 | |
List Price: $34.98 | | Label: Universal Studios
Salesrank: 1809
Released: December 17, 2002 |
| Our Price: $18.80 |
| Used Price: $10.75 |
|
MPAA Rating: PG (Parental Guidance Suggested)
Media: DVD |
|
Editorial Review:
Back to the future i ii & iii trilogy.
Description of Back to the Future - The Complete Trilogy (Full Screen Edition):
Filmmaker Robert Zemeckis topped his breakaway hit Romancing the Stone with Back to the Future, a joyous comedy with a dazzling hook: what would it be like to meet your parents in their youth? Billed as a special-effects comedy, the imaginative film (the top box-office smash of 1985) has staying power because of the heart behind Zemeckis and Bob Gale's script. High schooler Marty McFly (Michael J. Fox, during the height of his TV success) is catapulted back to the '50s where he sees his parents in their teens, and accidentally changes the history of how Mom and Dad met. Filled with the humorous ideology of the '50s, filtered through the knowledge of the '80s (actor Ronald Reagan is president, ha!), the film comes off as a Twilight Zone episode written by Preston Sturges. Filled with memorable effects and two wonderfully off-key, perfectly cast performances: Christopher Lloyd as the crazy scientist who builds the time machine (a DeLorean luxury car) and Crispin Glover as Marty's geeky dad. --Doug Thomas
Critics and audiences didn't seem too happy with Back to the Future, Part II, the inventive, perhaps too clever sequel. Director Zemeckis and cast bent over backwards to add layers of time-travel complication, and while it surely exercises the brain it isn't necessarily funny in the same way that its predecessor was. It's well worth a visit, though, just to appreciate the imagination that went into it, particularly in a finale that has Marty watching his own actions from the first film. --Tom Keogh
Shot back-to-back with the second chapter in the trilogy, Back to the Future, Part III is less hectic than that film and has the same sweet spirit of the first, albeit in a whole new setting. This time, Marty ends up in the Old West of 1885, trying to prevent the death of mad scientist Christopher Lloyd at the hands of gunman Buford "Mad Dog" Tannen (Thomas F. Wilson, who had a recurring role as the bully Biff). Director Zemeckis successfully blends exciting special effects with the traditions of a Western and comes up with something original and fun. --Tom Keogh
Back to the Future - The Complete Trilogy (Full Screen Edition) Reviews:
Didn't disclose covers condition 
2009-11-08 - Cover was in bad shape. Water damage and spots if dirt all over. Cd were ok inside.
Good movies! 
2009-10-21 - Great movies-didn't remember there being as much bad language in them. Have to wait till the kids get older to watch with them.
Received 2002 version!! Not Widescreen!! 
2009-10-13 - I ordered the 2002 version when it originally came out and the discs 2 and 3 were Pan and Scan with black bars at the top and bottom to make it appear it was widescreen. I heard the 2005 version, like advertised on this page had the corrected 2 and 3 discs. I ordered from this description, what did I get? the 2002 version again, saying 2002 on all three discs!! With the same problem on discs 2 and 3. I went to the description page again, and then the Back to the Future Trilogy was under review. I went through the return process with a "refund" being my only option. Hopefully I get refunded the entire amount or the correct version this time.
Great 80s' montage!
2009-10-02 - Back to the future is perhaps the best fantasy/comedy/adventure flick to date! And a great 80s' montage, as well (God, is this really almost 20 years old??). Along, with, of course "Gremlins", "Ghostbusters", John Hughes' movies and "Miami Vice"... But what makes this movie special is, that it seems to have aged a lot less than the other movies of its time - which is a tremendous achievement keeping in mind that this movie somewhat "boasted" with its time-travel special effects. The trick is, effects shouldn't manipulate the movie. Zemeckis was a genius ahead of his time, too many directors haven't learnt this lesson even yet. Why don't they make movies LIKE THIS anymore? Just set a likeable character (college kids seem to work well) in a predicemen, and let him work and stumble - the balance is essential; needs to be comedic, but not a farce - his way out of it through a 1000 minor and major situations and setbacks. All right, this guy "grows up to be" an unlikely hero, but do NOT reward him too much in the end (yeah, yeah, "rolemodels for the kids", blah blah. There is a surplus of "educational" movies, no need to to be ramming it down everybodys' throats every possible chance!). And do NOT forget the darker issues, even a little grown-up material. Only the really-really-unimportant side characters are to be card-board stereotypes. Special effects come LAST. Keep up the pace, etc etc. BTTF can also boast with its pace: comedic stuff from the starts and about a dozen "endings": great sentimental peak when George FINALLY punches Biff->We move to Marty having to play the guitar->the kissing scene (with a delay and a twist)->Johnny B. Goode-> and only THEN we move to "going home" with its problems- more than just a few plus running against the clock... and yet, after the "happy end" we're left with a great closing scene! Talk about a roller-coaster-ride! Your hands squeezing the nearest pillow. ANY more suspense or action and you'd and up a nerve-rack. Action, adventure and comedy, fitting for all ages. If you don't like this movie, there there just has to be something really wrong with you.
