Back to the Future

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Back to the Future
movie poster
Directed byRobert Zemeckis
Written byRobert Zemeckis,
Bob Gale
Produced bySteven Spielberg
StarringMichael J. Fox,
Christopher Lloyd,
Lea Thompson,
Crispin Glover,
Thomas F. Wilson
Distributed byUniversal Pictures
Running time
111 min.
Budget$19,000,000 (estimated)

Back to the Future is a 1985 film by Robert Zemeckis, written by Robert Zemeckis and Robert Gale, and starring Michael J. Fox. The movie opened on July 3 1985 with artist Drew Struzan creating the film series' distinctive artwork used on movie posters and in other marketing. After the success of the film, its two sequels were filmed together, Back to the Future Part II and Back to the Future Part III, forming a trilogy. Back to the Future grossed USD$210 million dollars at the US box office, making it the highest grossing film of 1985. On December 17 2002 Universal Home Video released Back to the Future: The Complete Trilogy on DVD and VHS. The box sets did very well when released, despite certain framing issues.

Plot synopsis

Template:Spoiler

Marty McFly, a high school student, is invited by his friend Doc Brown, a local scientist, to witness a demonstration of Doc's latest invention, his life's ambition; a time-machine, which has been made from a modified De Lorean sports car. During the test, a group of Libyan terrorists (from whom Doc has stolen the plutonium necessary to fuel the time machine), come looking for revenge. The Libyans murder Doc Brown, unloading a barrage of bullets into his chest. Marty flees the Libyans in the De Lorean and inadvertently travels back to the year 1955. It is here that Marty accidentally interferes with the first meeting of his parents George McFly and Lorraine Baines, an act with seismic cosmic significance, as it threatens to jeopardise Marty's own existence. Marty finds himself stranded, not having brought any additional plutonium back with him. Plutonium in 1955, Marty soon finds out, is "a little hard to come by." Consequently, Marty has to find Doc Brown's 1955 counterpart, find some way to fuel the time machine which needs 1.21 gigawatts of electric power, and get his parents to fall in love in order to repair the damage his presence has done to the events of the past.

See also:

Main cast

Popularity

"Doc" Brown (Christopher Lloyd) and Marty McFly (Michael J. Fox) watching the first test of the time machine.

The series was very popular in the 1980s, even making fans out of celebrities like ZZ Top (who appeared in the third film) and President Ronald Reagan, who used the movie's title as a catch phrase in his speeches and considered accepting a role in the third film as the 1885 mayor of Hill Valley. The hip, upbeat soundtrack to the movie by Huey Lewis and the News contributed to its popularity, and the movie's theme song topped the charts for several weeks in 1985.

Production of the film began on November 26, 1984 with actor Eric Stoltz portraying "Marty McFly", because Fox's schedule with Family Ties initially prevented Fox from accepting the role. After filming began, the filmmakers realized that Stoltz was not right for the part. It is believed that they had, at that point, recorded about one third of the completed movie. By that time, Fox's schedule allowed him to sign on. Shooting was completed on April 20, 1985.

Universal Studios executive Sid Sheinberg nearly retitled the film Space Man from Pluto, because he didn't think that anyone would care to see a movie about time travel. Zemeckis contacted Steven Spielberg for help, who wrote Sheinberg a letter. Spielberg's letter thanked Sheinberg for the joke and said that they all really had a good laugh about it, knowing that Sheinberg would be too proud to admit that he was serious. The issue was then dropped and never brought up again.

Trivia

  • In the Stargate Atlantis episode, Before I Sleep, Major John Sheppard briefly mentions the movie when Dr. Rodney McKay doesn't want to hear about it.
  • A series of tie-in computer games was released for the Amiga computer, to no great acclaim.
  • The nuclear reactor which powers the time machine bears at least passing resemblence to the 1958 Ford Nucleon concept car.
  • One of the episode-screens from Jazz Jackrabbit 2 is a parody of the "Back to the Future" movie-poster.
Wikiquote has quotations related to Back to the Future.
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