It’s been 40 years since the release of Back to the Future, and somehow, people still resonate with the themes the film touched on.
Reflecting on the lasting impact of the film, stars Michael J. Fox and Christopher Lloyd recently revealed why they believe the movie continues to connect with audiences after four decades.
“We live in a bully culture right now. We have bullies everywhere — you don’t need me to point the finger at who, but there are all these bullies,” Fox said in an interview with Empire. “In this movie, Biff is a bully. Time is a bully.”
Fox continued, “For me personally, Parkinson’s is a bully. And it’s all about how you stand up to them and the resolve that you take into the fight with them. It’s about your resilience and your courage.”
The actor noted that “there’s a lot to that right now,” adding, “I think a lot of people are responding to the movie because it strikes chords they wouldn’t otherwise recognise.”
Lloyd, who played Doc Brown in the trilogy of films, said, “It continues to amaze me how deeply the Back To The Future films affected young people. It still comes up all the time.”
Back to the Future was released on July 3, 1985. The film, directed by Robert Zemeckis, is set in 1985 and follows Fox’s Marty McFly as a teenager who is accidentally sent back to 1955, where he inadvertently prevents his future parents from falling in love, which threatens his own existence.
Following the success of the original film, the sequel Back to the Future Part II was released in 1989, and a third film, Back to the Future Part III, was released in 1990.