Blu-Ray Review: Great Scott! It's THE BACK TO THE FUTURE TRILOGY

By Simon Gallagher / July 1, 2011

Forget The Pacific, forget Lost and even forget the upcoming Disney duo of Toy Story 3 and Beauty & The Beast: Weighing it up, you'd have to say that the release of The Back To The Future Trilogy is the Blu-ray event of the year.

No other film could possibly hope to combine the rabid cult following that has made the trilogy almost a sub-culture in itself, and the mainstream love that the film still commands (how else do you explain the success of its recent Anniversary Run in cinemas world wide?!) And the trilogy has now arrived on Blu-ray...If you're a regular or even part-time reader of Obsessed With Film, you may have noticed that we got a little excited over the Back To The Future 25th Anniversary, including the excellent 52 Reasons Why BTTF Just Might Be The Greatest Film Of All Time article and my own BTTF Drinking Game. And rightly so - the films are untouchable classics, combining excellently developed characters, iconic acting performances and deliciously more-ish storylines.

I'm not going to spend a few thousand words going over why we should all love the films, because to do so would be re-treading very old ground, so I'll concentrate instead on working out whether the new Blu-ray transfer is worth shelling out for (in the vain belief that anyone will even give this any consideration before inevitably adding the boxset to their collection).

I will however, share one more alternative reading of the film, just for fun.

The way I see it, Back To The Future is an extended teenage quest for sex: albeit a very complex one, and one ruled by a moment of monumentally fortuitous opportunism. So basically - Marty wants to take Jennifer "up to the lake", but is foiled by Biff's abuse of the family car he had planned as his passion wagon (the boy's a romantic at heart). Flash forward a little and Doc's revelation of the time machine provides Marty with the opportunity to change the past to his liking, so that he eventually gets to have dirty sinful teenage sexual relations with his girlfriend.

Think about the way Marty ignores the rules of the Space Time Continuum on so many occasions: a few are genuine accidents (the lone pine/twin pine change), but there are definitely some examples where Marty is thinking with his future penis. Chiefly, it's the continued emasculation of Biff and the sexual liberation of both of his parents that I'm talking about here - and Marty is rewarded in the ultimate way when he returns to the future and he has changed enough that the car isn't wrecked (in fact it has been changed entirely to a more spacious and thus more suited to back-seat shenanigans) due to Biff's subservience, and his parents are now somehow willing to accept his sexual activeness.

Think of it as American Pie with a Delorean and 1.21 Gigawatts of (love) juice.

Ironically, of course the Space Time Continuum gets its own back, ensuring that Doc returns to 1985 to take Marty and Jennifer into the future to sort out their kids (which also carries the moral message: change the past to have sex and be cursed with unruly kids) and robs Marty of the immediate opportunity to go and make sweet, sweet love to Jennifer.

Or maybe I've just seen Back To The Future way too many times...

Quality

This is definitely the best the trilogy has ever looked- but that isn't the same as saying the film looks beautiful. The problem is of course that the original source material isn't the best: 25 years is a long time in terms of film quality (as proved by the overall increase in quality between BTTF and its second and third installments) and Back To The Future never looked beautiful in the first place, meaning this high definition transfer is simply the best of a bad situation.

There is something to be said for the quality increase definitely, but seen in another light, the new techniques of high-definition actually rob the films' then-impressive effects techniques of their tricks and makes them look more shoddy than fans will ever remember. The worst case of this is with the aging make-up used on some of the major characters to transform them from 1955 to 1985 versions of themselves (something I picked up on in my Drinking Game piece) - the latex is very visible- and it's a little bit like finding out that there's a false bottom in the Magician's hat hiding the rabbit.

Aside from source problems, the transfer is a worthy effort: there isn't the usual Universal over-use of DNR, and the digital sharpening doesn't interfere too much with the real feel of the image. Colours too are markedly better-looking, while the sound quality, which was always impressive even at the cinema, has been given a good boost as well. Overall, very good if you can forgive and forget the problems of the source material.

The question that resonates the loudest and longest of course is whether it is really worth buying the Blu-ray version for the quality difference alone. Personally I would say yes, though I can't shake the gnawing feeling that I must have felt when I discovered that Santa Claus wasn't real - the loss of innocence that came both at that moment, and during this high-definition experience (with all of its accidental revelations) meant a fundamental loss of magic in both cases. But, at the end of the debate, I'm a Blu-ray fan and plan to eventually replace my entire DVD film collection (apart from Ultra special and ultimate editions) with high-definition versions just as I did when DVDs replaced VHS.

This however, will be one of the cases where I'll probably go and pick up both versions to sit side by side on the shelf.

