Left to right: Louis Krubich, Jason Aron, Lee Leshen.
Left to right: Louis Krubich, Jason Aron, Lee Leshen.

By: Nick Eskey

“Back to the Future” has been marked in movie history as one of the greatest. Try to look at a DeLorean and not wonder if there’s a flux capacitor in the back, or whether something weird happens when it hits 88mph. Still to this day, shows and other film make tribute references to the movie.

This year will mark the 30th anniversary of the film, just in time for a documentary on it. It is being made and produced by Louis Krubich, Jason Aron, and Lee Leshen.

The three didn’t set out to do a documentary because of the anniversary though. Jason admits the idea came to him from a Bar Mitzvah. “[The client] wanted the video to be that he was going back in time to see his dad, and his dad’s dad,” said Jason. “We rented a DeLorean for it. There was no flux capacitor or anything, but it was still very cool…”

The car got his brain going, thinking that a documentary on Back to the Future would be awesome. But he kept his hopes low, thinking that after all this time someone must have had done one already, breaking to bits his awesome idea. “I looked all over the internet, and surprisingly there wasn’t one.”

During his internet searches for some sort of documentary, Jason came across a few very comprehensive websites. One of which was 88mphtimemachine.com, a father and son who lived and ran the site from Massachusetts, displaying their collection of Back to the Future cars, including Marty McFly’s actual pickup truck, and a DeLorean holding the record for the most paid for ($540,000). Jason and Louis contacted the two men to interview them. They accepted, and Jason and Louis soon had enough material for their Kickstarter.

While the campaign was active, Louis said he was contacted by someone going by Adam Goldberg, who was interested in co-producing the documentary.

“He said that he had a pilot called ‘The Goldbergs’ that was getting picked up,” said Louis. “And in my head I was like ‘Yeah, and I’ve had eleven of those myself… I thought it was just one of those Kickstarter hoaxes I’d heard about.”

But he was the real deal, and Adam Goldberg joined the project. By the end of the Kickstarter campaign’s first 60 day run, it had funded $45,000, beginning the documentaries two year production. It was after the Kickstarter ended though that Lee saw the page. He contacted Jason and Louis, saying he really wanted to help with the project.
From there, the team went across the country. Fans volunteered their time for the documentary, and eventually cast and crew followed, giving the filmmakers what they felt was some legitimacy.

First they traveled to Las Vegas for a DeLorean show, then heading to Los Angeles where they shot a couple of the cast on the set of “The Goldbergs” on the the Sony lot. From there, they went to Santa Monica, London, back to Hubbardston, Massachusetts, Santa Barbara, San Francisco, New York City, Las Angeles again, Lake Placid, New York City again, and finally again in Los Angeles. Some of the cast and crew they interviewed along the way were Lea Thompson, James Tolkan, Alan Silvestri, Bob Gale, and Michael J. Fox.

When it came time to begin editing the footage, the team realized the $45,000 was about all spent. “So we had to have a second Kickstarter,” said Jason. “But we wanted to show everyone what we had… I was looking to score the video, and Adam Goldberg said he knew someone who he’d used a number of times… He insisted I used him. Well, we really couldn’t afford him. But the money went to the scoring and editing the video for the second Kickstarter.”

This time, the documentary was shooting for $150,000. Lee explained that they needed to finish, edit, create an original score, at sound, and wanted the film to be in six languages. At the time of this writing, it has raised $129,000 of it. There’s in fact still more time to pledge to it.

The team promises that the film will be done in time for the 30th anniversary. When it does come out, you can bet that it’s going to be a wealth of Back to the Future nostalgia and fandom. If you wish to check out the project, and perhaps help it out, their website is backintimefilm.com.

2 COMMENTS

  1. As fond as I am of BTTF, what is there really to say about it that would sustain a feature documentary? Good flick. Everybody liked it. Spielberg. “We all had so much fun on set.” Weak sequels. Blah, blah, blah.

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