no I saw it was a funny little coincidence. Dean
Speaker 1: Coundy famously dop Halloween one, two and three, which famously
Speaker 1: uses mister sam Man. In fact, if I remember, mister
Speaker 1: sam Man was the music that played on the DVD
Speaker 1: menu of Halloween two, and then he dop's this film
Speaker 1: and it's also got it in.
Speaker 2: I wonder if he had anything to do with that,
Speaker 2: or if it's just coincidence.
Speaker 1: It's probably just coincidence, but it could have been a
Speaker 1: funny little thing. Whereas the mechis was like, oh, let's
Speaker 1: do a little reference to John Carpenter.
Speaker 2: So I made a weird note here. I don't know why,
Speaker 2: but this film is two hours long. It takes thirty
Speaker 2: one minutes for Marty to travel into the past. So
Speaker 2: I mean, that's that's pretty good timing because that's a
Speaker 2: quarter of the film length. We've had what half an
Speaker 2: hour set up, so that's too bad. I don't know why,
Speaker 2: but I just thought a check note that, Oh yeah,
Speaker 2: I'll just put we never go into the future. The
Speaker 2: film should be called back to the present. Ah, oh, yes, yes,
Speaker 2: that's that's all I had on that. I don't I
Speaker 2: must have been very tad.
Speaker 1: To be fair, I don't actually have that many notes,
Speaker 1: which you could say is a good thing because it
Speaker 1: meant I was absorbed by the film.
Speaker 2: Okay, well, but I also lost interested in the film
Speaker 2: a couple of times. Okay, what did you think of
Speaker 2: the alien reveal of Marty? So he crashes in the bar,
Speaker 2: he crashed into the barn. The kid has a comic
Speaker 2: book which has like a man in what looks like
Speaker 2: a modern day has matt suit, and then he comes
Speaker 2: out and a has matt suit because of the plutonium thing,
Speaker 2: and they're just like.
Speaker 1: Oh my god, it's an alien. Yeah.
Speaker 2: I didn't mind that. I thought that was pretty good.
Speaker 1: No, I thought it was funny enough. And there is
Speaker 1: the bit where Marty texts quite a fall if I
Speaker 1: remember when he stumbles backwards, he trips over part of
Speaker 1: the bar.
Speaker 2: I did put here. He's really good at pratfalling. He
Speaker 2: does that very well. Also, it must have been really
Speaker 2: hard for him because I don't know if we're aware
Speaker 2: of this, but Marke J. Fox moonlit to do this film.
Speaker 1: Yes, because he was also doing family Family tipin cities
Speaker 1: later in.
Speaker 2: Yeah, yeah, but he was the leading Family Ties and
Speaker 2: so basically he was he'd made an agreement that for
Speaker 2: two straight months he would work all day on Family
Speaker 2: Ties and then only film in evenings and maybe some weekends,
Speaker 2: which meant that he was basically working twenty four seven.
Speaker 1: I've seen a video about it where he'd get like
Speaker 1: ten minutes of sleep in the car ride from one
Speaker 1: sound studio to there.
Speaker 2: And I think you can. You don't really notice unless
Speaker 2: you're looking for it. But I'm fairly certain that the
Speaker 2: entire even though it's huge, the clock tower set is
Speaker 2: a set inside of a sound studio.
Speaker 1: I'm ninety percent sure, yes, because.
Speaker 2: I don't know how you'd get that much control of
Speaker 2: a real area if it was an actual town square.
Speaker 2: But number two like it kind of makes sense because
Speaker 2: of his shooting schedule. You have to set bits of
Speaker 2: it during the day, And I was like, how did
Speaker 2: they do these if he was only ever available at night?
Speaker 2: But you don't really see him during the day anywhere else.
Speaker 1: Well, for those who don't know, and I imagine everyone
Speaker 1: knows now. So I'll keep this brief because it's one
Speaker 1: of those things, like it's one of those things in
Speaker 1: the way that everyone also knows. Oh god, what's the
Speaker 1: film fact? Everyone else? Everyone knows that it took Jack Nicholson.
Speaker 1: They did one hundred and twenty seven takes of him
Speaker 1: going through the door in the shining and before he
Speaker 1: did the hears job.
Speaker 2: That was one of many takes.
Speaker 1: Yeah, everyone already knows this, so I'm just going to
Speaker 1: say it very quickly in case anyone doesn't. Originally, because
Speaker 1: of the family ties thing, they didn't give Michael J.
Speaker 1: Fox the role, even though he was the first choice.
Speaker 1: They went with Eric Staltz. So Eric Staltz was originally
Speaker 1: then cast as Michael J. Fox and Malaura Hardin, the
Speaker 1: daughter of Jerry Hardin, was cast as Jennifer. They did.
Speaker 1: They actually shot several scenes with Eric Staltz before Robert
Speaker 1: Zemeckis kind of watched the Rushers back and was just like,
Speaker 1: it just isn't working. And it's not that k Staltz
Speaker 1: is a bad actor. It's just that he went comedy.
Speaker 1: You know, ex Stots went on Tivy his own separate career,
Speaker 1: didn't he Off the top of my head, he's in
Speaker 1: Anaconda with Jennifer not Jennifer love Hewett, Jennifer Lopez, but
Speaker 1: it wasn't right. He just wasn't right for the role,
Speaker 1: so they swapped him out for Michael J. Fox. They
Speaker 1: agreed to this arrangement as you've just said, where they
Speaker 1: were going to work sort of split. Unfortunately, Malaura Hardin
Speaker 1: also ended up being a casualty of this because she
Speaker 1: was taller than Michael J. Fox and Roberts and Mekis
Speaker 1: was like, I'm not sure this works, and he actually
Speaker 1: pulled the female cast and crew and said, would what
Speaker 1: do you think about this? And they unanimously voted that
Speaker 1: Jennifer couldn't be taller than Marty, which is ridiculous because
Speaker 1: he's in the film for like five minutes, I know.
Speaker 1: So unfortunately, Malaura Hardin was let go as well and
Speaker 1: replaced with Claudia Wells.
Speaker 2: So I did put the cocktown Square set does a
Speaker 2: really great job of establishing the fifties for Marty, and
Speaker 2: it's I do like the continuity, though this is not
Speaker 2: for this film when we come back here in the
Speaker 2: future and then back in the alternate present of the
Speaker 2: yeah in the second film, because those they do are
Speaker 2: such a good job utilized in this set for as
Speaker 2: much as they can get out.
Speaker 1: Absolutely. I love when he gets back to the future
Speaker 1: or back to the present in this one. I love
Speaker 1: the country tst of you. You really realize that, oh yeah,
Speaker 1: this is the exact same set, but everything's just dirtier
Speaker 1: and dilapidated and more warn dad. But Marty likes it like.
