Quite an astonishing adventure!

Rating: Null/10 (30 August 2006)

"I don't want to hear anything about 'Back to the Future III.' Just give me g**d*** 'Back to the Future II'!" These words were spoken by the head of Universal Studios when he learned that writer/director Robert Zemeckis and writer/producer Bob Gale had devised not one but TWO fantastic sequels for the original 1985 megahit "Back to the Future." Of all three films in this famous trilogy, "Back to the Future Part II" is my favorite, simply because Marty McFly (Michael J. Fox) endures more adventure and more stark terror in this movie than he does in the other two movies. Not to mention the sharp contrast of time periods through which Marty travels in "Part II." (If you haven't yet seen any of the three films from the "Back to the Future" trilogy, please DO NOT read any further.) After the opening credits, Marty visits the future (2015), and then, after a brief sojourn into a nightmarish alternate reality (1985-A), he very quickly winds up back in the past once more (1955). The fact that the screenplay allows Marty to revisit 1955 with a different angle & viewpoint than he had in the first movie is what excited Robert Zemeckis more than anything else about the making of "Back to the Future Part II." Zemeckis claims "Part II" to be his favorite in the trilogy and certainly one of the most interesting films he's ever made.
Zemeckis once stated that great directing is great casting, and he is absolutely correct, because with the assembly of a fine cast, the director can be quite sure that he/she will elicit the strongest & most convincing performances from those actors he/she knows to be reliable. Most of the principal players from the original "Back to the Future" returned for the sequels, except for Crispin Glover. But the absence of Glover turned out to be a minor loss; Zemeckis believes that the sequels turned out fine anyway, and I agree. With actors like Michael J. Fox, Christopher Lloyd, Lea Thompson, Thomas F. Wilson, James Tolkan, etc., you just couldn't go wrong!
My favorite highlights from "Back to the Future Part II" include the following. The year 2015, as depicted in this movie, involves a great number of astonishing devices & inventions (e.g., wild clothing fashions, flying automobiles, and hoverboards), often just for the sake of a joke! One of the funniest scenes in 2015 involves a shark hologram (from "Jaws 19") emerging in the air and scaring Marty out of his wits; when the hologram disappears, Marty comments, "Shark still looks fake." In 1985-A, Marty climbs through a window into what he thinks is his house, but he soon finds out differently! Shortly afterwards, as a homage to director Frank Capra's 1946 classic "It's a Wonderful Life," Marty runs through the town of Hill Valley and finds it to be a trashed, corrupt war zone filled with prostitutes, motorcycle gangs, and drive-by shootings; what really puts the cherry on the cake is Marty's horrified reaction to a TV monitor outside Biff Tannen's Pleasure Paradise that shows Biff (Wilson) being married to Marty's mother Lorraine (Thompson) in 1973. Marty narrowly escapes being shot in Biff's grand casino hotel when Biff learns that Marty knows about the troublesome sports almanac, which has been the cause of Biff's wealth & corrupt power. Back in 1955, Marty relives his big musical moment playing & singing "Johnny B. Goode" at the high school dance, but in order to prevent his other self from seeing him, he crawls on a catwalk way above the stage and drops a load of sandbags onto Biff's thugs (Casey Siemaszko, Billy Zane, and J.J. Cohen). Shortly after that, in the most amazing double image split I have ever seen, the real Marty is knocked unconscious by a door swung open by Marty's other self. And finally, in one of the most exciting stunts in the movie, Biff tries to shake Marty off his car while Marty holds on for dear life in trying to retrieve the sports almanac.
"Back to the Future Part II" may have received quite a number of negative reviews and is probably not the classic that the original movie is becoming. I must admit that I had a difficult time trying to follow & understand everything that was going on in this sequel upon its initial theatrical release. When I watched it on videotape a few years later, I finally understood it and was quite enchanted with all the exciting adventures that Marty and Dr. Emmett L. "Doc" Brown (Lloyd) experience through their time travels. To me, "Back to the Future Part II" is simply a remarkable film!