The neighborhood where he will someday live hasn't even been built. Fox) steps into the specially equipped DeLorean owned by a mad scientist friend of his and floors the accelerator, he finds himself in a much simpler world. ![]() Once Marty (played winningly by Michael J. The film's observation that, in those days, a name sewn onto the back of one's pants was probably one's own is only one of the shrewd, rueful contrasts it draws between 1955 and the present day. The hero of the film is named Marty McFly, though his mother insists, when he ventures back in time 30 years, on calling him Calvin Klein. He handles ''Back to the Future'' with the kind of inventiveness that indicates he will be spinning funny, whimsical tall tales for a long time to come. Zemeckis is able both to keep the story moving and to keep it from going too far. In less resourceful hands, the idea might quickly have worn thin it might might have taken an uncomfortable turn, since the story's young hero must face the transformation of his plump, stern, middle-aged mother into a flirtatious young beauty. ''Back to the Future,'' which opens today at Loew's State and other theaters, takes this sweet, ingenious premise and really runs with it. What child wouldn't love the chance to tell the two lovestruck teen-agers who will someday become his mother and father: ''Hey, if you guys ever have kids and one of them, when he's 8 years old, accidentally sets fire to the living room rug - go easy on him, willya?'' Zemeckis has now gone himself one better with ''Back to the Future,'' about a boy who wonders what his parents were like in their salad days and is miraculously given the chance to find out. Zemeckis, together with his screenwriting partner Bob Gale, has progressed from teen-age kamikazes willing to risk anything to meet the Beatles (''I Wanna Hold Your Hand,'') to salesmen ready to peddle any form of figurative snake oil (''Used Cars'') to a timid pulp novelist who travels to the tropics (''Romancing the Stone,'' with a screenplay by Diane Thomas) and becomes her own most adventuresome heroine. The entire trilogy is still a must-see for parents who want to share a little bit of their own youth with the next generation, even if the children won't laugh quite as hard as you do at some parts.THE people in Robert Zemeckis's films have the great fun of living out their craziest daydreams. Fox's signature dance move, but it's funny even two decades later. One of the funniest moments is the saloon scene where Marty does the moonwalk when he's being shot at it may take some explaining if your kids don't understand the significance of Michael J. A heavily accented Thompson returns as Marty's relative, and Fox does double duty again as his own great-great-great grandfather, but the McFly kin has less to do in this one than in the first two the final film really belongs to Lloyd. ![]() Humor-wise, there are plenty of in-jokes for those who've seen the first two films, like Marty's touchiness at being called "yellow." As Marty's rival, Wilson gets to unleash a whole new set of insults as he bullies everyone around him. So for the romantics at home, this installment is for you. Doc was such a hermit outside of his connection with Marty, that it was a relief to see he could still have a chance at love - especially with someone as patient and intelligent as Clara. The introduction of a love interest for Lloyd may not seem interesting to kid viewers, but as an adult viewing it through grown-up eyes, that subplot with Steenburgen is so much more appreciated. After the mildly disappointing Part II, it would seem that a Wild West-themed threequel would flounder under the weight of too much time-travel confusion and overall Marty and Doc fatigue. Somehow Robert Zemeckis, Fox, and Lloyd make the back-in-time gimmick work, and it's a pleasant surprise.
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