Speaker 2: He looks because he's grown up, because it's what he expects.
Speaker 1: He's like a sweet home.
Speaker 2: I did notice that. So Mike goes into the diner,
Speaker 2: which will come back to several times in this film.
Speaker 1: Where people eat cereal. Yes, George Wick flies eating a
Speaker 1: bowl of cereal. Do you remember like I was about saying,
Speaker 1: you remember when diners did that? They never did it
Speaker 1: in Britain.
Speaker 2: But you know you'd never go into a diner in
Speaker 2: Britain and go conflicts.
Speaker 1: Conflicts oat milk. But I mean they semi skimmed. So
Speaker 1: you'll give me on that full fat golden top. Motherfucker,
Speaker 1: no fucking hell who has golden top? So he gets there,
Speaker 1: doesn't he? And I'm going to use this opportunity to
Speaker 1: talk about something that might be a little bit sketchy,
Speaker 1: maybe I'm reading too much into it. In the present,
Speaker 1: there's a guy called Goldie something who's the men Yes
Speaker 1: when he goes back to nineteen fifty five, and we
Speaker 1: should point out gold he's a black gentleman. When he
Speaker 1: goes back to nineteen fifty five. Goldie is basically the
Speaker 1: assistant at this Cereal milkshake bar that he's gone to, right,
Speaker 1: and he gives him the idea for running for mayor.
Speaker 2: Yeah, because what he's cleaning the floor, he's basically a
Speaker 2: dog's body for the guy runs it. And when he goes, hey,
Speaker 2: I could be mayor. They were like black mirror, as
Speaker 2: if that'll ever happen.
Speaker 1: They kind of sanitize what nineteen fifty five was like
Speaker 1: as well, an't they Later on in the film, and
Speaker 1: I'm skipping a bit now, he is the famous bit
Speaker 1: where Martin ends up playing in the prom band Yes,
Speaker 1: and he plays a Chuck Berry song Johnny be Good, Yes,
Speaker 1: And they do a gimmick where the bad isn't it
Speaker 1: Martin Martin Berry, Yeah, the cousin the cousin of Chuck Berry,
Speaker 1: And he gives it's a bootstrap paradox where you know
Speaker 1: where did it come from? And there's a little bit
Speaker 1: and I'm sure it's not this. I'm sure it's just
Speaker 1: an accident, but there was a little bit of me
Speaker 1: that was watching it going, so all the things these
Speaker 1: black characters achieve in the future.
Speaker 2: This white guy did to be fair, I will give
Speaker 2: this film one potential out on it, and it doesn't
Speaker 2: really deserve it for this, but I'll try and I'll
Speaker 2: try and be fair. He kind of does that with everyone.
Speaker 1: Yeah. I don't think it's an intentional thing at all.
Speaker 2: It just so happens because it's so obvious, because there's
Speaker 2: only two black characters with dialogue and both of them
Speaker 2: get saved by Marty.
Speaker 1: I think it's more ignorance than malice. Yes, it's just
Speaker 1: no one in nineteen eighty five thought could this be
Speaker 1: read in a bad way? Yeah?
Speaker 2: I think I think that's probably about right.
Speaker 1: Yeah. But yeah, so he's in this serial bar, he
Speaker 1: meets George McFly and Michael J. Fox. Oh, this is
Speaker 1: where we first get the first of many times we
Speaker 1: get the life present of a joke as well.
Speaker 2: I think, yes, because he goes to you, have you
Speaker 2: just come off the boat, like what you're wearing your
Speaker 2: life preserver?
Speaker 1: Yeah? Yeah. One thing I think Michael J. Fox is
Speaker 1: very good at is playing this fucking just weirded out, like,
Speaker 1: oh my god, what's going on type guy? Yeah, goes
Speaker 1: lost in tire the look he gets. I love the
Speaker 1: shot where George Rett flies eat in his cereal and
Speaker 1: Michael J. Fox is at the side of him and
Speaker 1: the camera doesn't move. No, Michael J. Fox moves because
Speaker 1: ordinarily you'd move the camera to reveal him, but instead
Speaker 1: Michael J. Fox is just leaning further and further forward.
Speaker 2: Which looks good for the shot, but the reality of
Speaker 2: that it's weird.
Speaker 1: Yeah. And then George mc fly Crispin Global without looking
Speaker 1: at him, just kind of freaks out and he's like
Speaker 1: what what And then of course Biff turns up and
Speaker 1: you get a fulllly bit where Biff. I do like
Speaker 1: the bit where Biff comes and he goes mc fly
Speaker 1: and they both turn Yes.
Speaker 2: God, Honestly, Tom Wilson deserves so much more than he got,
Speaker 2: I think following this film, because his Biff is great, Like,
Speaker 2: we needed a guy who was this scenery chewing twat
Speaker 2: and he just plays it to an absolute perfection. He
Speaker 2: is the Rau Julia of the film, Like raw Julia
Speaker 2: from Street Fighter is what I'm referring to, where he
Speaker 2: just owns the screen anytime he is on it, and
Speaker 2: you're like yes, and you keep going.
Speaker 1: Tom Shenanigan's happening here, George ment Fly flees yes. And
Speaker 1: this is a weird choice in the film when Marty
Speaker 1: catches up to him. So we know in the film
Speaker 1: before this part, we know that the wayler Rain meets
Speaker 1: George is her dad hits him with his car and
Speaker 1: he kind of asked the question what was he doing
Speaker 1: in the middle of the road anyway, and George ment
Speaker 1: Fly kind of just in the present just kind of
Speaker 1: goes another time. It's a story for another time type thing.
Speaker 1: We're seeing this. He's a fucking pervert. He's climbed up
Speaker 1: a tree and he's spying in a woman's window.
Speaker 2: Isn't it Lorraine herself?
Speaker 1: No, it's a different woman.
Speaker 2: I thought it was Lorraine. That's why he's because it's
Speaker 2: right outside of her house, isn't it. Because after he
Speaker 2: hits the kid, he goes I've heard another one right
Speaker 2: the kids on the street. I'm fairly certain it's meant
Speaker 2: to be Lorraine is getting changed with her window open.
Speaker 2: And he's on the tree outside spang with why do
Speaker 2: you need binoculars.
Speaker 1: Five feet away? Like, how bad is your eyesight? George
Speaker 1: wild Fly? But yet it's really weird, Like, and I
Speaker 1: know people it was a different time.
Speaker 2: I still don't think it was okay to like and
Speaker 2: fairly sudden voyeurism was still considered a shameful thing. Not
Speaker 2: saying that people didn't do it, and you know, I'm
Speaker 2: not gonna comment on the morality of it at this point,
Speaker 2: but because it's very long ago, and I wasn't alive
Speaker 2: in nineteen eighty five.
