Guest Review: Back to the Future Part III (1990)

by ScottDS
As I mentioned in my last review, I watched the Back to the Future films in reverse order, so Part III was my first glimpse inside the universe created by filmmakers Robert Zemeckis and Bob Gale. I don’t remember how I stumbled across it one Saturday night in the early 90s but something about it kept my interest and two hours later, I was a fan.

1955 Doc (Christopher Lloyd) has just sent Marty (Michael J. Fox) back to the future when, all of a sudden, Marty re-appears! Marty from the second film, that is, with news that the DeLorean was struck by lightning, zapping Doc back to 1885. From the Western Union letter, we find out that Doc has been doing fine, working as a blacksmith in Hill Valley. He buried the DeLorean in a mine, along with repair instructions, so Marty can take it back to 1985. Doc also warns Marty not to come get him, lest the space-time continuum get disrupted again. While retrieving the DeLorean, they stumble across Doc’s tombstone. It turns out that, one week after writing the letter, Doc is shot in the back by Buford “Mad Dog” Tannen (Thomas F. Wilson), the great-grandfather of Marty’s nemesis Biff Tannen. Marty decides to go back and rescue him.

Marty, dressed in a ridiculous faux cowboy outfit, arrives in 1885 in the midst of a Cavalry charge. He hides the DeLorean in a cave but discovers that an Indian’s arrow has punctured the fuel line. He takes off and falls down a hill, where he’s awakened by his great-great-grandparents, Seamus and Maggie McFly (Fox and Lea Thompson). The next day, he makes it into town where he’s accosted by Buford and his goons who try to hang him, but is rescued by Doc. While figuring out how to get the DeLorean up and running again, they notice an out of control buckboard and rescue it’s driver: the lovely Clara Clayton (Mary Steenburgen). It’s love at first site for Doc and Clara. That night, Buford tries to kill Doc but Marty intervenes – he’s ready to leave well enough alone but Buford calls him “yellow” which Marty can’t deal with. Buford challenges him to a duel the next morning.

After loading the DeLorean onto a rail spur (only a train is fast enough to push the car to 88 m.p.h.), Doc tells Clara the truth but she doesn’t take it too well. The next morning, Marty finds Doc, who falls unconscious after one swig of whiskey. Buford shows up but Marty wins the duel, thanks to the metal firebox door he has strapped to his chest (this was nicely set up in the previous film). Doc and Marty then take off for the train, hijack it in the name of science, and use it to push the DeLorean to 88 m.p.h. Clara discovers Doc’s model of the time machine in his workshop and catches up with them. Doc uses the hoverboard (which Marty had kept in the car) to rescue Clara from falling off the train as Marty is sent back to 1985, where the DeLorean is quickly destroyed by a passing train. It turns out everything is okay, with alternate 1985 having returned to normal. On the way back to the wreckage, he and Jennifer (Elizabeth Shue) run into Needles (Flea), who challenges him to a street race. Marty thinks for a moment, having learned his lesson, and reverses instead, avoiding a terrible accident. Jennifer opens the “You’re fired!” note she kept from 2015 and the words vanish.

After checking out the wreckage, a time-traveling train appears, manned by Doc, Clara, and their two kids (Jules and Verne). Doc gives Marty a framed photo of the two of them that had been taken in 1885 in front of the new town clock. Jennifer inquires about the “You’re fired!” note but Doc reminds them that their future hasn’t been written yet. “No one’s has! Your future is whatever you make it! So make it a good one!” The train then takes off for the friendly skies as the words “The End” appear on the screen. Cue the ZZ Top song and away we go…

I’m sorry but I can’t stress it enough – I love these movies. They’re not perfect, mind you, but taken together as a whole, they don’t get much better than this. As far as this movie goes, it’s... good but not great. The love story between Doc and Clara is sweet and I always liked the idea that the thing that brought them together was their mutual love of all things science and science fiction. It was geek love before geeks became a pop culture thing. Oddly, this is the second time Mary Steenburgen fell in love with a time traveler, having fallen for Malcolm McDowell’s H.G. Wells in Nicholas Meyer’s 1979 film Time After Time. As per usual, the visual effects and other technical details are more or less top-notch. A couple of split-screen shots don’t hold up but the art direction and costume design are excellent. This was, for all intents and purposes, my first western. I even refer to this film as a “gateway western” for parents who want to introduce their children to the genre without going straight to John Wayne and Gary Cooper.

