Directed by: Robert Zemeckis
Starring: Michael J. Fox, Christopher Lloyd, Lea Thompson, Thomas F. Wilson, James Tolkan, Elisabeth Shue
You had better watch Back to the Future Part II with a better-than-vague recollection of the original film, because this ingeniously creative sequel not only takes you to the future, but also back to 1955 to circle the events of the first film with a whole new point of view. After watching Part II, go back to the initial film with the understanding that was so much more going on than meets the eye. Part II does not have the poignancy of the original, but it is wild fun. Trying to explain it is a fool's errand. Just watch how it unfolds and when the ride is over, you realize things more or less fall into place and the plot pieces manage to fit together.
The ending of Back to the Future (1985) provides the jump-off point for this film. Doc Brown (Lloyd), the creator of the DeLorean time machine, takes his young friend Marty (Fox) and his girlfriend Jennifer (Shue) to 2015 in order to rectify a situation which could affect their son's future. "It's your kids. We have to do something about your kids," Doc breathlessly tells Marty and throughout the movie breathlessly explains even more with heedless glee. If there is a record for the number of times "Great Scott!" is uttered in a movie, this movie holds it. Marty and Doc fix the problem with his son, but then unwittingly foster a more dire problem involving a sports almanac, the scheming Biff Tannen (Wilson), the bully from the first film who is now an old man, and of course the time machine itself.
Marty buys a sports almanac in 2015 which details the outcome of "every major sporting event until the end of the century." You would think such an almanac would be the size of an encyclopedia set, but no matter. Marty buys the almanac with thoughts of personal enrichment, but Biff soon steals the almanac and uses the time machine to travel to the past for his own personal enrichment. When Marty and Doc return to 1985, they are soon dropped into a crime-infested, hellish world in which the corrupt, filthy rich Biff runs the town from atop his casino, Marty's mother is married to Biff, and his father has been dead for twelve years. Marty and Doc soon deduce that Biff stole the almanac and time machine and this caused a (I hope I'm explaining this right), a fracture in the space/time continuum in which the events of the past have now given us this "alternate 1985". How to restore the original 1985 to its glory? By traveling back to 1955 and prevent Biff from handing off the almanac to himself and thus sparing the future of Hill Valley the mess it will become if Biff becomes rich and powerful.
Whew. Enough of the plot recap. I'm amazed I've been able to explain it as coherently as I did, but the plot is only just the plot. Part II's ingenuity lies in the joyful absurdities it piles one on top of the other. It stretches the limits of time travel theories and poses questions even the most prolific science fiction writers may not have thought of. We are engrossed in the film even as we realize how crazy it is. Could we pass a quiz on the events we witness here? Probably not, but that is part of the fun. Director Zemeckis and writers Bob Gale and Neil Canton upped even the wacky joy of the first film and leaves us nearly breathless.
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