Back to the Future Part II (1989)

Genre: Comedy / Science-Fiction

Directed by: Robert Zemeckis

Starring: Michael J. Fox, Christopher Lloyd, Lea Thompson

Running time: 108 minutes

The second movie starts where the first one ends. After repairing the damage he did to his personal history with the help of Doc. Brown and his DeLorean time machine, Marty McFly plans to resume his teenage life with his family and his girlfriend Jennifer. But, Doc comes back to get him, saying they have to go to the future to prevent Marty and Jennifer’s future son from ending up in jail and thus bringing doom upon the family. They travel to October 2015 (yes, I know). Unfortunately, in the process, they do some more life-changing damage to their history, which they will have to repair by going back to 1955 again.

While not as solid as the original, Back to the Future Part II is still a very entertaining flick. Now that we are actually in October 2015, it is quite interesting to see the vision the filmmakers had for these times over 25 years ago. Flying cars and hoverboards, everything automated and technology-galore; while much of it was outlandish, it is still fun to see it and notice that technology has indeed taken over our lives, even though not quite to that extent.

It was also a nice touch to go back to the events of the first film, in a time-travel back to 1955, and see it with a different point of view.

The chemistry between Fox and Lloyd is still solid in this sequel. They work well off each other. Some of the cast, namely Crispin Glover and Claudia Wells, needed to be replaced, but many of the originals were back at it too.

As for the plot, it got convoluted at times because they tried to squeeze a little too much in a film lasting only 108 minutes. Nonetheless, the charm of the characters and the basic storyline still operated. Years later, I am still entertained by it, and that’s really all you can ask from this type of movie. It is not meant to be an accurate account of the future we are in now. In that sense, Zemeckis and co. did a great creative job. They may have gone a tad overboard in terms of plot, but they still managed to deliver a very good movie.

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