Going Back With “Back To The Future”

Lake Charles, LA, July, 1985

I fondly remember seeing 1985’s wildly successful Back To The Future with my friend, Brent, in Lake Charles, LA when I was kid. The only bit that I’m not sure about is whether I saw the film at the old Prien Lake Mall Cinema I, II, and III, or the old Oak Park VI. I’m leaning towards Oak Park, as that was my favorite theater as a child. In any case, what I remember best was the actual film. I wanted to be Marty McFly (Michael J. Fox) and I wanted to be Jennifer Parker’s (Claudia Wells) boyfriend. I wanted to drive the DeLorean and I wanted to be friends with Doc Brown (Christopher Lloyd). I wanted to travel through time and rock out to Huey Lewis & The News.

Well, I didn’t get to travel through time, date Claudia Wells, or befriend Doc Brown, but I did get to rock along with Huey Lewis & The News. Their album Fore! was the first cassette tape that I ever purchased as a kid. I loved them as a preteen and still do. I also got to take a photo with a DeLorean a few years ago that was traveling the world (but not time) raising money for the Fox Foundation, Michael J. Fox’s Parkinson’s research group.

The film was a perfect storm for me. It featured a hero that was cool, loved rock n’ roll and science, and drove a sweet Toyota truck. It had time travel and all of the wonderful fictional bits and gizmos that such an idea would need to appeal to a preteen kid who loved science fiction. It also featured the 1950’s, which were probably some of the coolest years in American history as far as I was concerned at the time (and now).

The film’s cast was also amazing. Who didn’t want to be Michael J. Fox in the 1980’s? He simply bled cool all of the time. Between his film career, voice acting, and popular run on television with shows such as Family Ties and Spin City, Fox became a household name well into the late 1990’s before Parkinson’s disease slowed him down. Christopher Lloyd nailed the role of Dr. Emmett “Doc” Brown. He was the old weird guy that was actually a genius that a wide-eyed kid like myself wanted to stumble upon and go on a great adventure with and discover wonderful things. His career was already well established (including a turn as Commander Kruge in Star Trek III: The Search For Spock) when Back To The Future was released, and he has continued to have a prolific career. Lea Thompson was (and still is) a knockout as Marty’s mom. Like Lloyd, Thompson had already featured in a number of films (including All The Right Moves and Red Dawn), and would go on to have a solid career littered with hits such as her series Caroline In The City and a few misses such as Howard The Duck.

Two other key members of the film’s cast, Crispin Glover as George McFly, Marty’s father, and Thomas F. Wilson as Biff, the main antagonist of the film, would also have solid careers. Glover would find his niche in eccentric and oddball characters in films such as Willard and Tim Burton’s Alice In Wonderland. Wilson would turn to stand-up comedy, voice acting, and recurring and guest starring roles on television.

Claudia Wells (Marty’s girlfriend, Jennifer) left acting after making Back To The Future due to her mother’s breast cancer diagnosis. She returned to acting in the 2000’s. Other cast members included character actors Marc McClure (Jimmy Olsen in the Christopher Reeve Superman films) and Wendi Jo Sperber (Bosom Buddies, Private Benjamin) as Marty’s brother and sister, Dave and Linda, and James Tolkan (Remington Steele, Masters of the Universe) as Mr. Strickland. The film also featured Billy Zane (The Phantom, Titanic) in his first film role as Match and Casey Siemaszko (Young Guns, The Phantom) in one of his earliest roles as 3-D, both of which were goons in Biff’s gang.

Also of note is Donald Fullilove (Up) as Mayor Goldie Wilson, Courtney Gaines (Children of the Corn) as Dixon, and Jason Hervey (The Wonder Years) as Milton. I actually met Fullilove at a convention a couple of years ago. He was an amazing dude.

The film’s music also hit me. The score by Alan Silvestri (The Avengers, Forrest Gump), whose music almost always lifts a film to another level, did just that with Back To The Future. Despite taking place primarily in the 1950’s, the film sounds like a blockbuster shot in the 80’s with tons of heart that doesn’t take away from the primary setting. The tracks by Huey Lewis & The News also add to the film, reminding everyone that even though Marty was in the 1950’s, he was a child of the 80’s.

I love this film (if you couldn’t already tell) and despite that fact, I only recently picked up the film on Blu-ray. I still have my old VHS copy but I don’t know if it will even work. 2020 will see the film celebrate thirty-five years, so be sure to strap into your favorite recliner at some point this year and watch Back To The Future. When it hits eighty-eight miles per hour, you’re gonna see some serious……awesomeness.

Thanks for reading!