Review for Back To The Future Trilogy

Introduction

“If only I’d had known that they’d invent Blu-ray, I’d never have bought the DVD!” For anyone who’s been a collector of home cinema, I’m sure that is a sentiment that has crossed the mind on more than one occasion, as no doubt has “If only I’d had known that they’d invent DVD, I’d never have bought the Video!”, and probably “If only I’d had known that they’d invent widescreen VHS, I’d never have bought the pan and scan!” With the Back to the Future trilogy however, that first exclamation is one that has crossed my lips on many an occasion. After all, the UK release of the trilogy on DVD was a nightmare that seemed never to end. The initial release looked fine, until it transpired that both of the sequels were incorrectly framed. That was a production error of a magnitude that got reported on BBC Ceefax! When Universal issued corrected discs, the corrected Back to the Future III wound up with incorrect brightness for the second half of the film, prompting another disc replacement programme. It was almost a year between purchasing the set, and finally viewing it as intended. On top of that Universal gave with one hand, Region 2 & 4 exclusive DTS audio tracks, and took with the other, over half of the US extra features. By the time they moved to rectify that with a four disc re-release, I had become disillusioned with the whole thing, and never bothered to double dip.

That’s until now, given that the Blu-ray trilogy can usually be found in bargain buckets for a third the price I originally paid for that DVD collection, and I find that it not only has all of the extra features that were on that US release, and were mostly culled in favour of DTS audio, but there are more recent and other vintage extra features as well, including the infamous Eric Stoltz as Marty footage. And while I had put the DVDs in the ‘good enough for an upscale job’ pile, I’m not going to complain about having to watch some of my favourite movies in high definition!

Three discs are presented in one Amaray style Blu-ray case, with two discs on a central hinged panel, and one at the rear. The case also has a nice shiny o-ring card that merely repeats the sleeve art and blurb.

Introduction: Back to the Future

A typical teenage boy by the name of Marty McFly lives in the typical dysfunctional family, two siblings, an alcoholic mother Lorraine, and a spineless father George (who’s been bullied by his supervisor Biff Tannen for as long as he can remember). Marty has dreams of escaping this humdrum existence, of becoming a rock and roll star, but he’s inherited his father’s lack of self confidence, but has a plus in Jennifer, his hot girlfriend. The one thing that makes him atypical as a teen is his choice of friends, Hill Valley’s very own mad scientist, Doctor Emmett Brown. Only Doc Brown is an inventor who’s finally made something that works... a time machine. Which is how Marty winds up stranded in 1955, with a DeLorean time machine without any plutonium. He has to somehow convince the younger Doc Brown to help him get back to 1985, but that’s the least of his problems, as he wound up bumping into his dad as a teenager, stopping his parents from meeting, and worse, his teenage mother has seriously got the hots for him.

Picture: Back to the Future

Very soon, I’m going to start sounding like a broken record when it comes to the technical qualities of well-authored Blu-rays. It doesn’t matter so much that the discs take a comparative eternity to load, that the menu interface feels so clunky, when they get the basics of image and sound right. Back to the Future looks gorgeous on Blu-ray, and as a film that comes from a period where the majority of Hollywood output generally looked soft and grainy, this film’s image is full of detail, with strong colours and a restrained level of film grain. Back to the Future is a very visual film, both in terms of actor performances from the leads, the period detail of the 50s and the visual gags and payoffs that you really need to pay attention to. The clarity of Back to the Future’s 1.85:1 widescreen 1080p transfer makes watching this film on Blu-ray an added joy, and it has really scrubbed up a treat. Of course in HD, some of that old-age make-up is beginning to look a little ropy, but you can’t have everything.

Sound: Back to the Future

It’s the same with the audio, with a DTS-HD MA 5.1 English surround track that is rich and vibrant, not overegging the surround experience, but conveying the film’s action sequences with impact, and bringing extra clarity to the film’s music soundtrack. Alan Silvestri’s score still helps the film soar, while the pop tunes, not least that iconic Huey Lewis theme song sound better than ever. You also have audio choices in half bitrate DTS 5.1 Japanese and German, DD 5.1 Surround Turkish, and DTS 2.0 mono Japanese, along with subtitles in those languages, and subtitles in Danish, Finnish, Icelandic, Norwegian, Portuguese, and Swedish.

