Lone Pine Mall: Easter Egg or Thing in the Movie?

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 Twin Pines Mall became Lone Pine Mall after Marty changed the future in “Back to the Future” (1985). Is that an Easter Egg or a Thing in the Movie? Let’s find out!

To me, an Easter egg is a fun gag referencing something that doesn't require full audience understanding to decode the character or plot point. For example, the Harold Lloyd "Safety Last!" clock operates as both an Easter egg and a setup+payoff gag.

If the audience member doesn't know the clock is a reference to "Safety Last!", it's okay! It's not an obstacle to them understanding key character/plot information:

--this character is obsessed with clocks and time

--setup+payoff to his dangerous stunt at the end of the movie

Original Twitter thread.

The Other Marty McFly, HD Analysis

Back in July of 1986, Starlog Magazine printed an article by Bruce Gordon about "Back to the Future", in which Gordon ponders the idea of the alternate universe created in the Robert Zemeckis time-travel film. Gordon talks about the opening of the film, as we see Marty and Doc get ambushed by terrorists. Gordon speaks of a mysterious figure in the background of this opening scene, which takes place at Twin Pines Mall.

At the very instant that Doc tosses his pistol to the ground (and all eyes in the audience are following its path across the pavement), a silhouetted figure steps into that light. Less than a second later, the figure is gone, Doc has been shot and the chase is on.

I thought it would be fun to look at the artifact that Gordon supposes is "Marty II" in HD.

direct YouTube link

Clearly, it's "Marty II" back there. Or Bigfoot. Gordon wrote follow-up articles after "Back to the Future Part II" and "III" were released. They're available online via the Internet Archive.

“The Other Marty McFly” by Bruce Gordon, Starlog #108, July 1986
https://archive.org/stream/starlog_magazine-108/108#page/n69/mode/1up

“The Return of the Other Marty McFly” by Bruce Gordon, Starlog #54, May 1990
https://archive.org/stream/starlog_magazine-154/154#page/n12/mode/1up

“The Other Marty McFly Rides West” by Bruce Gordon, Starlog #170, Sept. 1991
https://archive.org/stream/starlog_magazine-170/170#page/n15/mode/1up

"Back to the Future" and Eric Stoltz

This is another follow-up post to our "Back To The Future" podcast on The VFX Show.

On the podcast, we discussed the early production troubles on the set of "Back to the Future," when the film's leading man, Eric Stoltz, was fired from the movie after five weeks of shooting. No film footage of Stoltz as Marty McFly has been seen by the public, until now. As part of the new 'making-of' documentary accompanying the upcoming Blu-Ray release of the film, we can finally get a glimpse of what the movie could have looked like with Stoltz in the lead role.

"Back to the Future," Einstein Jump

This is the first of several follow-up posts to our "Back To The Future" podcast on The VFX Show.

Here's an objective breakdown of "Back to the Future"'s first big effects sequence, the first time slice of the movie that sends Einstein the dog forwards in time.

Real photographic background plate of Delorean, with glows and time slice animation created by the animation department at Industrial Light & Magic.

The fire and sparks (and their reflections) were created on the set with special effects rigs attached to the Delorean.



A large strobe light on location provided bright interactive light. Full frame flashing was also achieved in the optical composite.

Hey, look in the upper left corner of the screen. Say hi to the crew!




Panning left with Delorean. The car is actually on the set, with animation and effects added optically.

The pan reveals bluescreen-photographed Marty and Doc. The actors were tracked and matted into the shot.



Pan abruptly stops, explosions and flares optically composited to represent time slice effect.


First visible frame of explosion element. The main explosion element has a faked reflection in the wet ground, achieved in the optical composite.

Explosion element runs backwards, giving the impression of an implosion. On-location, live-action ignition of fire trails appear, and are skip printed to appear to ignite much faster than reality would allow, approximating the feeling of 88mph.

Marty's foreground foot is rotoscoped to allow the fire trail to appear behind his leg.


The last frame of the shot.

In-camera effect, featuring on-set fire trails, using stunt performers.

This shot was skip printed in post production to give the ignition the feeling of greater velocity, giving the impression of the Delorean continuing its 88mph journey in a parallel dimension of time. As a result, the fire's motion is somewhat strobey.

Notice the relative exposure difference between this shot and the shots preceeding and following it. In this shot, the cinematographer exposed the film to feature the fire (or was underexposed in the colortiming or visual effects process), which reveals the internal structure of the fire. In the shots before and after, the actors and environment were the target exposure values; consequently, in those shots, the fire is blown out and overexposed, leaving only hot white fire shapes.

The first frame of the iconic Einstein time slice effect, featuring actors Christopher Lloyd and Michael J. Fox. The actors were shot against a bluescreen, standing on a mirror. The mirror gave the effects artists pristine reflections of the actors; the reflections were matted to separate them from the actors, and treated in the composite to appear as wet, pavement reflections by adding displacement and tweaking the brightness.

Michael J. Fox's screen right foot was placed behind fire licks via frame-by-frame rotoscoping. Areas of fire were articulated to bury Fox's foot within the fire. Like the previous two shots, the background plate was skip printed to give the fire trails more energy and speed.

"What did I tell you?!?"

"Eighty eight miles per hour!!" This shot is entirely in-camera. The fire trails are a practical effect, just like all of the previous shots. In the sequence, the trails have been fully formed, and are no longer being generated; as a result, there was no need to skip print the trails for this shot.

In a future post, I hope to dissect the shots more thoroughly from a subjective point of view, and expand upon ideas Mark, Mike and I discussed on the podcast.

"Back To The Future" and The VFX Show

Recently, I had the pleasure of discussing the visual effects of the Robert Zemeckis classic, “Back to the Future” on The VFX Show podcast. Mike Seymour and Mark Christiansen and I spent nearly an hour discussing and dissecting not only the film itself, but the impressive visual effects, special effects and makeup work on the film.

The VFX Show - Mike Seymour, Todd Vaziri & Mark Christiansen
revisit “Back To The Future"
show #105, July 20, 2010
Tunes link \ The VFX Show on FXGuide \ Overcast link

“Back to the Future” was an extremely influential movie for me. It’s the movie that inspired my passion of filmmaking, while the films of James Cameron opened my eyes to the possibilities and opportunities of visual effects. It was my privilege to appear on the show, and I want to thank Mike and Mark for inviting me.

I plan on posting some follow-up articles here on FXRant that expand upon some of the comments we made about the movie. [update: here are two additional posts!]

• "Back to the Future," Einstein Jump
• "Back to the Future" and Eric Stoltz