Speaker 1: They'd already done a horror film in nineteen sixty corn
Speaker 1: Peeping Tom that's about this sort.
Speaker 2: Of So it was a known it was, and it
Speaker 2: was a psycho is technically that because like throughout the
Speaker 2: film he's peeping on her, isn't he? So actually no,
Speaker 2: we knew damn well even in film that this was
Speaker 2: not the other problem that Okay, So this starts a
Speaker 2: problem with George McFly as a character, which is woman
Speaker 2: to root for George McFly to a certain level because
Speaker 2: we know that he gives birth to Marty and we
Speaker 2: want Marty to live, So Marty needs to make sure
Speaker 2: that George is up to the task of being you know,
Speaker 2: a little bit at least cool and self aware enough
Speaker 2: that he can pull the rain. But we get given
Speaker 2: no positives to George, no from his so we know
Speaker 2: in the future he's a weak, simpering nerd. We go
Speaker 2: back to nineteen fifty five, he's still a weak, simpering nerd,
Speaker 2: which at least that tracks. But then the next thing
Speaker 2: we see of him is, oh, and he's a perv
Speaker 2: who is voyeuristic and peeping through her window, and we
Speaker 2: never we never get a point where's just like, you know,
Speaker 2: I've got even the bit where we've learned that he's
Speaker 2: a writer and he's writing science fiction work, which is
Speaker 2: a cool anger, and you can go, Okay, this is
Speaker 2: a guy's kind of misunderstood. You could have developed that
Speaker 2: instead it's just like, yeah, sometimes right, a bit anyway,
Speaker 2: I'm going to try and spinn the rain and the
Speaker 2: nickols through the tree in the window. Again, You're like,
Speaker 2: there is nothing I like about this guy.
Speaker 1: At least Michael J. Fox plays the disgust exactly right ya.
Speaker 1: He's like, oh god, he's a peeping tom Yeah, because
Speaker 1: you'd be absolutely mortified if you found out that was
Speaker 1: your dad. Obviously, Marty ends up being the one who
Speaker 1: gets hit by the car this time, and that starts
Speaker 1: us off on this whole comfortable train where he gets
Speaker 1: taken to Lorraine's house by her dad and he's like
Speaker 1: passed out, so they let him sleep in the bed. Yes,
Speaker 1: and she's taken his trousers off Calvin because of the
Speaker 1: Calvin Kline underwear. Yes, yeah, no, this is just weird
Speaker 1: that he's his own mum wants. I mean, I know
Speaker 1: she doesn't know she's his mom.
Speaker 2: Yeah, it's a bit, it's kind of weird. They do
Speaker 2: pay that off later in the film. Obviously, she's got
Speaker 2: the hots for him the whole way through the film,
Speaker 2: and she goes, oh, it's weird. It's like kissing my
Speaker 2: uncle or my brother, my brother, and but it's weird
Speaker 2: that it took her kissing him to feel that problem.
Speaker 1: But yes, it's it's a little weird and uncomfortable, and
Speaker 1: it is not what I thought Back to the Future
Speaker 1: was when I first watched it.
Speaker 2: Yes, because it doesn't come back in the other two well,
Speaker 2: actually no, in the second one, there is at least
Speaker 2: a moment of it when he goes into the future
Speaker 2: changes the past and comes back to the altered present,
Speaker 2: and Biff's married to Lorraine in Trump Tower and his
Speaker 2: mum has had fake boobs put in right, and he goes, bom,
Speaker 2: you're so so Something that's weird in this that is
Speaker 2: a callback is com Yeah, even though she wasn't really
Speaker 2: fat in the present, every single five seconds at the
Speaker 2: post you're so fit right. Well, in the second one,
Speaker 2: he sees that she's got these massive fake boobs installed
Speaker 2: and he goes, Mom, you're so big really yeah? So
Speaker 2: actually no, to be fair, this is a kind of
Speaker 2: a theme in the whole trilogy. I can't remember anything
Speaker 2: in the third film that does it, but who at
Speaker 2: this point, if I watch it again, I wouldn't be surprised.
Speaker 2: Was like, Mom, you're so ye haw.
Speaker 1: So yeah.
Speaker 2: I couldn't think of anything else to go with big
Speaker 2: and small, so yew was good enough.
Speaker 1: So Marty ends up realizing that what he's got to
Speaker 1: do is make sure that they go to the prom together. Yes,
Speaker 1: the problem is and it won't surprise anyone. Lorraine doesn't
Speaker 1: really want to go to the prom with George McFly
Speaker 1: on account of the fact that he's a weird and
Speaker 1: she wants to go with Marty instead. Now tell me
Speaker 1: the truth. How much did you nerd rage when Marty
Speaker 1: decides to convince George to ask Lorraine to the prom
Speaker 1: by putting on his spacesuit, appearing in his bedroom at
Speaker 1: night with us think a smoke machine and saying, I
Speaker 1: am Darth Vader from the planet through the he's got
Speaker 1: a walkman as an age. Yeah, And he says, I
Speaker 1: am Darth Vader from the planet Vulcan, and he does
Speaker 1: the I can't do it, but he does the spock
Speaker 1: Vulcan thing. I can't do it.
Speaker 2: It takes a while to practice. Yeah, make your fingers
Speaker 2: manually do it. After a while, you'll get used to
Speaker 2: it and you can be able to do it without it.
Speaker 2: But where's my weekends?
Speaker 1: Motherfucker double Vulcan. He's achieved a lot in your life.
Speaker 1: Thank you.
Speaker 2: I don't have a wife, I don't have a relationship,
Speaker 2: I don't have children, I don't have a career.
Speaker 1: But I can do the on both hands without having
Speaker 1: to do it. Now I look like a frog.
Speaker 2: I did want to say. Something I do like in
Speaker 2: this film is us. It's got an almost expert framing
Speaker 2: in almost every scene he's shot gorgeously.
Speaker 1: Yeah. Dan Kundy is an excellent d P.
Speaker 2: Yeah. And there's several times that before it's even introduced
Speaker 2: into being relevant to a conversation or to a scene,
Speaker 2: you'll get glimpses of the clock tower all the way
Speaker 2: through the film and you'll be like, oh, the clocktails
Speaker 2: on the back of that piece of paper mart is
Speaker 2: holding up the dot. Can't see. It's not relevant to
Speaker 2: this scene. And then about a minute later it'll become
Speaker 2: relevant to the scene. But Scott the clock tower and
Speaker 2: the lightning pot, and so it's quite smart in the
Speaker 2: way that it utilizes its visual language.
