Back To The Future Test Footage Makes Hoverboarding Look Like A Blast
This article is more than 2 years old
Even 22 years after their first appearance in Back to the Future II, hoverboards remain one of the most iconic film gadgets of all time. And sadly, even though we’re only three years away from the future Marty traveled to, we still don’t have real, functional hoverboards available on toy store shelves. So while we won’t be skimming around on them anytime soon, we can take a look back and marvel at just how well the hoverboarding footage holds up all these years later. Check out this early test footage from the production of Back to the Future II.
It’s no surprise that the hoverboarders were being dangled from cranes, but even knowing that, and even being able to see the cables in this footage, it’s still amazing to see how well the hoverboards sequences worked. You can see in this clip that it takes a little getting used to, learning how to balance your body and so on. In this day and age when damn near everything is done using CGI, it’s great to watch how a simple bit of Hollywood sleight-of-hand was able to produce effects that still hold up two decades later.