Extras

Blu-Ray Exclusive Special Features

To be honest, this first lot is just a collection of the superfluous gadgetry that is attached to blu-ray releases these days, which is reserved for only the most committed of Extra Features fans. Everyone else, as usual, will just skip past them to get to the more fun stuff.

U-CONTROL BD-LIVETM: Access the BD-LiveTM Center through your Internet-connected player to get even more content, watch the latest trailers and more! My Scenes: Bookmark your favorite scenes from the movies. pocket BLU„ (including the following five techy trinkets): Browse Titles: Access to a complete list of pocket BLU„-enabled titles available and coming to Blu-ray„. They can also view free previews and see what additional content is available to unlock on their device Advanced Remote Control: Users can navigate through menus, playback and BD-Live„ functions with ease. Video Timeline Mobile-To-Go: Users can unlock a selection of bonus content with their Blu-ray„ discs to save to their phones or to stream from anywhere there€™s a Wi-Fi network. Keyboard Then there's the content Extra Features- a few of which are exclusive to the Blu-ray version, though in my opinion there should be more of a bias towards offering more exclusives on the high-definition version, since fans are encouraged to shell out a good few extras dollars or pounds to pick it up. There isn't really that much at all to shout about here, though the 30 minute NBC special hosted by the legend Leslie Nielson which aired before the first TV screening of the film is good fun and the Set-Ups & Payoffs feature that showcases items in the scene that prepare you for a future plot point. When you get to that moment in the film, the €œpayoff€ is shown to complete the correlation. Back to the Future Night Featurette: Hosted by Leslie Nielson Set-ups & Payoffs Storyboard Comparison Trivia Track Blu-Ray & DVD Special Features

This is where it all gets very good. This new edition packs in the Extras to a crazy degree, giving the Anniversary edition the perfect treatment to suit the occasion: as with anything, there are good additions and some less so good, but the swing is definitely more towards the former. The "Tales from the Future" six part retrospective documentary is pretty much worth the money alone, and stands out as the definite highlight of the boxset. Here's the full list of what you can expect from just the DVD version (though of course all are included on the Blu-ray as well):

Tales from the Future: Brand new six-part documentary with interviews with Michael J. Fox, Christopher Lloyd, Lea Thompson, Director Robert Zemeckis, Producers Bob Gale and Neil Canton, plus Executive Producer Steven Spielberg. In the Beginning . . .: Basically a Behind-the-Scenes/genesis featurette Time to Go: Production stories Keeping Time: The score and the songs of the Back to the Future Trilogy. Time Flies: Learn more about how the sequel came about, the futuristic look, the special and visual effects, recreating 1955 and more. Third Time€™s the Charm: Focusing on the building of the third movie's western town, Doc Brown€™s love story, the casting of Mary Steenburgen, the train sequence and completing the Trilogy. The Test of Time: Back to the Future becomes a phenomenon! President Reagan quotes the film, the Back to the Future ride opens at Universal Studios theme park and fans rebuild the iconic DeLorean. The film€™s cast and crew also discuss the franchise's appeal and longevity. The Physics of Back To The Future: A discussion with Dr. Michio Kaku Nuclear Test Site Ending Storyboard Sequence: Storyboard sequence of the original proposed ending of the film. 16 Deleted Scenes Michael J. Fox Q&A Q&A Commentaries with Director Robert Zemeckis and Producer Bob Gale Feature Commentaries with Producers Bob Gale and Neil Canton Back to the Future: The Ride Music Videos: Huey Lewis and the News €œPower of Love€ ZZ Top €œDoubleBack€ Photo Galleries, Including Production Art, Additional Storyboards, Photographs, Marketing Materials and Character Portraits Theatrical Trailers Behind The Scenes Mini-Features: (i) Outtakes (ii) Original Makeup Tests (iii)Production Design (iv) Storyboarding (v) Designing the DeLorean (vi) Designing Time Travel (vii) Hoverboard Test (viii) Designing Hill Valley (ix) Designing the Campaign Re-used Special Features Making the Trilogy: Chapters One, Two & Three: Original 2002 DVD documentary The Making Of Back to the Future Part I, II & III: Provides a vintage first look at the making of all three films. The Secrets of the Back to the Future Trilogy: a televised special hosted by Kirk Cameron addressing fans unanswered Back to the Future questions. Cheesy isn't the word. Holy Shit that's a lot of Extras.

The Final Word

At the end of the day, you don't need me to tell you to go out and buy it: by now there should be little doubt that the trilogy is an as essential a purchase as they come. The Blu-ray is on sale now.