Extras: Back to the Future

The disc starts up with an anti-piracy thank you, before eventually loading the animated menu, in whichever language you choose from a preliminary menu screen. The film pops-up a progress bar during playback if you pause or skip back and forth, and apparently there is some BD Live content for this disc, if the servers are still switched on...

The Q&A commentary with Bob Zemeckis and Bob Gale was on that original DVD release, but the feature commentary with producers Bob Gale and Neil Canton wasn’t, and both are subtitled if you need them.

A U-Control feature allows you to access a pop-up trivia track (identical in content if not presentation to that on the DVD), set-ups and payoffs, and PiP Storyboard Comparisons (not just the two from the DVD) during playback of the film.

The Tales From The Future documentary segments were created in 2010, a more recent retrospective with contributions from the cast and crew. In The Beginning lasts 27 minutes, Time to Go lasts 29 minutes, and Keeping Time lasts 6 minutes. All are presented in 1080p HD.


In the Archival Featurettes, I found the original Making of Back to the Future 1985 featurette that was on the first DVD trilogy, as was the Making of the Trilogy Chapter 1 featurette from 2002, both running to 15 minutes each. It was my first time watching Back to the Future Night though, which was an NBC special from1989 that preceded a showing of the first film, while promoting the then imminent release of the second. This lasts 27 minutes and is presented by Leslie Nielsen. All of these are in SD format.

The Michael J. Fox Q&A lasts just over 10 minutes, and can be played in 8 chunks, or all in one go. It too is in SD format, and is probably taken from the 4-disc DVD re-release.

Behind The Scenes offers the same Original Make-up Tests, (2 mins and SD) and the outtakes (3 mins and HD) that were on the DVD. The Nuclear Test Site Sequence is something that is new to this release, the original ending presented in storyboard form with optional commentary from Bob Gale. This is presented in HD, and will make you see the ‘nuke the fridge’ moment in Indy 4 in a new light. The Photo Galleries are presented in HD and offer production art, additional storyboards, behind the scenes photos, marketing materials and character portrait slideshows, with a lot more material than was on the DVD.

You get the Huey Lewis and The News music video for The Power of Love, 6½ minutes SD, which I appreciated, and the cool Theatrical and the Teaser Trailer, both in SD.

Conclusion: Back to the Future

There comes a point where reviewing a film makes no sense whatsoever. I’m long past that point with Back to the Future. It is a perfect film, a great story with engaging characters, capturing the zeitgeist of the era in which it was made, yet also sparking nostalgia for a simpler, more Technicolor era, and on top of that obtaining timeless classic status. It’s untouchable as a piece of art, immune to criticism, and subject only to appreciation and analysis. You don’t go through Back to the Future picking nits or searching out flaws, although you might watch it perplexed at how the filmmakers got it so right! Every time I’ve watched Back to the Future it’s with an upwelling of irrepressible glee, and the same was true watching the Blu-ray this time.

In the extras, Bob Gale mentions that the idea for Back to the Future crystallised when he was going through old high school yearbooks and discovered his own father’s high school career. He wondered if he could have been friends with that boy, and from that came the idea of travelling back in time to meet your parents as they were teenagers, and finding out that your teenage selves probably have more in common than not. It’s a compelling idea that lies at the heart of Back to the Future, and that’s what makes it so timeless. That Marty also goes back and winds up fixing his parent’s personal issues, and changing their futures for the better, turning a dead-end loveless marriage around by simple means of teaching his father to stand up for himself also gives the film a Capra-esque quality that adds another layer of wonder.

Of course you have the nostalgia for the bright and shiny, Fonzie-world fifties which probably bear no resemblance to the real thing, but appeal to our constant belief that things were always better when we were kids, that the sun was shinier, that life was simpler, and that people were happier, which will immediately be contradicted by complaints when our own kids ask for a Playstation, of doing homework on the back of a shovel, keeping warm in the winter around the only TV in the house, and getting beatings for looking at our parents the wrong way. But after 30 years, it turns out that there is an added layer of nostalgia now in Back to the Future, to the simpler days of the 1980s when Huey Lewis rocked his way up the charts, and no one had yet ‘twerked’.


