1.21 gigawatts?! 1.21 gigawatts?!
December 31st, 2002
It was a real pleasure to see Back to the Future on BBC1 this afternoon. I don’t think I’ve seen it since it first showed up on TV, which would probably have been somewhere around 1989 or so.
Although there were elements which looked and sounded a little out of place nowadays - the gibbering, cartoonish Libyan terrorists were plain embarrassing, and the soundtrack for 1985 scenes sounds horribly out of its time - the core of the storyline still stands up remarkably well, aided by nicely judged performances all round. Michael J Fox was born to play Marty McFly, Lea Thompson and Crispin Glover were fun in their respective dual roles (especially Thompson’s rather forward 1955 version of Lorraine) and Christopher Lloyd was great value as ‘Doc’ Brown.
I’ve been off work today thanks to a stinking cold and feeling sorry for myself, so a little trip back to the 80s was just what I needed to raise my spirits.
December 31st, 2002 at 10:29 pm
A great film, but it leaves me troubled. This has probably been dissected endlessly on Usenet … but what happens after the end?
OK: Marty (call him Marty I) returns to 1985 and sees Doc shot (again) and himself being sent back to 1955. However, the Marty departing for 1955 is the Marty of the new timeline (call him Marty II). That could cause serious complications. We have all the uncertainty again of this different Marty ensuring that his parents get together.
I suspect that, to preserve the new timeline, the safest option for Doc would be not to send Marty II back to 1955, but instead to a few hours into the future. When Marty I gets back safely, Doc drops him home as Marty II’s replacement, then meets Marty II when the car arrives (at, say 3am Nov 6 1985) and disposes of him.
January 1st, 2003 at 2:40 am
The way I see it as soon as marty II leaves for 85 he becomes marty I. Or simply they’re the same person and “marty II” isn’t going to come back because he’d arrive exactly the same time and space as Marty I. It’s like seeing a reflection of yourself. The reflection doesn’t actually exist even though you can see it.
As for the main story, shame on you john for not watching it for so long. Some channel showed BTTF2 the other day, no doubt they all got a good deal due to the just released DVD box-set. Sadly the set doesn’t have footage of the Eric stoltz version.
Apparently they actually shot most if not all the film with ES in it and then changed their minds. They reshot everything with ES in but left the rest. In some scenes you can see ES but you won’t be able to tell who it is. Shame though because that would have been the “killer app” on an already excellent set.
January 1st, 2003 at 8:56 am
Strange, I’d always understood that only two weeks were filmed with Stoltz, and the only surviving footage was of him driving the DeLorean away from the Libyans. There were a few stills of Stoltz in one of the documentaries on the disk. I’ve always wondered how his Marty would’ve played.
January 1st, 2003 at 4:50 pm
Doc “disposes of” Marty II? This no longer sounds like a comedy…
What with the various versions of Marty and Doc floating around, after a certain number of times around the loop it all gets too confusing for me. After a certain point I find myself agreeing with Miles O’Brien: “I hate temporal mechanics.”
January 1st, 2003 at 4:52 pm
Like g.r., I always understood that only took a week or two for the producers to decide that Stoltz’s performance wasn’t what the film needed.
I have a hard time imagining Eric Stoltz as Marty McFly. I can see Stoltz excelling at the more dramatic, emotional elements of the part - the angst over your having inadvertently wiped out your brother and sister, the knowledge that 1955 Doc isn’t going to get to do as much time travel as he thinks he is - but I can’t see him playing the lighter moments. That said, this is probably as much a function of my lack of imagination given the type of roles I’ve seen him in as anything else: who’s to say that he couldn’t do light comedy if asked. On the other hand, the fact that the director and producer were prepared to change lead actors suggests that they agreed with me. :-)
January 1st, 2003 at 9:26 pm
It’s a surprise that he was considered in the first place. Like you I understood that only a small part of the film had been filmed before the change but the story coming out now seems to be different. I think they were a bit embarrased really, it’s not something they seem(ed) happy to comment on.
2 weeks is quite a lot of time and they could have got quite a lot of shots done in that even if it was only 2 weeks.
It’s only “legal issues” stopping them including the footage on the disc. Sounds like Stoltz wants it kept in the volt or wants a huge payoff.
January 3rd, 2003 at 2:42 am
In fairness to Eric Stoltz (if we assume for the moment that he is the one blocking the release of the footage), if you’re an actor whose performance in the lead role in a blockbuster film was deemed so poor/inappropriate/inadequate that you were fired you’d probably not be to keen on letting everyone see you flounder either.
Two weeks is certainly a significant amount of shooting time, and I suppose that as the lead character was in most of the scenes he very likely was in most of that footage. I don’t suppose anyone involved found it an easy decision to make.
Of course, a certain current blockbuster trilogy also changed one of the leading actors after a fortnight’s shooting. Perhaps two weeks marks some sort of cut-off point in a film, the one where it’s clear that the actor has had time to settle into the role and the director has had time to have lots of long talks with the actor and watch for signs that he can give the director the performance he needs.
January 3rd, 2003 at 3:23 pm
It also sounds a bit like after more then two weeks, you don’t have much choice left. It is either do the change of live with it the way it is. Time is money, and even more-so in the moviemaking business.
January 4th, 2003 at 1:32 am
Well 2 weeks or so isn’t that much if it means the difference between success and failure.
As for the triology, is that LOTR? Who was replaced?
January 4th, 2003 at 2:36 pm
Aragorn was originally played by Stuart Townsend. According to his IMDB bio after four days of shooting (not two weeks, as I thought) he was replaced by Viggo Mortensen due to that old favourite, “creative differences.”
TheOneRing.net has an interesting clue as to what that oft-abused term might mean:
I have to say that I really can’t see Townsend as Aragorn, particularly the wonderfully calm, self-assured Aragorn who deals with Theoden and helps defend Helm’s Deep in The Two Towers. Orlando Bloom is allowed to look relatively young, because he’s an elf and the same rules don’t apply, but could you see a twentysomething as effective leader of the Fellowship. Would Gimli, Theoden or Boromir have paid much attention to a guy in his late twenties?