Great Character: Dr. Emmett Brown (“Back to the Future” Trilogy)

This month’s theme: Sidekick. Today: Guest poster Jason Cuthbert looks at Dr. Emmett Brown, the crazed professor from the Back to the Future trilogy.

The combination of the “Steven Spielberg Presents” co-sign, two recognizable TV actors: Michael J Fox (Family Ties) and Christopher Lloyd (Taxi), a time-traveling DeLorean sports car and an Academy Award-nominated screenplay by its director Robert Zemeckis (Who Framed Roger Rabbit) and Bob Gale (Used Cars) helped make Back to the Future the biggest blockbuster box office success of 1985, with an unprecedented 37 straight weeks in American movie theaters.

If that wasn’t enough, Back to the Future 2 went 30 years into the future in 1989 and then further back in time to the Old West in 1990 with Back to the Future 3. Michael J Fox’s Marty McFly character made the most of this merger of the Coming-Of-Age comedies and Science Fiction genres that both thrived in the 1980s. But this Calendar Hopper would have never left 1985 without the hilarious help of Marty’s brainy and zany sidekick, Dr. Emmett Brown (Christopher Lloyd).

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AmIRh4DoUYo

Back to the Future from IMDB:

A teenager is accidentally sent 30 years into the past in a time-traveling DeLorean invented by his friend, Dr. Emmett Brown, and must make sure his high-school-age parents unite in order to save his own existence.

Even though we don’t get a good glimpse at the manic movement of Dr. Emmett Brown until a little over 19 minutes into this sci-fi comedy classic, we learn quite a bit about him before he appears. The Back to the Future opening title sequence glides past the plethora of Doc Brown’s clocks, portraits of inventors like Benjamin Franklin and Albert Einstein and homemade mechanical gadgets scattered around his private warehouse.

Marty McFly is able to enter this half lab/half frat house domain unsupervised, suggesting the mentoring bond that exists between the two is strong. McFly’s principal also takes it upon himself to smear Dr. Browns name and associate it with danger and lunacy. But by the time Dr. Emmett Brown makes his frenzied exit out of his Time-Mobile and anxious entrance into the plot, this scientist reinvents every scene, with the camera becoming a microscope firmly focused on his every action and utterance.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pLRk4xG-JCI

The Albert Einstein references go beyond the man’s likeness framed on Dr. Brown’s wall. The name of the good doctor’s dog bares the name Einstein, and also Dr. Brown’s wild mad scientist Einstein-esque white hair pays homage to the world-famous inventor as well. Brown’s almost absent-minded behavior suggests that he is more focused on his theories than keeping up with current event unfolding in front of him.

DR. EMMETT BROWN: If my calculations are correct, when this baby hits 88 miles per hour… you’re gonna see some serious shit.

What makes this jovial gentleman so effortlessly entertaining is that he lives purely in his own head, reacting to his own ideas, unbothered by how his actions may be viewed in the eyes of strangers. Whether he is wearing a mind-reader machine that makes his head look like it’s riding a carousal, or he has turned a rare, highly coveted sports car into a vigorous vessel for the Space-Time Continuum, Doc Brown answers only to his own imagination.

DR. EMMETT BROWN: The way I see it, if you’re gonna build a time machine into a car, why not do it with some style?

Unlike Marty’s character, who is the exact same age in every scene, we get the opportunity to experience Dr. Emmett Brown at different ages, pre-time machine and post-time machine.

DR. EMMETT BROWN: [holding Marty’s video camera] No wonder your president has to be an actor. He’s gotta look good on television.

His discoveries of what have come back from the future with Marty both startle him and intrigue him, adding fuel to his hyperactive boisterousness. He claims adamantly that he doesn’t want to know what happens to him in the future, for fear of ruining the timeline. Yet he peeks at the video of the night that Marty traveled in time from that 1985 mall parking lot. Curiosity and responsibility tug Brown in opposite directions.

MARTY MCFLY: Whoa. This is heavy.
DR. EMMETT BROWN: There’s that word again. “Heavy.” Why are things so heavy in the future? Is there a problem with the Earth’s gravitational pull?

That over-caffeinated social awkwardness that Christopher Lloyd imprints into his performance accurately captures an isolated guy who clearly has more of a relationship with his machines than other flesh and blood beings. The fact that McFly appears to be the only person who respects Dr. Brown’s work and isn’t in the least bit judgmental towards him makes their connection that much more believable. With Marty, Brown gets to be a teacher, a father figure, a friend and an influence. And in return, he freely allows Marty access into the ride of a lifetime.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=f-77xulkB_U

For his modern reworking of the Mad Genius character type, his witty, highly turned up demeanor and his desire to discover without recklessly ruining the world in the process — Dr. Emmett Brown is an unforgettably GREAT CHARACTER in the history of cinema.

This is how important Back to the Future is in my life: I saw it for the first time on my honeymoon. That’s right, my wife — God bless her soul — accompanied me to the Arlington Theater in Santa Barbara to see Marty McFly, Emmett Brown and the rest of the film’s memorable characters in our sojourn north to Big Sur after our wedding. Hey, I’m a movie guy!

In terms of Dr. Emmett Brown, while it would seem natural to slot him in as a Mentor figure, I think it’s more apt to look at the character as a Trickster. He gets Marty into trouble, creating a pattern of tests which precipitate the teen’s transformation. So an ally in some ways, but also an ‘enemy’ in the way he goes about enlisting Marty in his cockeyed schemes.

Thank you, Jason, for this post. Please join us in Comments to discuss Dr. Emmett Brown in the movie Back to the Future.

You may follow Jason on Twitter: @A2Jason.

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