Avis Metacritic

It twists it, shakes it and stands it on its ear. But as before, the film's technical brilliance is the least of its appeals. Satirically acute, intricately structured and deftly paced, it is at heart stout, good and untainted by easy sentiment.

All in all, Future II is another fantastic voyage in a thoroughly entertaining contraption.

Back to the Future deserved a chance to come back, especially under the cheerful, enterprising, mathematically minded stewardship of Mr. Zemeckis and Mr. Gale. Their new film isn't an ordinary sequel. It's as if the earlier film had been squared.

I should have brought a big yellow legal pad to the screening, so I could take detailed notes just to keep the time-lines straight. And yet the movie is fun, mostly because it's so screwy.

If "Back to the Future" made you bored and querulous, then the tumbling inventiveness in its sequel may come as a pleasant surprise. Of course, if you were among the 92% of the world who loved the ride in Dr. Emmett Brown's diabolical DeLorean back in 1985, then Part II is your oyster. [22 Nov 1989, p.F1]

Directed and played with terrific verve, this moves so fast from one special effects set-piece to the next that there's no time at all to reflect on the basic ridiculousness of its Chinese box of a plot.

A movie that must spend most of its running time explaining its hopelessly complicated premises, which leaves very little room for anything much to happen. [22 Nov 1989, p.C1]

Some of the best bits of the original movie are replayed here but lose their punch the second time around - the horse manure bit, the skate board sequence. Maybe people who never saw the first movie will get a big kick out of them. [22 Nov 1989, p.E1]

The energy and heart which Robert Zemeckis and story-writing partner Bob Gale (who takes solo screenplay credit this time) poured into the ingenious story of part one is diverted into narrative mechanics and camera wizardry in Future II.

Given Part II's quality, the final sequence, a series of clips from next summer's Part III, may be a major miscalculation. "To be concluded," reads the final title. Sounds more like a threat than a promise. [22 Nov 1989, p.C9]