Speaker 1: I think has going for it the clock tower because
Speaker 1: we're on a litteral clock, which is they need the
Speaker 1: lightning bolt to power the Dolorean, and they know when
Speaker 1: the lightning bolt's going to strike. So the whole film
Speaker 1: has this impending clock on it, yes, where they have
Speaker 1: to be ready by that time. And by keeping the
Speaker 1: image of the clock ever present throughout the film, yes,
Speaker 1: not only are you keeping the theme of time but
Speaker 1: you're also making it this constant looming thing of time
Speaker 1: is run.
Speaker 2: Out, yes, which is hard to do it a time
Speaker 2: travel thing that time is running out, but they do
Speaker 2: a very good job with that last thing I mentioned
Speaker 2: before we get to back to the diner and start
Speaker 2: kicking into the last part of the film is basically
Speaker 2: Marty ends up getting aggressive with Biff and Biff goes
Speaker 2: to beat him up in school until the principal stairs
Speaker 2: out and he goes, you're new here, so i'll give you.
Speaker 2: I'll give you a purse this time, and then he goes,
Speaker 2: so why don't you make like a tree and get
Speaker 2: out of here.
Speaker 1: I was like, yeah, well, they do that line in
Speaker 1: I wonder if it's a reference. Now, I'll never put
Speaker 1: that together. That line is in I know your favorite
Speaker 1: episode of That's TC. That line is in Zombie Strippers.
Speaker 1: There's a bit where Robert England says to that he's
Speaker 1: at the end of the day where he's leting all
Speaker 1: the strippers go home, and he goes, go on, get
Speaker 1: get out of here, make like a tree and get
Speaker 1: the fuck out of it. And I always thought, I
Speaker 1: know this gun has stupid, but I never knew what
Speaker 1: that meant. So I was always like, I'm guessing. Because
Speaker 1: this film is supposedly set in a semi apocalyptic future
Speaker 1: where George Bush has declared himself the forever President. Yes,
Speaker 1: And I think in that you know that very terrible
Speaker 1: beginning text spiel that's in Zombie Shippers, where it's basically
Speaker 1: like Chief Supreme cut Justice Jenna Bush held another Supreme
Speaker 1: care go and I'm sure it said something in there
Speaker 1: about global warming, getting Outcatol, all the trees dying. So
Speaker 1: I was assumed Rob England was doing a reference to
Speaker 1: the fact that there's no trees anymore, right, because the
Speaker 1: environment's dying. But you see trees in the scene where
Speaker 1: in a handful of scenes that are outside, I reckon
Speaker 1: that's a budget limitation, a bit like when we were
Speaker 1: split second and London is completely flooded, but there's loads
Speaker 1: of area shots where you can clearly see it's not.
Speaker 1: I'm just wondering if it is a back to the
Speaker 1: future reference.
Speaker 2: Actually could be a bit reference. So something that I
Speaker 2: find interesting is we return to the diner, and when
Speaker 2: we get to that point, the diner is incredibly smoky.
Speaker 2: They walk in and they smoke everywhere across the diner,
Speaker 2: which is great because it gives you that impression of, like,
Speaker 2: you know, the fifties were different time you could smoke
Speaker 2: in the diner even if you were younger. Interesting fact,
Speaker 2: if you look around, because I did, I was that
Speaker 2: hang on, not a single person is smoking.
Speaker 1: Yeah, I admit I didn't notice that the diner was smoking.
Speaker 2: It was only on this particular scene. But yeah, for
Speaker 2: some reason, the diner is cut. This is where Lorraine
Speaker 2: is in the diner.
Speaker 1: Yeah, and George McFly goes up to her.
Speaker 2: Yeah, the entire diner is filled with smoke. Only on
Speaker 2: this scene. Now one is smoking. The closest we get
Speaker 2: is as George approaches Lorraine's table from his POV, the
Speaker 2: girl opposite her on the table is feigning to smoke
Speaker 2: a cigarette using a wooden stirer. But that actually doesn't
Speaker 2: match the next cut when then cuts to the side
Speaker 2: of the table as Georgia arrived, right, And it's really
Speaker 2: weird thing. It was like literally notn't smoking, And it's
Speaker 2: like they wad pretend to smoke with a stirr so
Speaker 2: people know why it's smoking.
Speaker 1: Right.
Speaker 2: That's one of those things I think like in the
Speaker 2: edit edited version of ET, which has now gone back
Speaker 2: and unedited, Spielberg removed all the shotguns and stunned the
Speaker 2: guns from the police and replaced them with the walkie talkies.
Speaker 1: Yes, and it looked stupid. Of course it did, because
Speaker 1: you don't hold walky talkies like that.
Speaker 2: No.
Speaker 1: So, yeah, this is where Biff comes in and Marty
Speaker 1: trips him, isn't it.
Speaker 2: Yes, And I put here Tom Wilson is brilliant younger bif.
Speaker 1: Oh and this is this the bit that leads into
Speaker 1: the action sequence where they're chasing around this Marty on
Speaker 1: the skateboard. Yes, and they end up doing the oh
Speaker 1: so clever gag where they crash into the manure truck
Speaker 1: and they're like, oh shit, and then actual shit.
Speaker 2: I have to say I love the chase. The chase
Speaker 2: was really inventive. The way he defeats Biff throughout the
Speaker 2: chase or escapes and defeats himself. I really like that.
Speaker 2: It does come back in the second film on the
Speaker 2: horror boards. Yes, and he ends up crashing into him
Speaker 2: on track and get it. But yeah, there was I
Speaker 2: actually thought it was a really good chase sequence.
Speaker 1: Jokes in Back to the Future three, doesn't he end
Speaker 1: up in crashed into a wagon full of Yes he does.
Speaker 2: I think it's a thing that happens to Biff in
Speaker 2: every film. Christoph Lloyd really seems to have developed into
Speaker 2: the role over the film, so he's much more comfortable
Speaker 2: in nineteen eighty five again we seem to but then
Speaker 2: there's a lot more script for him to run by.
Speaker 2: The only time we actually see Doc Brown before Marty
Speaker 2: goes back into the past is in the scene where
Speaker 2: he's explaining the dolor in and he's just basically info dumping,
Speaker 2: so we actually get a really nice amount of information
Speaker 2: about Doc as a person and the way he actually works,
Speaker 2: and then we get to guessing that basically the third act,
Speaker 2: Marty sets up an idea that he's gonna he's basically
Speaker 2: because George has been so shit at trying to pull
Speaker 2: the rain. He goes, right, I'm going to go to
Speaker 2: the dance with Lorraine, and then what will happen is
Speaker 2: that I'll basically.
Speaker 1: Make a bad guy.
Speaker 2: Yeah, be a bad guy. I'll, like, you know, go
Speaker 2: to attack her in a certain way. You open the door,
Speaker 2: go hey, get your hands off her, and punch me
Speaker 2: in the face and then you look like the big hero.
