Back to the Future (1985)

I was 11 when “Back to the Future” hit theaters. Not yet in high school. (I got called “McFly!” A lot.) But I loved the story and acting, and knew this movie was whip smart. Watching it again with high school long past and looking at 1985 as movie hero Marty McFly looks at 1955, I’m blown away. “Future” is epic. You know the plot: Michael J. Fox -– then a TV star -– is Marty, a skate-boarding 1980s teen who gets zapped back 30 years in a time machine sports car (how genius!) built by an eccentric nut-job scientist (Christopher Lloyd). In 1955, McFly meets the teenagers (Lea Thompson as a hottie and Crispin Glover as an incredible nerd) who will be his parents, and puts his own existence in jeopardy when he crashes their meet-cute. Never mind sci-fi, Robert Zemekis’ film is one of the great comedies, with marvelous turns from the whole cast, especially Tom Wilson as an idiot bully. The script toys with time-travel like a kid in a Lego store and serves up Ronald Reagan jokes so great Ronal Reagan loved them. Fox –so young – defines movie stardom. A childhood favorite improved with age, I love it. A+