1989's 'Back to Future on & off mark in vision of 2015

Published: Sun, October 18, 2015 @ 12:01 a.m.

By BRANDON KLEIN

bklein@vindy.com

YOUNGSTOWN

If you want to take a real trip back to the future, go look outside.

There's something missing.

Despite what filmmakers told us in 1989, flying cars do not own the air, hoverboards don't yet dominate the streets and "Jaws 19" is not playing in theaters.

But that's what Oct. 21, 2015, looked like in the 1989 film "Back to the Future II" when Emmett "Doc" Brown, his dog Einstein, Marty McFly and girlfriend Jennifer Parker arrive in a DeLorean time machine at Hill Valley, Calif., from the year 1985.

It's easy to see what director Robert Zemeckis and co-writer Bob Gale got wrong about today in the sequel, which starred Michael J. Fox and Christopher Lloyd as McFly and the Doc, respectively.

But for more than a quarter of a century, the film's version of 2015 has left an impression for fans and inventors across the world.

"I was really inspired by the movie, and it's kind of made me start trying to see what we could do better or even come close to what the movie was showing in the 2015 time period," said Jonathan Jenyk of Austintown. "Unfortunately, we didn't make every single thing that's out there now."

While growing up in Brookfield, Jonathan became an avid fan of the films. He even bought a 1981 DeLorean from an auto body shop on state Route 46 in 2012. He also has a replica of the flux capacitor — the core component of Brown's time machine — and the multi-colored hat and jacket that McFly's son wears in 2015.

Jonathan works as a system analyst for Youngstown State University and his wife, Sarah Jenyk, said he's really good with computers.

"Jonathan already had an interest in technology and the future and kind of making things better and advancing the way we live," she said. "Technology plays such a larger role in our lives today than back in the 1980s."

FLYING CARS

In the film, flying cars and rainy weather welcome Marty and his group to 2015. In that version of the future, there were still roads for shorter commutes with the words "No Landing" in certain spots.

Today's cars are still earth-bound, however.

"They had to do some outlandish things when talking about the future," said Aspasia Lyras, who runs The Little Youngstown Cinema, which has screenings twice a month downtown.

"The movie is about entertainment and comedy," said Jack Uldrich, a Minneapolis-based global futurist. He said flying-car technology is out there but not available to the public or refined as the film depicted. But when predicting the future, Uldrich says, it's often a misconception that everything is going to be new.

"It's going to be layered on top," he said.

Uldrich said there are now other companies working on flying-car technology, but most would likely be accessible to the military and the ultra-wealthy.

FITTING IN

The film also makes a fashion statement about 2015. In addition to multi-colored hat and a jacket that self-fits and dries, the Doc also provides Marty with Nike shoes that have self-tying laces.

Lyras said the fashion trends in the film were similar to the colorful styles of its era.

"They were going to take 1980s to the max, and that's what they did," she said. She added that featuring Nike in the film was part of the product-placement practices prevalent in many films during that era.

"All of those things have been merchandised one way or another," she said.

There have been reports this year that Nike will release a shoe that does come with self-tying laces although a release data has not been determined. Jenyk said its rumored to be released this Wednesday. Nike did not respond to The Vindicator's request for comment.

Additionally, Doc tells Marty to pull out his pants pockets because it's the latest fad among youth.

"They knew the styles were going to change with clothing," Jenyk said. "It seemed like they overexaggerated some of the stuff."

However, the equally silly notion of sagging pants is a fashion trend today among some urban youth.

Uldrich said fashion trends are hard to predict. "It's difficult to predict social changes," he said.

USA TODAY

USA Today was also prominently featured in the film's 2015 segment when McFly reads about his son's difficulties with the law. The filmmakers were partly right that the Gannett-owned newspaper would undergo a redesign of its logo.

But instead of the big blue orb the newspaper is using to identify itself today, filmmakers imagined a more futuristic — by 1980's standards – choice of type designs.

In the film, the paper also used drone technology, which does exist, Uldrich said.

A USA Today spokeswoman said the paper does have plans to do some celebratory features to tie into Wednesday but did not elaborate.

McFly learns from reading the paper that his son was tried, convicted and sentenced to 15 years in prison within two hours of his arrest. His daughter attempts to break her brother out of jail but fails and is sentenced to 20 years in prison. He also learns that lawyers were abolished to speed up the court process.

"Unfortunately, lawyers will still exist in the future," Uldrich said.

TOWN SQUARE

The town square of Hill Valley, Calif., in 2015 showcased a variety of technological innovations and historical predictions. Among them is an automated Texaco service station refueling a car. Uldrich said that such robotics are used in manufacturing and that Tesla has developed a robot to charge an electric car.