Speaker 2: But over the course of events of the night, he
Speaker 2: gets replaced with Biff because he gets dragged out and
Speaker 2: Biff finds Lorrain alone in the car, which is a
Speaker 2: very good reveal by the way, because you see the
Speaker 2: door open. Yeah, you see the hand grab Marty, and
Speaker 2: you assume it's George because you've seen George leave the dance, yes,
Speaker 2: and you're like, okay, well we know this mount and
Speaker 2: then when he pulls him out, it's actually Biff, and
Speaker 2: it's the way it's shot is a very good reveal.
Speaker 2: Earlier in the film, I wanted a little bit more
Speaker 2: of shades of dark with how he used to bully
Speaker 2: present day George. What we get here is dark enough
Speaker 2: for back to the future. I understood they weren't going
Speaker 2: to go mega dark, and that's understandable. But I'll tell
Speaker 2: you what, Biff in this sequence where he's clearly going.
Speaker 1: To he's gonna rape Lorraine.
Speaker 2: Yes, during that sing, you you get enough threat from
Speaker 2: him that you feel you're like, he's gonna get away
Speaker 2: with it if someone doesn't stop him. You get enough
Speaker 2: threat for that. Meanwhile, it's light enough that it would
Speaker 2: still be accessible to a family audience. But yeah, I
Speaker 2: have to say again that was something else that Biff
Speaker 2: does very well is yes, he's a comedy villain, but
Speaker 2: when it comes down to it. It seems like this
Speaker 2: he is genuinely terrified.
Speaker 1: It caught me off guard because I did not expect it.
Speaker 1: I was like, okay, yeah, you're you're the villain of
Speaker 1: the film, but you're just a bully, like it never
Speaker 1: goes beyond giving wedgies and nouggies and that's the sort
Speaker 1: of thing. And then you're like, oh no, oh no.
Speaker 2: But then George comes along and saves her. You know,
Speaker 2: that's cool. But he punch.
Speaker 1: He knocks out Biff in one punch. Yeah, did you
Speaker 1: know that in a previous draft of the script, after
Speaker 1: that future George or present George, whatever you want. Adult
Speaker 1: George in one of Prestress was a champion heavyweight boxer,
Speaker 1: and the idea was meant to be that that taught
Speaker 1: him that he's got an amazing knockout punch. Right Luckily,
Speaker 1: thank god, someone I think it was Spielberg, make the
Speaker 1: right call of Gwen. No, you've lost the character's relatability now, yeah,
Speaker 1: because now.
Speaker 2: He's gone from epic nerd to like super strong bubby.
Speaker 1: Have him be a sci fi author instead?
Speaker 2: Well, what so, there's something that it still leaves a
Speaker 2: problem for me because I said it's easily rectified by
Speaker 2: giving Georgia a hobby that means he works his arms
Speaker 2: in some way. Could be fishing, could be panking. Yeah,
Speaker 2: but he's in the goon is but I mean he was.
Speaker 2: He wasn't meant to be from a rich family, so
Speaker 2: he could have been chopping wood for the family fire
Speaker 2: something like that. So he's got strong arms because he's
Speaker 2: so afraid, he just never really uses them, which would
Speaker 2: then give him some sort of heft to knock out
Speaker 2: Biff in one punch. Anything to suggest how a weedy
Speaker 2: man with literally zero fight experience is able to spark
Speaker 2: out the school's biggest bully, it won hit.
Speaker 1: I think maybe it's meant to be one of those
Speaker 1: things where it's a it's a typical bully trope is
Speaker 1: they can dish it out but not take it. So
Speaker 1: actually Biff can go around beating people all he wants,
Speaker 1: but he's got a glass jaw. And the only reason,
Speaker 1: the only reason no one knows that because no one's
Speaker 1: ever been brave enough to actually hit him back.
Speaker 2: Possibly possibly, I'm also put it so blatantly not Michael J.
Speaker 2: Fox's voice when it's saying Johnny, it's like it's not
Speaker 2: even a sound alike, Like normally you'd hire a really
Speaker 2: good vocalist who's not Michael J.
Speaker 1: Foxx, who sounds like they could be.
Speaker 2: Could Yeah, this is just like you might as we
Speaker 2: have just got Barry White to do it.
Speaker 1: To be honest, is he not? Is it just the
Speaker 1: actual Chuck Berry song?
Speaker 2: It could?
Speaker 1: Or is it? It's definitely not. It's definitely not Michael J.
Speaker 1: Fox But this bit's very cool where they're playing like
Speaker 1: the big band swing music. Yeah, and then he sobs in,
Speaker 1: isn't it. I don't know if this is a skill.
Speaker 1: I think some musicians, like really good musicians can do
Speaker 1: this where they can play a song without ever having
Speaker 1: heard it. If it's basic enough, they can just.
Speaker 2: Well, usually you'd have to turn around and go, okay,
Speaker 2: we're playing in CEA. I don't know if you could
Speaker 2: do that with Johnny be good with their not having
Speaker 2: been a prior to Johnny, certainly the energy, they probably
Speaker 2: play it like an old fifty swing band rather than
Speaker 2: like the rock and roll.
Speaker 1: He says something like he tells him like what key
Speaker 1: it's in? Yeah, and then he says something about like
Speaker 1: oh high's at the end. Watch me for the Changers.
Speaker 1: Let's go.
Speaker 2: I don't know enough about music enough, but I assume
Speaker 2: it's not.
Speaker 1: No, I would assume not to play it so perfectly.
Speaker 1: So Biff sticks Marty in the get in the bonnet
Speaker 1: of another car, doesn't he No, he puts me in
Speaker 1: the boot bonnet, Yeah, of the well, the trunk of
Speaker 1: the band's car.
Speaker 2: I skip back.
Speaker 1: I've skip back. We've already moved on to the band,
Speaker 1: haven't we Sorry, we're doing the band. Yes. I like
Speaker 1: the fact that he plays Johnny b Good and he's
Speaker 1: very energetic, like well done to him, and he does
Speaker 1: the famous I think it's a move Chuck Berry used
Speaker 1: to actually do where crouches down and sort of duck
Speaker 1: walks across the stage while he's playing.
Speaker 2: Yeah, And I'm basically just doing the music video Johnny
Speaker 2: be Good.
Speaker 1: Yeah, it's good. I do like the bit where he
Speaker 1: finishes the song. He looks back at everybody. Everyone's just
Speaker 1: like hair and he's like, I guess you're not ready
Speaker 1: for that.
Speaker 3: Yeah, yeah, but your kids are gonna love it. It
Speaker 3: did depress me watching this to realize that if you
Speaker 3: did a modern back to the future and he went
Speaker 3: back in time, thirty years. It would be nineteen ninety six,
Speaker 3: six years after I was born.
