I am both a diehard cinephile and a lifelong practitioner of tsundoku. It is therefore no surprise that my bookshelves hold quite a number of books on the subject of film. More specifically, I have many books devoted to the making of one film or another. We Don’t Need Roads: The Making of the Back to the Future Trilogy, by Caseen Gaines, is one of those long neglected titles.
Or it was.
After buying it all the way back in 2015, I left it to languish in my office. My eyes have lingered on its spine many, many times over the ensuing eight years, but I’ve only just finished reading it. I’m very glad I did.
That it took me this long is embarrassing enough. I am a massive fan of these films. The book is a mere 268 pages, or 250 if you omit the acknowledgement, sourcing notes, and index. To be honest, I was always a bit suspicious of its slender size.
A Niche Sub-Genre
Books on the making of specific films is a bit of a niche sub-genre. I have a certain affinity for them, but I’ve come to appreciate their trademarks. As often as not, these books appeal almost exclusively to super fans.
That is the inevitable outcome of trying to squeeze even a couple hundred pages from the backstory of a single film. Most people just aren’t prepared to spend several days exploring every nook and cranny of a film’s production. They probably shouldn’t be.
The brutal truth is, even when a film is a hell of a lot of fun to watch, their productions are usually not that interesting.
So authors blend anecdotes from on set with detours into pre-production sketches or costume designs. Sometimes, they mine early versions of the scripts. What changed by the final cut? If you really loved the film, it can be wonderful. It’s just as often a slog.
The Longest of the Best
The books that stand out in this little sub-genre have fully embraced their inherent nerdiness. As a result, they’re typically pretty damned long. Also as a result, they tend to appeal to only the most committed devotees of a particular film.
Take Space Odyssey: Stanley Kubrick, Arthur C. Clarke, and the Making of a Masterpiece for example. It is a tour de force of making-of literature. Michael Benson crafts a genuinely compelling narrative with fully drawn characters. Kubrick and Clarke feel like the real humans they were. Benson also logs a page count north of 500.
J.W. Rinzler’s three-part series on the original Star Wars films is a beloved part of my library. In addition to being the size of large coffee table books, they collectively span slightly more than 1,100 pages. Production sketches, photographs, and script excerpts sprawl across almost every one of those pages.
We Don’t Need Michael J. Fox
Which brings me back to the only real disappointment I had with We Don’t Need Roads: It isn’t long enough. I could tell from it’s small footprint on my bookshelf. My eyebrow cocked even further by just the third paragraph of the introduction.
“I got a hold of [director Robert] Zemeckis’s assistant, who promptly scheduled a half-hour interview for us,” writes Gaines. Thirty minutes!?
Look, I’ve done interviews before. You can do a lot with just a little time if you’re prepared. This, however, is supposed to be the definitive history of not one, not two, but three feature-length movies. All you had with the director of those films was half an hour?
It is more, apparently, than the author got from Michael J. Fox. As far as I can tell, after reading the book and double-checking the sourcing notes, Gaines never got the chance to interview the films’ lead star.
There are allusions in the acknowledgements that gave me pause, as well. Gaines uses phrases like “our condensed schedule” and “written as quickly as it had to be.” There was clearly a deadline tied to the first film’s 30th anniversary.
Does We Don’t Need Roads suffer from being, perhaps, a bit rushed? Perhaps it does, a bit. The final chapter, exploring the legacy of the trilogy feels a bit too light. But where it suffers, it doesn’t suffer much.
A Love Letter to Filmmaking
That is because, for most of the book, Gaines is doing much more than retelling old war stories about rushed editing on the first two films, or actor Crispin Glover’s contract negotiations, or the recasting of a major actor a month into shooting. Those are all there, of course.
But what really elevates We Don’t Need Roads is how lovingly it explores the multiple facets of these films’ production. Of any film’s production, really. I emphasize lovingly.
It’s clear that Gaines genuinely loves the artistry and craft of every contributor to these films. He gives plenty of people whose names you probably don’t recognize a chance to talk about their work.
In the introduction, after recounting his brief (though, it turns out, substantive) interview with Zemeckis, Gaines writes this:
“I began to realize that this project isn’t simply about the making of one film trilogy, but is also about how some of the titans in the movie industry came into being. Even readers who are only casual fans of the films will find interesting pieces of information about the movie business, from the perspective of some of Hollywood’s best.”
That’s a promise he pays off over and over again. For all the brevity of his time with Zemeckis, he appears to have had considerable access to the director’s partner and franchise co-creator Bob Gale. The book spends a great deal of time on the duo’s path breaking into Hollywood. Their screenwriting process also gets more attention than you’d probably expect.
For film lovers, especially those who dream of working on movie sets every day, it’s a delight. Gaines doesn’t stop with the screenwriting either. The films’ editors get spotlighted, not just to talk about the unique challenges on these films, but the whole craft of film editing writ large. The same is true for the stunt crews, the visual and special effects artists, the actors, and on and on.
A Book for Film Lovers
Ultimately, what you’re left with is a pretty good survey of all three Back to the Future productions. More than that, this book is a wonderful exaltation of the hard work and collaboration that goes into every film. That is what makes this book a must-read.
It’s true, Doc Brown and Marty McFly “don’t need roads.” I think it’s also true that we need more books like We Don’t Need Roads. Filmmaking, perhaps more than any other art form, is anchored in the craft of dozens of skilled, passionate artisans. Not enough books on the subject convey that. Fewer still make you feel it.
Caseen Gaines may not have gotten all the interviews I wish he had, or had as much time as I’m sure he wished he had. But I’ll be damned if he didn’t make me feel the filmmaking that went into this classic trilogy. For that, I salute him.
P.S. Thanks to my friend, Matt Goldberg, who proclaimed in his excellent newsletter that he was about to read this book. It turns out, all I needed was someone to discuss the book with.