If my calculations are correct, when this baby hits eighty-eight miles per hour... you're gonna see some serious shit.

No 23 - Back To The Future
Director - Robert Zemeckis

Right. Before we start, this is going to be a terrible bit of writing - but hell, I've got 499 other films to hone my skills on... and allow me to explain why we start with this random number and not with something more logical.... like 500.....


The first film that I owned on the list was No 498 - Back To The Future Part 2 (discussed tomorrow), so it made sense to me to begin with the much higher ranking first film.

I sit here with a cup of tea and Fore! playing in the background, to make sure that I stay in the right frame of mind. And to make sure that I can have the excellent Power of Love playing on loop.

This film is an absolute gem - It is only two months younger than me, and unlike me it has aged marvellously well. The scenes set in the fifties look as fresh and as well shot as any recent film set in this period, meaning that you can still be fully transported by the film without loving it because it is kitsch, or part of your childhood. The few scenes that ARE set in the eighties are just so gloriously eighties. Who can not love a film which has Huey Lewis and the News providing the songs? Then there is the wonderfully awful and blatant product placement and the CLOTHES!!!

3 articles of clothing that make this film a must see (technically 2 are accessories)

1) Marty McFly's ridiculous puffer jacket body warmer. It is disgusting. It is perfect.
2) Biff's friend in the 50s wears £D glasses and thus has the Moniker 3D. I want 3D glasses. I would wear them on a day to day basis.
3) When Doc Brown returns from the future he is wearing a see through perspex tie.
- let me just repeat that. A. See through. Perspex. Tie.

Genius - absolute fucking genius,

And the DeLorean is too cool, so cool that I still get far too excited if I see one in real life (this happened once, in Brighton. It was parked outside my house and me and my friend spent a good hour just staring at it) - to think it was almost a fridge.
(to quote Wikipedia "In the first script of Back to the Future the time machine was shaped like a refrigerator. The idea was scrapped, for fear of kids climbing into and becoming trapped in refrigerators. Because an abandoned refrigerator can become an inescapable trap for a small child, laws in most nations require that the door be removed when such an item is disposed.")

This film may be neatly protected with years of nostalgia and may be viewed by millions with rose tinted glasses but it is an excellent film handling some pretty weighty themes in a frothy accessible manner. This is a film after all that touches on the Grandfather Paradox and, to some degree, the Oedipus Complex. It also has some excellent performances.

Michael J Fox is perfect as a 16 year old, and pulls it off despite being 8 years older and working 2 hjobs at the time. The poor guy never slept yet stays fesh faced and the epitome of 80s cool.
Christopher Lloyd was pretty much born to play Doc Brown - his wide scary eyes and manic mannerisms turn the Doctor into one of the most likable and quotable cult figures.
And lets not forget Lea Thompson....

In fact lets take a minute silence to truly contemplate on just how unbelievably hot she is in this film.

She is incredible - her innocence is displayed in the naive way she acts the sexual predator, and it is that which makes her so irresistible (in my un biased eyes)
And of course, this is the film that gave us Biff Tannen. Who is comedy gold and an unbelievable bastard. It is the role of Thomas F Wilson's career and it will follow him to his grave.

So, before PGs got sanitised (there is an awful lot of swearing in this film) we are left with a very clear moral to this story. Punch someone in the face. That way your wife will stay hot, she will not become an alcoholic (I told you that PGs were edgier in those days) and Biff will give your car an extra coat of wax. This will only happen if YOU have your own personal Incredible Hulk moment, just like Crispin Glover.