In the same scene, McFly also comes across a movie theater showing "Jaws 19." Without warning, a holographic giant shark springs from the theater and attacks McFly.

Although he quips that the shark still looked fake, many 2015 action films have spectacular 3-D versions in theaters.

On the other hand, there have only been four films made in the Jaws franchise with the 1987 release of "Jaws: The Revenge" as the last film. But Uldrich said the film isn't far off on its caricature of Hollywood's addiction to sequels.

"We don't have "Jaws 19", but we do have "Fast and Furious 7," he said.

Universal Studios released a parody trailer this month for the film featuring all of the possible plot lines for each iteration after the fourth film.

Holograms were used throughout the town square for announcements, such as news that the Chicago Cubs won the World Series in a sweep against Miami. In 1989, the Cubs had not won a World Series title in 81 years – now 107 years – and Miami did not have a Major League Baseball franchise until 1993 with the Florida Marlins, known as Miami Marlins since 2012.

But Uldrich said there was little evolution with sports as video game competitions are starting to become televised. The film briefly implied that video games were hands free after Marty demonstrates how to play a shooting-style arcade game to kids, who consider it a baby's toy.

NOSTALGIA

The mid-1980s film celebrated the nostalgia of its era with its products in an antique store and a retro-1980s cafe. Adam Sullivan, a YSU art history professor, said the '80s would not have been nostalgia for 2015.

"In reality, culture — where we have revivals — they operate on a 20-year cycle," he said. He highlighted how 1970s culture, for example, was revived during the '90s.

"But 'Back to the Future' seems to operate on a 30-year-cycle," he said, adding that it's a compromise from the first film where Marty travels back 30 years into the past to see his parents in their youth and therefore, travels back 30 years into the future for the second film.

But the sequel's version of 2015 was "kind of like if the '90s didn't happen," Sullivan added.

HOME SWEET HOME

The film showed biometrics — technologies that use human-body characteristics such as fingerprints for authentication purposes —being extensively used in several circumstances. In 2015, police officers use a thumbprint scan to identify Jennifer Parker, Marty's girlfriend, portrayed by Elisabeth Shue. Such scans also were used to make payments and to open the door.

Today, the iPhone can be unlocked with a fingerprint, and the phone can be used to pay for merchandise.

Though most common households are still secured by lock and key today, Jenyk said he plans to install a thumbprint reader on his front door to his home.

The film accurately featured flat-screen televisions at the McFly's residence. And although fax machines are phasing out, people now do video-conferencing with services such as Skype. Uldrich said that many homes didn't have a fax machine in the 1980s.

The film's kitchen sequence shows Marty's mother hydrating a tiny pizza into a full grown one after three seconds. Uldrich said that hydrating technology was discovered to be implausible, based on research done in the 1980s.

The same sequence also shows McFly's kids wearing high-tech glasses similar, Lyras said, to the Google Glass — so-called smart glasses that the company introduced in 2013.

MISSES

But the film's biggest miss, Uldrich and Sullivan say, was the cellphone and the Internet.

"Cellphones are the most definitive thing of 2015," Sullivan said.

Uldrich said it was a strange omission in the film because bulkier versions of the cell phone existed in the 1980s.

The technology also has opened the floodgates for new services. Taxis still exist, but compete with ride-sharing services such as Uber and Lyft, operating in larger markets and requiring a smartphone.

But Uldrich said even futurists could not have predicted Uber or the smartphone.

"It is happening at a rapid pace," he said.

Uldrich said that a film about 2045 would extrapolate anxieties about technology such as putting people out of work and causing a lot of displacement and climate change.

While October marks the 30th anniversary of the first "Back to the Future," film released in 1985, music was less prominent in the sequel.

"There was definitely more music throughout the [first] film," Lyras said.

The Youngstown/Warren Regional Chamber's Black and White Gala featured music by renowned 1980s singer Huey Lewis — whose "Power of Love" was the theme for the first movie — on Saturday evening.

But Sullivan said that music styles broke down in the 2000's and were not definitive of its era.

BACK TO THE JENYKS

The Jenyks plan to celebrate the arrival of Marty and the Doc with friends and family this Wednesday.

"It's interesting to see that's the direction they saw the world going for 2015, and in a lot of ways I think it has," Sarah said.

Jenyk said the filmmakers were more visionary and wanted things to change. And he's always on the search to collect items connected to the franchise.

"I really hope that I still see flying cars whenever I get older," he said.

Source: 1989's 'Back to Future on & off mark in vision of 2015