OUTATIME 
2009-09-22 - PART I: The perennial classic featuring Michael J. Fox as Marty McFly, Christopher Lloyd as Doc Brown and a DeLorian DMC-12 as a time travel machine with a license plate reading OUTATIME. When Doc is gunned down in a shopping mall parking lot, Marty escapes in the DeLorian--only to be propelled thirty years into the past. There he looks up the version of Doc Brown existing then and tries to tell him what's happened. In the process he pollutes the time stream, thusly opening up the possibility that his mother and father will never meet--and the reality he will cease to exist if that becomes the case. Marty must then attempt to rectify the situation with his parents and then convince the 1955 version of Doc to help him get back to 1985, back to the future. So how does this now-22-year-old movie hold up? Pretty well, for the most part. It was a fun movie in 1985 and it's a fun movie in 2007. Not to be taken too seriously, just something to sit back and go along for the ride with--full of humor, excitement, teenaged abandon, great characters with enjoyable dialogue and some interesting time-travel dilemmas, both comedic and mildly dramatic. Even thought-provoking at times. But this movie never gets heavy-handed; it's all about having fun. Sure, there's a certain displacement when considering I was 16 when I first saw it and now I'm nearly 40. There's a definite sense of time's unforgiving passage when it's recognized that the "present" in this film (1985) is now nearly as far in the real past as Marty took the DeLorian when he went to 1955. Still, not much has aged badly here, and for all its typical movie clichés I still enjoyed living in the past with it. OUTATIME, indeed.
PART II: Getting back was only the beginning. Recapping the end of part one and immediately continuing from there, this sequel finds that Marty, after visiting 2015, must travel back to 1955 again to prevent disastrous changes to his version of 1985. Got that? Once again, a successful film full of charm, humor, excitement and cool time travel dilemmas is in store for the viewer. My favorite parts were Marty's visit to 2015, where we see all manner of future technologies in play (flying cars, wall TVs, robotic waiters, video phones--imagine!), a cool retro-80s café (which is really retro to the 2007 viewer, heh) and, more interestingly, the dismal results of Marty's life. Oh, that's me? And my family? That's where I end up? No way. Oh, to know then what we know now and be able to go back and do it again, do things right the second time. It's a nice sentiment, if bittersweet in the knowledge that only the movie persona Marty McFly has that ability to go back and make things right. In addition to the 2015 aspects, I also liked the nearly-apocalyptic vision of 1985 we're treated to, with the ever-vile Biff Tannen having been transformed into a megalomaniac controlling the city. All of which isn't to suggest this movie got serious on us. Not at all. As with its predecessor, things never get too serious or heavy-handed; it's still about providing excitement and fun for the viewer. And in this, it was another enjoyable movie. Not as good as the original perhaps, but not that far behind either. The only negative I can point at is, as with the first film, it didn't really have an ending, but rather just an offramp to the next sequel.
PART III: In the last installment of the series, Marty--trapped for the moment in 1955--gets a Western Union letter from Doc Brown penned in 1885 informing him that he's trapped there, the time machine's broken, and it cannot be repaired with materials available then. Yet he's buried the DeLorian in a remote location so that Marty and the 1955 version of Doc can dig it up, repair it, and thusly send Marty back to the future one last time, back to 1985. Doc says he's happy to live out his days in 1885, not to attempt to go back for him. But soon thereafter, Marty finds that the 1885 version of Doc is shot and killed by a member of the ever-tormenting Tannen family mere days after writing the letter. So, after excavating the DeLorian and repairing it, Marty heads back to the old west of 1885 to save Doc. Got all that? Good. So then, how did this third installment fare when compared to the previous two? Not so good. I think they went to the well one too many times with this. Most of the humor, charm and excitement were still attempted, but this time around they were only partially successful. It all began feeling flat. Most of this movie takes place in the old west. In doing so, we get an interesting look at the inception of Hill Valley. And while I do appreciate how they gave us multiple perspectives of the town and famous clock tower throughout the three movies, I found the period spent in 1885--which is basically this whole movie--to be lacking compared to all that came before. Michael J. Fox donning multiple roles (and genders) once again and a cameo appearance by ZZ Top weren't enough to really liven things up, either. By the end, with the big train scene, I was just waiting for it to be over, remembering how much fun it had been to revisit the first two Back to the Future features...and vaguely disappointed with how bored I became with this last one.