Speaking of John Wayne, the filmmakers used this opportunity to pay homage to him and John Ford. Marty’s arrival in 1885 was shot in Monument Valley, which you’ll recognize from many John Ford/John Wayne westerns. John Wayne stock company regular Harry Carey Jr. appears in the saloon, along with Dub Taylor and Pat Buttram, with Richard Dysart playing a barbed wire salesman who tries to console Doc, and whose small talk on the train tips off Clara that Doc still loves her. This film has what the second film lacked, which was colorful supporting characters and a sense of fun. The second film has its fun moments, too, but with a very dark and serious second act. Mention also needs to be made of Tom Wilson’s performance as “Mad Dog,” which is an absolute tour de force!

I want to use this opportunity to mention Roger Ebert’s review. He gave the film a marginal thumbs down, claiming that the Old West of this film was the “sitcom version” – he preferred a more realistic portrayal, citing McCabe and Mrs. Miller as an example. For what this film is and for what it sets out to accomplish, 1885 Hill Valley is just fine. It’s a family movie from the Spielberg/Amblin Entertainment factory (back when that meant something) and a dark, gritty setting wouldn’t have been appropriate. Plus the filmmakers were huge western fans and simply wanted to pay homage to their heroes. I also learned that, since westerns were mostly out of fashion by this time, every stuntman in Hollywood wanted in on this film since so many of them grew up on the genre and you don’t get to do horse falls every day.

Now… here’s where I give this film a thumbs half-mast: while Doc’s story is sweet, Marty’s is kind of frustrating. His Achilles’ heal was set up in the second film and, once again, if he didn’t care about people calling him “chicken” or “yellow,” it would’ve made things so much easier for everyone. There are so many close calls and a few dei ex machina, that after watching this film so many times, one begins to see the wheels turning. To be fair, you can watch any movie enough times and start to see the flaws, but with any story dealing with time travel and paradoxes, either the science needs to be perfect, or the film needs to be so damned entertaining that we don’t have time to think about the problems. The first film is borderline perfect but the sequels, not so much.

I also had a recent epiphany which explains why I prefer the second film to this one. In Part II, the major conflict is caused by character: Marty buys the sports almanac, thinking he can cheat the system by placing a few bets in 1985, knowing he’ll win since he has all the scores. This is a perfectly understandable and human thing: greed is something we all have to deal with and it makes you wonder, what would you do if you had access to forbidden knowledge? However, in Part III, the conflict is caused by an Indian’s arrow. The reason they can't go back to the future is because a random arrow, shot by a random Indian we never actually see, causes the DeLorean’s fuel line to leak. If only the DeLorean had been a few feet to the left or right, everything would’ve been fine. I understand why they made this choice but it’s just one of those forehead-slapping moments. Also, the second film has so much going on with it, that the viewer is left with much to ponder, whereas this film is more of a straight western/romance, with all the clichés thereof.

As of this writing, the Back to the Future ride at Universal Studios has been replaced, but the actual ride footage can be found online and on the latest DVD/Blu-Ray releases. There was also a Saturday morning animated series, of which I have fond memories. There was also a recent video game, though I don’t know much about it. I’ve remarked on more than one occasion that I wish these films had a series of novels to go with them. There is so much backstory and so many alternate universes and “what-if” scenarios that I’d love to explore one day. If seemingly every background character from the Star Wars and Star Trek franchises can get their own backstories, why not this one?

Lastly, I have to give props to co-writer/producer Bob Gale. While he’s mostly been working in the comic book world all these years, he’s been a great steward of the Back to the Future legacy. He’s there to supervise DVD and Blu-Ray transfers, he’s there to contribute to audio commentaries and documentaries, he’s available to consult whenever a company makes a licensing deal, and don’t worry, as long as he and Robert Zemeckis are still standing, there won’t be a fourth film! (I only wish certain other filmmakers cared that much.)

“You're just not thinking fourth dimensionally!”