Speaker 2: Yeah, so they would they would be playing spice skills. Yeah,
Speaker 2: you're right, ninety six. Okay, So there's so Marty goes
Speaker 2: back to the car to you know, do the runs,
Speaker 2: try and get himself back to the future. There's an
Speaker 2: emotional moment where Marty tries to warn Doc of his
Speaker 2: best sceneing film. Yeah, that is played brillantly. It's a
Speaker 2: little let down, not in the scene itself, in the
Speaker 2: fact that we didn't get enough backstory of these two
Speaker 2: together in the future, but the scene itself, as you say, brilliant.
Speaker 1: Yeah, because dogs told Marty. As we said, Doc gets
Speaker 1: shot the day that the Dolorean takes off, Yes.
Speaker 2: Because I'm going to be doing so much time travel,
Speaker 2: and it's just like, you're not.
Speaker 1: And Marty keeps trying to tell him, but Doc Brown's like, no, no,
Speaker 1: I don't want to know anything about the future.
Speaker 2: You have to tell me. I'll find out myself, yeah.
Speaker 1: In time, And it's like yeah. So Marty decides to
Speaker 1: write it in a letter and then writes on the
Speaker 1: letter don't open till nineteen eighty five. But when he
Speaker 1: tries sneaking it into Doc's pocket. Doc finds it, and
Speaker 1: obviously Doc knows that he can't even have that because
Speaker 1: the temptation will always be there. Yeah, to open it.
Speaker 2: And it rips it up, doesn't he. What's interesting about
Speaker 2: the whence that follows is essentially the idea is that
Speaker 2: they needed plutonium to generate one point two eight gigawatsigjiga?
Speaker 1: Does that fucking annoys me that he keeps calling it
Speaker 1: jiggerwatts and you're like, you must know it's giga right well,
Speaker 1: to be honest, ban in eighty five, they probably didn't,
Speaker 1: but Doc Brown should. Doc Brown's one of those people
Speaker 1: would pronounce gift of Jeff, isn't it.
Speaker 2: Yeah, I've got a new animated Jiff for you, Marty.
Speaker 2: But yeah, so he They can't get plutonium in nineteen
Speaker 2: fifty five, but the only thing that could generate it
Speaker 2: is the bottle lightning, which is why they need to
Speaker 2: go to the clock tower because they know exactly when
Speaker 2: that's going to get struck. And during this whole sequence,
Speaker 2: it's kind of weird because it's all just delaying time.
Speaker 2: There is no reason that this couldn't just be a quick,
Speaker 2: short sequence of It's happened Boom for he's going to
Speaker 2: the future. But I kind of want to get your
Speaker 2: thoughts on whether or not you think this was worth it.
Speaker 2: Like there's a lot of things that this this sequence does,
Speaker 2: where like it kind of references old horror films, like
Speaker 2: the melodramatic version of Hunchback of Notre Dame, because he
Speaker 2: goes up the clocktown and then the bell starts chiming,
Speaker 2: and you just get loads of dock mooning and the
Speaker 2: camera going ah, the sound of the bells. He does
Speaker 2: everything but the bow under me, but he's yeah, and
Speaker 2: then there's him hanging off the actual clock itself and
Speaker 2: stuff like that. I'm not sure those hands would have
Speaker 2: held his body.
Speaker 1: Wave what tries to plug the cable in and it's
Speaker 1: a little bit too short because.
Speaker 2: The amount of times that's happened to me when I've
Speaker 2: moved my mildier visual equipment and you're just like, give
Speaker 2: me more fucking gable. Best Marty gets back to the
Speaker 2: future regardless of all of this, and so they do
Speaker 2: something I like here, Again, it's a choice. They could
Speaker 2: have done a lot cheaper by just showing us the
Speaker 2: chase sequence of doc getting shot and Marty escaping using
Speaker 2: the shots we saw but at the beginning of the movie.
Speaker 2: But what we get instead, which is much better, is
Speaker 2: we see the entire sequence again but from Marty's new perspective,
Speaker 2: which is from you know, him observing from afar, And
Speaker 2: that's really cool. It's always nice to see the same
Speaker 2: events again but from a different angle. And then it's okay,
Speaker 2: so I've got to talk about this. So Doc isn't dead.
Speaker 2: It turns out that he basically stapled the fucking message
Speaker 2: back together and read it and realized that he was
Speaker 2: going to get killed by the Libyans, so he was
Speaker 2: wearing a bulletproof veest. So they shoot the crap out
Speaker 2: of him. But it doesn't matter. He's wearing the bulletproof
Speaker 2: fest he's safe and.
Speaker 1: I'm just still looking.
Speaker 2: None of them bullets hit his head, Yeah, every single
Speaker 2: one of them hit his chest, and you're like, one bullet,
Speaker 2: one bullet in the face, just in the arm would
Speaker 2: have ruined it, because obviously he's playing dead when he's
Speaker 2: been shot in the chest. But if they just shot him.
Speaker 1: In the other and we'd be like, oh, yeah, doubt
Speaker 1: he's good enough to hide that page yeah, exactly, or
Speaker 1: one in the nut.
Speaker 2: What's weird about the next bit is so Doc survives,
Speaker 2: and the next we realistically sees Marty wakes up in
Speaker 2: bed at home and he's just like, oh, it's all
Speaker 2: a dream, and I'm like a little bit vivid for
Speaker 2: me to just wake up the next day go oh oh,
Speaker 2: that was a weird dream. Like he's been living it
Speaker 2: for like three days, at least a week a week.
Speaker 1: They literally say he's got to be there for a week.
Speaker 2: So like, yeah, I don't believe that after a week
Speaker 2: you'd be like, oh, what a terrible dream. But anyway,
Speaker 2: the reason for this is that he walks downstairs and
Speaker 2: his normal home has been renovated into what was at
Speaker 2: the time a very stylist looking home. It's quite dating now.
Speaker 2: And as we mentioned earlier, his brother is a suit
Speaker 2: he's doing a job where he's wearing a suit. His
Speaker 2: sister's doing a little bit better for herself as well.
Speaker 2: And then his parents walk in and his dad is
Speaker 2: a successful sci fi author, his mum is a lot
Speaker 2: happier with him. He seems a lot more sure of himself. Now.
Speaker 2: What's interesting is Biff's entire family line has also been altered.
Speaker 2: So whereas Biff was, you know, Biff still could have
Speaker 2: been a dickhead middle management guy, but he's not. This
Speaker 2: is like just to go go oh though they had
Speaker 2: for you, mister McFly, polishing up the cars, like doing
Speaker 2: just general dog's body work, like a lap dog, And
Speaker 2: it's like, why would Biff?
Speaker 1: That's a message. You're right, that's a message I actually
Speaker 1: didn't like as a as.