You also have the wonderful characters, the everyman hero of the film, Marty McFly, and his mentor, the wonderfully eccentric Doc Brown, George and Lorraine McFly, who are in fact two characters in one, as it’s the performances that sell the middle-aged versions of the characters more than the make-up, so much so that the first time I saw the film, I was actually stunned when I saw young George McFly in the cafe, and briefly wondered if they’d actually got two lookalikes for the roles. And of course there is the multigenerational nemesis, Biff Tannen. There’s a great sense of humour to the film which never grows old, and it’s full of deft touches and visual gags that reward repeat watches. As I said, Back to the Future is perfect.

10/10

Introduction: Back to the Future Part II

After having his life saved by Marty’s letter, Doc Brown might have felt obligated to help his young friend’s future family, which is why he bundled Marty and Jennifer off to 2015 at the end of the first film. But you don’t take a flying DeLorean time machine, and a teenager who can spot a get-rich-quick scheme in a Sports Almanac to 2015, and get careless around a future Biff Tannen. When they get back to 1985, Hill Valley has changed, and changed for the worse. Biff Tannen is now the richest man in America, has turned the courthouse into a casino hotel, and Hill Valley into a lawless polluted hellhole, and married Marty’s mother. What’s worse is that George McFly is dead. Not only must Doc and Marty figure out how history has changed, they must go back and fix it. It means going back to 1955, the night of the Hill Valley storm, the night that Marty’s parents fall in love, the night that Marty goes back to the future, the first time. Things are getting heavy.

Picture: Back to the Future Part II

Just like the first film, Back to the Future Part II gets a 1.85:1 widescreen transfer at 1080p resolution, and it’s of similar overall quality to the first film, although to my eyes, it did seem a little less grainy, and with a richer colour palette, and a smidge more detail as a result. There is the odd scene which is a little soft in comparison to the rest of the film, but the irony is that as it’s the film in the trilogy that is the heaviest in terms of special effects, it also looks the most dated. Optical effects do hold up well in comparison to the way CGI holds up over time, but the creakiness comes in the double, and triple role scenes, where the seams are more obvious and you can see where the camera splits are, even with the accuracy of motion control. When things get back to the alternate 1985, and back to 1955, the film evens out.

Sound: Back to the Future Part II

You have the same audio and subtitle options as for the first film. I was very happy with the surround audio, which does a splendid job in immersing the viewer in the film. The dialogue is clear throughout, and for a film that was originally distributed in stereo, the effects get decent placement around the soundstage. Alan Silvestri’s score carries the film, but other than a brief burst of Beat It at the Cafe Eighties, and revisiting Earth Angel and Johnny B. Goode at the ‘Fish Under the Sea’ dance in 1955, this is a pop song free movie.

Extras: Back to the Future Part II

An anti-piracy trailer precedes the animated menu once more, after a lengthy load wait.

Once again, the U-Control feature allows you to pop up Storyboard Comparisons, Set-ups and Pay-Offs and a Trivia track during playback of the film. With closer examination it turns out that the Trivia tracks aren’t just the DVD tracks repurposed, but have been updated for the 2010 set with new information.

I got to hear the Q&A Commentary with Bob Zemeckis and Bob Gale, and the theatrical commentary with Bob Gale and Neil Canton that were left off the original DVD release for the first time, and there is some interesting information about the film to be had here.

Tales From the Future: Time Flies is the documentary that was created for the second film for this Blu-ray release, and features input from the cast and crew, and some intriguing behind the scenes footage from the making of the film. It lasts 29 minutes and is presented in HD.


Also new to this collection is the Physics of Back to the Future with Dr Michio Kaku. This lasts 8½ minutes and is presented in HD, and the physicist waxes lyrical about a time travel movie that mostly gets it right!

