Time Traveling can be a Real Headache

Rating: 7/10 (12 March 2006)

Many critics of this sequel probably find this effort unnecessary and others may just find it overly confusing. The streamlined, comparatively simple plot of the first "Back to the Future"(85) gives way here to a messy 'to and fro' time travel angle in which the heroes just can't seem to get it right. With the audience needing to concentrate all their energy on keeping track of the plot twists, much of the entertainment value could be lost. There's validity to this argument; however, I, for one, admire dense plotting, especially in science fiction tales - the more complex, the better, I say. It shows me someone was making the effort and wanted the viewer to wrap his mind around concepts not usually encountered.
In this follow-up, Marty (Fox) goes to his future (year 2015 or 30 years in his future) to help his own son. As usual, the filmmakers overestimated progress, since we now know the flying cars in this future will not come about 10 years from now. The motivations seem haphazard; in the 1st pic, Marty went back in time by accident; here, he and the Doc purposely travel in time and manage to make a mess of things. Their arch-nemesis, Biff (Wilson), steals a future book back to 1955 and changes the course of history. The revised 'present' of 1985 becomes a nightmarish surreal world of anarchy and decay. With us so far? Now the heroes again go back to 1955 to correct things. Here's where things get really messy: Marty & the Doc are running around in 1955 while their counterparts from the 1st Back to the Future are also there in the background doing their thing. So now we're seeing the same scenes of the previous film from a slightly new perspective (from the p.o.v.of this movie's Marty & Doc).
Wow. The filmmakers either wanted to dazzle the audience or drive them insane with this mind-warping running about. The drawback to the final 3rd of the movie is that most viewers will expend all their energy trying to remember scenes of the first film. But you really have to admire the creative attempt of metaphysically snaking back to the events of the previous film, seeing it from the inside out. Even if the whole Back to the Future trilogy becomes needlessly complex thanks to this chapter. The next & final sequel was filmed at the same time as this and was more back to basics.