Speaker 2: A younger personally, he had to lose for them to win.
Speaker 1: As a younger person, I could get why you'd make
Speaker 1: that the ending because as a young person where you're
Speaker 1: young and you've like been bullied at school, that that
Speaker 1: is cathartic. Yes, everything works out and the bully gets
Speaker 1: their come up, and as an adult who's older and
Speaker 1: supposedly wiser, you kind of look at it and go
Speaker 1: So Biff was obviously a bad guy as a teenager,
Speaker 1: but he doesn't get a chance to make up for
Speaker 1: those mistakes, like it's redmp that's doomed his entire life.
Speaker 1: But then again, he also did try and rape Thiggy,
Speaker 1: soh so actually my sympathy, But how does he.
Speaker 2: Go from that to the simpy guy that.
Speaker 1: It doesn't really fit, does it.
Speaker 2: No, he's clearly there.
Speaker 1: I don't know. I think I'm guessing they already knew
Speaker 1: they were gonna do the sequel, because it's it's just
Speaker 1: set up for the sequel, because if I'm writing the sequel,
Speaker 1: he's that pathetic version, isn't he. And then he gets
Speaker 1: the Almanact.
Speaker 2: No souse, it kind of it kind of destroys itself.
Speaker 2: So according to the Cannon as it would be at
Speaker 2: this point, he was the rapee jock guy in the
Speaker 2: in his youth. He then became a simpering guy who
Speaker 2: just polished the car for George, and then as he
Speaker 2: gets older in the future, he then sees Martin mc
Speaker 2: fly by the Sports Almanac and finds this time machine,
Speaker 2: and he's a grouchy get going hello, and he's back
Speaker 2: to being a bit of a bully. And then he
Speaker 2: goes back in time gives the nineteen fifty five self
Speaker 2: of him the Almanac so that he can become rich.
Speaker 2: So that which is a great storyline again something we'll
Speaker 2: discuss more if and when we do the second film,
Speaker 2: but it essentially means that it's Biff is only a
Speaker 2: simpling twat in this slither of time in this one timeline,
Speaker 2: he's not like even in the future of that character.
Speaker 2: He goes back to being old Biff, which is kind
Speaker 2: of weird. Something I do want to say is, and
Speaker 2: that's never mentioned in the entire trilogy. Marty is surprised
Speaker 2: to find that his family are much more successful. Every
Speaker 2: other change that's been made in history, Marty has basically
Speaker 2: been the only reason to know that history is playing
Speaker 2: out differently, and in this occasion, history is playing out differently.
Speaker 2: His parents are a success, He's families of success. Biff
Speaker 2: is different, but Marty doesn't know why. He just knows
Speaker 2: he's made a change in fifty five and now everything's different.
Speaker 2: And what I think a third film should have been,
Speaker 2: rather than The Wild West, because I don't particularly care
Speaker 2: for that idea, is this this film is about the past.
Speaker 2: The second film is about the present because it's got
Speaker 2: the alternate present created by Biff getting the Almanac in
Speaker 2: nineteen fifty five. The other one is about well and
Speaker 2: they go into the future. Sorry, And then the third
Speaker 2: one should have been about the fact that Marty can't
Speaker 2: really connect with his family anymore, because if you think
Speaker 2: about it, all the little things you have, if like
Speaker 2: all the jokes you have with your family are do
Speaker 2: you remember when we did this?
Speaker 1: No?
Speaker 2: Like yeah, and how would that affect?
Speaker 1: Like?
Speaker 2: Yes, his family are doing much better and they're still alive,
Speaker 2: but they're not really his family anymore, because the entire
Speaker 2: connecting thread between them and him doesn't connect into any
Speaker 2: of his memories. And I think that would have been
Speaker 2: an interesting side to play out. Didn't necessarily have to
Speaker 2: end in a dark way. You could have found a
Speaker 2: positive end to it. Essentially, that end would have been
Speaker 2: this is his coming of age story, and it's as
Speaker 2: he leaves the home he's become. In this sense, it's
Speaker 2: exaggerated to the fact that he's a time traveler, but essentially,
Speaker 2: as he comes of a and becomes an adult, he
Speaker 2: realizes he no longer fits into the home dynamic and
Speaker 2: has to go out on his own, which is what
Speaker 2: the lessons he learns from the dock and eventually becomes
Speaker 2: a time traveler having the adventures he wants. Right. Number one,
Speaker 2: that would have been good if you wanted to make
Speaker 2: sequels or cartoons, spin offs, things like that, which is
Speaker 2: great for the marketing department. But number two, it's also
Speaker 2: much better for a story narrative than seeing Wild West Biff.
Speaker 2: It has a lot more impact because you're actually giving
Speaker 2: us a story about Marty.
Speaker 1: Yeah, I agree, the Wild Way. I've only I've seen
Speaker 1: the trilogy once and I remember the Wild West one
Speaker 1: feeling out of place.
Speaker 2: It was meant to be so Back to Future two
Speaker 2: and three were meant to be one movie.
Speaker 1: Yes, and that's very much evident when you watch Back
Speaker 1: to the Future eventually.
Speaker 2: I'll be honest, the Wild Worst bit was unnecessarily regardless,
Speaker 2: like adding it to two would have ruined two, and
Speaker 2: having it as his own film wasn't enough to substantiate itself.
Speaker 2: So I just find it weird that there was this
Speaker 2: potential better element they could have used that actually impacts
Speaker 2: the characters, and they just didn't go with it. I've
Speaker 2: got one last thing I just want to know if
Speaker 2: there's any because of mine is about the very end.
Speaker 2: Do you have anything else you've you're not the own before?
Speaker 1: I get no, not really, I yeah, no, not really.
Speaker 2: So my last couple of bits is I love the
Speaker 2: last line, which is where we're going. We don't need
Speaker 2: Rhods classic line. But last thing where I'm like, this
Speaker 2: doesn't really work so Marty finds Jennifer. They're about to
Speaker 2: go out and do something. Doc pulls up in the Dolorean. Marty,
Speaker 2: we've got to go back to the fieldal Mardy, kids, Mardy,
Speaker 2: Jennifer's right there has no idea about the rest of
Speaker 2: this film. That's no idea what they're talking about. And
Speaker 2: he's just up the duck. One of our Jennifers. She
Speaker 2: should come to it. It concerns her future. Quickly, they
Speaker 2: all just bundle into the car, including Jennifer, with zero questions.
Speaker 1: Yeah, Jennifer has no lines. I don't know a single
Speaker 1: She's not all like, what this crazy old man doing
Speaker 1: here driving a.
Speaker 2: Dolore and what's this flux capacitor ship?
Speaker 1: What do you mean time travel?