There are seven deleted scenes here presented in HD running to around 6 minutes, some 3 more scenes than on the DVD that I have. Also from that DVD and presented in SD are the archival featurettes, the Making of BTTF II from 1989, and the Making of the Trilogy Chapter 2 from 2002.

The contents of the Behind the Scenes menu are mostly presented in SD, and repeat the Outtakes and Hoverboard Test that were on the original DVD release. Left off that release, but available here are featurettes on Production Design (3 mins), Storyboarding (1½ mins), Designing the DeLorean (3½ mins), Designing Time Travel (2½ mins), and the Evolution of Visual Effects Shots with voiceover from Bob Gale (6 mins). The Photo Gallery slideshows are in HD, and once again comprise production art, additional storyboards, behind the scenes photos, marketing materials and character portraits.

Finally for this disc, there is the Theatrical Trailer.

Conclusion: Back to the Future Part II

It starts off as Back From the Future, and then becomes Back From the Second Altered Timeline to the First Altered Timeline, before becoming Back to the Future Again. Watch out for the changes and try to keep up! Back to the Future Part II was made back when the majority of sequels were often remakes, or separate stories utilising the same characters. This was an attempt to continue a story, and made back to back with Back to the Future Part III, turned one popular film into a popular saga. Of course, now the situation is reversed, where ongoing narratives are the norm, and filming movies back to back isn’t unusual either. What’s amazing is that Back to the Future had a joke ending, with the flying DeLorean and the ‘to be continued’ caption. As mentioned in the extras, it left the creators with a dead end to write themselves out of, with a visit to the future, and with Jennifer Parker tagging along as well. After all, the movies are really about Doc Brown and Marty McFly, and it’s why Jennifer spends most of the sequels unconscious.


For me Back to the Future Part II is my least favourite of the films, as it loses itself somewhat in complexity, and with the first and the middle act really just there to move the film to the final act, the movie that the two Bobs were really aiming for, getting the main characters and inserting them into the first film, revisiting that story from another perspective. The future is played for laughs, exaggerating future trends, and hiding the thinness of the story at that point behind a heap of special effects, and the gag that Michael J. Fox plays all the members of his family. To use Elizabeth Shue a little more, they should have got her to play Marty Jr. against Fox’s Marlene, but I guess that would have been a little too weird.

Obligatory ‘Where’s My Flying Car?’ paragraph begins.

Next year is 2015. That’s both mind-boggling and depressing. The future that I watched with such wonderment and joy back in 1989 has almost come to pass, 30 years after the first movie, 25 years after the sequel was made, and it’s inevitable that you evaluate its predictions against reality. At this point however, it stops being prognostication, and starts being the kind of quaint novelty in film like 2001 and 2010, in Things to Come, and other futurist films that missed the target. Let’s face it, all future films miss the target as they have to entertain first, and that requires exaggeration, not realism. So no flying cars, no hoverboards, no bionic implants, no holographic displays, and no Mr Fusion. In fact fusion energy is still just as far in the future now according to the scientists as it was when I was born. But, we do have mobile phones and the Internet (fired by fax indeed!).

Obligatory ‘Where’s My Flying Car?’ paragraph ends.

The alternate 1985 is just as radical an exaggeration as this film’s view of the future, with Biff Tannen’s rampant excess and flagrant abuse of power figuratively turning Hill Valley into hell. It’s interesting seeing the world gone wrong, lawless, polluted, hedonistic, as well as the changes it has wrought on Marty’s family. There are less of the special effects here, but just as the opening act was really about setting up the Sports Almanac Maguffin, this act is about establishing the magnitude of the error that Doc and Marty have to undo, and finding out just where and when they have to go to undo it. Everything else feels like window dressing, a means to an end.


It’s when they get back to 1955 that things get interesting, as it’s those characters that we fell in love with from the original movie, not the OAPs and caricatures from 2015, and certainly not the distortions from the alternate 1985. The dual role effects finally contribute to the story beyond simple effects wizardry and vanity, when Doc Brown and Marty have to avoid interacting with their past selves in the original movie. We get to see more of Biff’s attempts to woo Lorraine, and we see the first movie again from a different angle. It’s just as charming and engaging, and the best bit about Part II. I certainly wish there was more of it, and less of the second act.

