Skateboards, manure, and heart: The Back to the Future cast on why their movie stands the test of time

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I want you all to try a little experiment.

Mention the Back to the Future trilogy in a random conversation and see how people react. It’s no secret that the franchise is beloved, but there’s a special emotional resonance people have when they discuss the film. People don’t talk about Back to the Future the way they discuss other films.

Watch your friends as they talk about the movie. When people discuss the film, it’s almost like they’re talking about their favorite childhood playground or a beloved family member. Back to the Future is special in a way other films aren’t.

Why is that? Speaking to a crowd at Fan Expo New Orleans 2025, the cast discussed why the movie has stood the test of time (no pun intended). “It has something that a lot of movies don’t have, which is an unbelievably great heart. It has friendship, and family, and love between parents and their son,” Tom Wilson said.

“It has all of those things. What if you met your mom and dad when you were a kid and they were your age. What were they like? Would you be friends with? I think those are all sweet things. The things that connect people to their own lives, that really make Back to the Future a great movie, but a loved and remembered movie,” Wilson added.

“There’s fun, there’s skateboards, and there’s manure,” Lea Thompson said. “Then there’s this really intense thing that if you just do the right thing at the right moment you can change your whole life. If you have courage, you could change not only your life, but your family’s life.”

For Christopher Lloyd, the answer was simple. “It’s all about time travel. Everybody at some time in their lives, whether they’re a child or elderly, everyone at one time or another has thought, if I could go back in time, guess where I would go.”

“It’s a great idea to begin with,” Huey Lewis said. “It was brilliantly written. It was brilliantly directed. It’s brilliantly cast and acted. The production is brilliant. The special effects are brilliant. It’s really all of those things. And how much from Bob Zemeckis on down, how much everybody worried about those tiny little details, and that’s why it’s a great film, because it’s absolutely brilliantly produced.”

“And the song is pretty good too,” Lewis added.

As a wise man once said, that’s the power of love.

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