Speaker 2: Yeah? She just sits in there and he's just like,
Speaker 2: so where we're going dark? And he just goes where
Speaker 2: we go we don't need.
Speaker 1: Roads and the car flies.
Speaker 2: Yes, And she's just sat there going, well, I wonder
Speaker 2: where we're going to day? Give this Jesus.
Speaker 1: I feel like she's the I feel like she's the
Speaker 1: dog in the house on fire meme. This is fine.
Speaker 2: Yeah, she's just fucking lived it all right, This is fine.
Speaker 2: But yeah, that's my last road baby.
Speaker 1: Okay, then, Raussam, how do you feel after a second
Speaker 1: take about Back to the Future. Does it deserve its
Speaker 1: place in film history?
Speaker 2: I think it does hold up, yes, and no. I
Speaker 2: think it holds up for the nostalgia sake. If you
Speaker 2: have been staged for this, it will definitely hold up.
Speaker 2: And I don't think there's anything anyone could say to
Speaker 2: make you hate this film. This film has more plot
Speaker 2: holes than the second one, and the second one is
Speaker 2: not exactly free of them either, but this one has
Speaker 2: a lot more holes and I just find the whole Hey,
Speaker 2: my mum fancies me a bit creepy, so it's not
Speaker 2: really my gym something I will say, And maybe I
Speaker 2: might be right wrong. This might be something I'd actually
Speaker 2: asked the audience to comment on and see what they feel,
Speaker 2: because my ex used to really like this film, that
Speaker 2: she thought this was the best one and I didn't.
Speaker 2: And I after talking to a few people that preferred
Speaker 2: and didn't prefer this film, the common thread I found
Speaker 2: with those who really preferred it and thought this was
Speaker 2: the best of the trilogy was they were what they
Speaker 2: would say is going, Oh, but don't you think it
Speaker 2: would be cool to, you know, go and see what
Speaker 2: your parents were like in school. No, and yeah, for me,
Speaker 2: the answer is no, I don't. I don't really want
Speaker 2: to go and see my mum and dad in school.
Speaker 2: But and I know my dad was doing stupid, pranky
Speaker 2: things like he used to toilet paper the outside of
Speaker 2: the building and get away with it because they never
Speaker 2: figured out it was him. But you also used to
Speaker 2: get caned quite a lot, which would have been fun
Speaker 2: to watch. And so but it's one of those things
Speaker 2: where it's like, I know my parents as they are now.
Speaker 2: I don't really want to meet them at a point
Speaker 2: where they would because that's part of their history that
Speaker 2: they'd want to keep to themselves. There's parts that we
Speaker 2: all do. Certainly when we've grown up, we make mistakes
Speaker 2: that you don't then pass on to your children. And
Speaker 2: yet if you were to go back, you to see
Speaker 2: all those mistakes. I know my parents for who they
Speaker 2: are and how they present since I've been born, and
Speaker 2: that's what I'd like to know of them. And if
Speaker 2: they tell me anything about their past, that'd be great,
Speaker 2: But it's I don't want to also remove their narrative
Speaker 2: because the thing is they've been certainly my dad. My
Speaker 2: dad tells a lot of stories about himself. Fast to think,
Speaker 2: actually you got the details wrong, It breaks in because
Speaker 2: it's his story to tell.
Speaker 1: Well, I guess those people are the target audience though,
Speaker 1: because I don't know if you've read this. Zamechis uh.
Speaker 1: I was reading about the production and the pre production
Speaker 1: of the film, and zamechis like, the thing that inspired
Speaker 1: him to write this story was he was looking at
Speaker 1: his dad's school yearbook, Yeah, and saw a picture of
Speaker 1: his dad, and he just randomly got the thought, I
Speaker 1: wonder if we'd have been friends. Probably not, Yeah, And
Speaker 1: he thought, I'm going to make a film about that.
Speaker 2: Yeah. And I mean it's I like, as an idea,
Speaker 2: it's cool, but it's not something that I've ever been
Speaker 2: interested in my own family life. I think that's where
Speaker 2: your line would normally be correct me. If I'm wrong, audience,
Speaker 2: you know, obviously go into the discord or emailing say
Speaker 2: your piece. But I think to really think, to really
Speaker 2: appreciate this film at its best, you would kind of
Speaker 2: have to be the sort of person that does that question.
Speaker 2: Would I have been friends or would I you know,
Speaker 2: how cool? Would it have been to see my parents
Speaker 2: when they were young. If the answer for you is yeah,
Speaker 2: that would have been smoking cool, then this is film
Speaker 2: for you. If not, it's still enjoyable film. It's still
Speaker 2: a good film, but I don't think it will hit
Speaker 2: the same beats that it does for the other people.
Speaker 2: What about you?
Speaker 1: So, like I said at the start, I don't have
Speaker 1: nostalgia for this in the way that other people know.
Speaker 1: So I'm not going to see it and claim I
Speaker 1: loved this film. I enjoyed it. It's a good film. Yeah,
Speaker 1: it's a perfectly enjoyable film. I can see why it's
Speaker 1: got the place in history that it's got. It's the
Speaker 1: highest grossing film of nineteen eighty five. They ended up
Speaker 1: making three of them. Like you said, they've also done
Speaker 1: a stage musical that apparently is brilliant.
Speaker 2: Yeah, i've heard from what I've seen it, but yeah.
Speaker 1: No, neither of I. But I've heard it's great. Yeah,
Speaker 1: I don't regret having watched it. I don't regret having
Speaker 1: given it a second take. Like I said, it's never
Speaker 1: going to have the cultural grip on me that it
Speaker 1: has on a lot of people my age.
Speaker 2: But it's definitely one you need to see as a kid.
Speaker 1: I had a good time. There are some weird fucking
Speaker 1: choices in it. Yeah, but I had a good time,
Speaker 1: and it's it is. Marty and Dock will be pop
Speaker 1: culture forever. Like you know, no matter what happens going forward,
Speaker 1: that image will be pop culture for a very long time. Anyway.
Speaker 1: That is back to the future, and that is the
Speaker 1: end of Listener Request month. Thank you everyone for tuning
Speaker 1: in with us over the last few weeks. We are
Speaker 1: going to go on a little bit of a break now,
Speaker 1: but don't worry, it won't be for too long. If
Speaker 1: all goes to Planet's about a month and a half,
Speaker 1: about six weeks. We already have the next season planned.
Speaker 1: We know what episodes we're doing, We've got some guests
Speaker 1: lined up, and we're gonna be off to a big start.
Speaker 1: So we'll see you in about a month and a
Speaker 1: half for season four of Second Take Cinema. Until then,
Speaker 1: have a great early summer period as wo our guests.
Speaker 2: We would call this now. Yeah, May, May and June is.
Speaker 1: Sort of early summer, early summer, early summer. Peace out