Back to the Future Part II is fun, but it feels like three episodes glued together rather than one single movie. It doesn’t hold up too well by itself, but taken as the middle film in the trilogy it works effectively. I can’t remember how I handled the six month wait between it and the final film back in 1990, but fortunately that isn’t a problem with this Blu-ray collection.

7/10

Introduction: Back to the Future Part III

Doc Brown is stranded in 1885, after the DeLorean was struck by lightning, but he’s happy living in the Old West, and has found a job as the Hill Valley blacksmith. He has no intention of returning to 1985, which would leave Marty in a quandary, as he’s still stuck in 1955. Fortunately the younger Doc Brown is there, and once he gets over the shock of seeing the boy he just sent back to the future all over again, he and Marty can uncover the DeLorean, buried for the last 80 years in Boot Hill Cemetery, repair it and get Marty back home. Except that they discover Doc Brown’s grave in the cemetery, shot in the back, and died just a week after he sent Marty the letter. Marty decides to go instead to 1885 to save his friend, except he gets into trouble straight away when he runs out of gas, runs into his great grandfather, and then runs into Buford ‘Mad Dog’ Tannen. To top it all off, Doc’s fallen in love, and he isn’t thinking straight. Great Scott!

Picture: Back to the Future Part III

Just as before, Back to the Future, Part III gets a 1.85:1 widescreen transfer at 1080p resolution. The third film fares a little better than the second on this disc, as I feel that the image quality is more consistent and clear throughout. It helps that it’s one movie, and not three as before, a Western through and through, while the film isn’t as reliant on special effects. Other than the time travel effects, the only challenges are the scenes where Marty interacts with great-great grandpa Seamus, and this time it’s not a case of showing off the technology, but rather more essential to the story. It isn’t exactly Deadwood, but the production values certainly show on screen creating a past a little more grimy and primitive, while the film has a nice nostalgic warmth to it that mirrors the first film. Once again, the detail really pays dividends on Blu-ray, although seeing Buford’s drool in all its glory probably won’t be a selling point.

Sound: Back to the Future Part III

The same audio and subtitle options again, and you can guess that I went with the DTS-HD MA 5.1 English track. This film has the more robust sound design and presence of the three, once again due to it sticking to one specific genre, and also because it’s the most recent. Dialogue is clear, while the surrounds are put to use conveying the film’s effects and music. It’s in this film that Alan Silvestri’s music shines the most in my opinion, as he adapts his score for the first film to give it a Western feel, as well as adding a few new specific themes as well to convey the romance of Doc Brown and Clara. But you do get a bit of ZZ Top for the end credits, as well as a memorable cameo.

Extras: Back to the Future Part III

An anti-piracy trailer precedes the animated menu once more, after a lengthy load wait.

Once again, the U-Control feature allows you to pop up Storyboard Comparisons, Set-ups and Pay-Offs and a Trivia track during playback of the film

And once more I finally got to hear the Q&A Commentary with Bob Zemeckis and Bob Gale, and the theatrical commentary with Bob Gale and Neil Canton that were left off the original DVD release. One thing to note, as I was playing with the disc during playback, hopping through commentaries, flicking the various U-Control options, and skipping back and forth through the disc, I apparently overwhelmed my player’s memory, and the disc froze and crashed.


New for the Blu-ray release are the Tales from the Future featurettes, presented in HD. On Part III, there is a retrospective look at the film’s making titled Third Time’s The Charm, which lasts 17 minutes. Then there is an overall look at the trilogy’s legacy in The Test of Time, which also last 17 minutes.

You’ll find that Strickland murder deleted scene on this disc, this time in HD, which lasts just over a minute.

The UK BTTF III DVD disc had the most in the way of extra features removed for its DTS audio, and in the Archival featurettes on this Blu-ray, only the Making The Trilogy Chapter Three (16 mins) is familiar. The making of Back to the Future Part III from 1990 lasts 7½ minutes, while the Secrets of the Back to The Future Trilogy is one of those promo programmes that channels like NBC put together for the film’s release, here answering ‘fan’ letters, about the trilogy. This lasts 21 minutes. All are presented in SD.

