I’ve seen the movies several times, but I remember
specifically watching it in 2001 with my brother and realizing that we were
closer to the future (2015) than we were the “present” (1985)! My brother and I
had another movie objective in 2001, to watch 2001: A Space Odyssey, but somehow couldn’t find the time in 365
days. (And I still haven’t found the time 14 years later…I know, shame on me).
Anywho, back to the future. So, as 2015 approached, I got
pretty excited. And on January 1 of this year, my husband (who also loves the
trilogy, because, well, if he didn’t that might be a deal breaker) and I
watched BTTF II. (Note to any fellow
diehard fans, don’t worry, we’ll also be watching it on October 21, 2015,
obviously!) While it was really fun oohing and awing over what they got right
(like large flat screen TVs, voice instruction, and glasses that can perform
tasks), and giggling at what they got wrong (like their quaint over-reliance on
paper newspapers, flying cars, and hover boards), those observations are
actually missing the point.
The thing is, the speculative 2015 in BTTF is less about
what it might actually be to live right now than it is a distorted mirror to
1985. I don’t believe the writers were actually trying to predict things. That
wasn’t the point. They used the “future” to say things about the American culture
they were living in then, one where paper newspapers were still very much in
use, the most prominent inventions were cars and TVs, not handheld
communication devices.
So, I try to remember that speculative elements can’t just
be fun and imaginative (what would the future really be like?), they need to
say something in and of themselves (what does our vision of the future say
about us now?). Speculative elements, no matter how fantastical, should still shed
light on our readers’ current, real world.
Given this, what do you think a fictional 2045 would look like?
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