In the Behind The Scenes section, the Outtakes will be familiar from the DVD, but the Designing the Town of Hill Valley featurette will not, and neither will the Designing the (poster) Campaign. These snippets run to about a minute apiece and are presented in SD. Also in here, you’ll find the Photo Gallery slideshows, divided into the same five categories as on the first two discs.

Naturally the ZZ Top, Doubleback video is here.

FAQs About the Trilogy is a text slideshow with a little Q & A about the trilogy, covering plot holes and time travel concepts. It’s a little akin to the Secrets of the Back to the Future Trilogy featurette but nowhere near as shallow.

The Theatrical Trailer is here.

Finally, the Back to the Future: The Ride is here, presenting the video footage from the Universal theme park ride, without the pesky motion sickness. I was really looking forward to this, as I had missed out on the 2008 DVD re-release, and I had always wondered what it was like. It must have been better in the theme park, as on this disc, played back on a TV; it put me to sleep, with 28 minutes of build-up, followed by 3 minutes of action.

Conclusion: Back to the Future Part III

I mentioned before that the Back to the Future sequels were different from normal sequels from the period, as rather than tell different stories with the same characters, or simply remake the first movie over again to try and appeal to the same audience with as few twists away from the formula as possible, these films actually continued the story and moved the characters on. That’s certainly true for Part 2, and it is true for Part 3 as well, but if you were being uncharitable you could look at Part 3 as a remake of Part 1. After all, it has our characters stranded in the past, trying to figure out a way to get the DeLorean back to the future. This time it isn’t the flux capacitor that needs lightning juice, it’s the humble internal combustion engine. In between they have to stop history getting out of whack, and change someone’s destiny for the better. It sounds a lot like the first film, with the differences being it’s Doc’s destiny that’s up for improvement, and that it’s a Western. Marty has some character growth to undergo as well, as the second film introduced his short temper and inability to resist provocation. Here he learns that being called ‘yeller’ by a man with a gun is a whole lot different from being called ‘chicken’ by Needles.


The film doesn’t shirk on mirroring events from the first two movies either, whether it’s the saloon/cafe confrontation with a Tannen, a chase sequence in the town square, an automated breakfast, a model not built to scale. The film is full of little touches and echoes that delight, familiar enough to reference, but different enough to not merely rehash.

The bottom line is that Back to the Future III is just so much fun. Whereas the second film got a little lost in its time travelling complexity, and revelled in being nifty to the point where the story and the characters began to take second place, Back to the Future Part III brings things back to basics, makes it about the characters once more. It has pace to it, it has energy and it’s replete with magical moments and laugh out loud wittiness. For me, the unexpected star of the film is Thomas F Wilson, who creates a memorable and mangy villain in Buford Tannen. Unlike his descendants, he has a steel core of menace behind his ineptitude and lack of social graces, and of all the Tannens we meet, his descent into manure filled comeuppance is the most deserved and the most satisfying.

I still feel that the ending is a little too schmaltzy, and the less said about those Irish accents the better, but I always look forward to watching Back to the Future III, maybe even a little more than the original, given that I was brought up on Westerns. The first is the best film in my view, with the third close behind, but I find that the more that time passes, the more I see the second film as a necessary stepping stone between the first and the third, and little more.

9/10

Overall

The Back to the Future trilogy is the best I have ever seen it on this Blu-ray release, and the discs are jammed full of extra features to appreciate, collecting everything from that first DVD release, the re-release in 2008, and adding new material for this 2010 Blu-ray edition. It is as comprehensive a release as you can get, until the next one, which will probably have the Saturday morning cartoon on it as well. The films look splendid in high definition, rich in colour and detail, and it doesn’t look as if they’ve been excessively tinkered with in the transition to Blu-ray. These are still the films as I remember them. Of the three, the second film has held up the least well, with the overabundance of special effects in its first act really showing the seams in HD, but that doesn’t stop this from being one of those essential double-dip upgrades.